Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 112 (September 2019) by John Joseph Adams

Author:John Joseph Adams [John Joseph Adams]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: John Joseph Adams
Published: 2019-08-30T22:08:54+00:00

All In

Rajan Khanna | 9976 words

Quentin Ketterly could tell that the cards weren’t special when the fortune teller held out the deck to him. Real Cards, like those he carried in the case around his neck, didn’t show wear like Madame Serena’s did. And when he touched the deck, as she instructed him to, they were warm with the midday heat of the tent, not cold to the touch like the Cards always seemed to be. He didn’t know why—neither he nor Hiram knew much about the Cards at all, save for how to use them some.

He shook his head as Madame Serena lay down the cards, nine of them, in three rows of three.

“Why nine?” Hiram asked from his seat beside Quentin.

“Left to right—beginning, middle and end. Top to bottom—past, present, and future. Nine cards tell the story of a life.”

Quentin shook his head again. He considered walking out, but he’d paid for the telling and didn’t want to be rude. She laid out his past: the Five of Diamonds, Ace of Spades, and Jack of Clubs. She waved her hand over the cards. “A seed, from a strong tree, swallowed by a carrion bird as the tree falls. It survives fire and storms, to take root in a new forest, with another sapling at its side.”

It was a fair summation of his past, Quentin thought. His happy family fractured by his father’s death at his uncle’s hands, his revenge on his uncle, and his mentoring of the young man at his side. But the first part could apply to many people, and the last part could be inferred since he and Hiram had arrived together.

Madam Serena flipped over three more cards, laying them below the first three: a Joker, Four of Hearts, Two of Clubs. “A ship on a grand voyage, seeking to map the unmapped, but the wind has dropped from your sails.”

Again, it could be seen as true. Their search, months spent tracking down names from another Card Sharp’s book, had been fruitless. When they did find someone who knew one of the names, the person had always moved on, or died. Madame Serena, near the last location they had looked, was their last lead.

“Now your future.” She put down the last three cards in the bottom row: Jack of Diamonds, Eight of Spades, Nine of Spades. She looked up furtively at Quentin, then Hiram, then back down at the cards. “The arrow you loosed will come back to strike you. The tree you helped nurture will bear poisoned fruit.”

Quentin frowned. He wasn’t sure what it meant, but it didn’t sound good.

“Of course these things can be changed,” Madame Serena said. “The future is a galloping stallion, but it can be steered.”

Quentin was taking this all in when a man entered the tent, disheveled and stinking of liquor. He held a revolver, pointed at Madame Serena. Quentin’s hand went to his Cards.

“What do you want?” Serena asked, her eyes wide, hands shaking.

“It’s all your fault,” the man said, spitting, his voice thick.

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