by Laura Powell
“So how did you know I was one of these chancer types and not a knight?”
“I arrived at Temple House just behind you. I saw you hand over your invite—the Fool—but lost you after I entered the party. As you probably found, that place is weirdly disorienting. Maybe it’s a side effect of being on two sides of the threshold at once.”
“You seem to be quite the expert.”
“But I’m not,” he said earnestly. “I’m an amateur, really, trying to pick up stuff here and there. That’s why it’s so great I met you. Chancers are rare, but now the two of us have teamed up—”
She laughed sourly. “If you think I’m getting any more involved, then you’re even crazier than those royals of yours.”
“What?” Toby was incredulous. “Look, I realize you’re probably still in shock and everything, but you need to give the Game a chance.”
Cat got to her feet. “There doesn’t seem any point if I can’t win a prize.”
“But you can still experience the Arcanum! The prizes are only part of what it has to offer.”
“Magic? Mystery? Adventure?”
“Absolutely.” Toby didn’t seem to notice the sarcasm in her voice. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes bright. “Chancers don’t have to work through the cards’ obstacles like knights do, or serve the courts like the knaves. We’re free agents.”
“In that case, I’m free to walk away. None of this has anything to do with me; it was a mistake from the start.”
For once, Toby didn’t shuffle or fidget, but stared back at her levelly. “That’s a load of crap and you know it.” She opened her mouth to protest but Toby swept on. “You might’ve been drawn in by accident, but you still chose to get involved. You followed the Knight of Wands. You went to the Lottery. You asked your questions. When you left me at Dark Portal, you went straight to Temple House. So you’re obviously not as detached from things as you pretend to be.”
“Yeah, well, if I’d known what I was getting into, I would’ve detached myself a hell of a lot earlier.”
“Would you? Can you look me in the eye and tell me that this isn’t the most amazing thing that has ever happened to you—will ever happen to you in your entire life?”
“That’s not the point,” she said, but her voice was uncertain.
Toby’s face was alight with missionary zeal. “Come with me into the Arcanum. Just one visit to one move. We’ll get ready for it together, go in side by side. After that, if you still don’t want to be involved, I’ll leave you alone. I swear.”
There was a long pause. “I’ll think about it,” said Cat, and then she left him.
IT WAS STILL EARLY in the afternoon when Cat got back to the flat, and she was sure she was too wired even to sit down. But the moment she closed the door of her cupboard-sized room, she sank onto her bed and into a dreamless sleep. When she woke up, groggy and disoriented, it was to find she’d been out for nearly six hours.
By the sound of it, the Saturday-night revelries were already well under way: music throbbed, engines revved, catcalls and laughter floated up from the street below. For a moment, she lay there drowsily, and it was as if she was still the old Cat, the Cat from before. The feeling only lasted for a few seconds, though. Knowledge came jolting back and she sat up, breathless.
“Well then,” she found herself saying out loud, “I guess it’s time I made a move.”
She didn’t quite know how she’d reached this decision, but it came as a relief. The Wondrous World of Tarot, Toby’s present, was poking out from under her bed, and she gave it a contemptuous kick. To hell with Toby—she didn’t want a chaperone. She was the Cat who walked by herself. Once I find a threshold, I’ll keep it quick, she promised herself. In and out. New energy surged through her and she found she was humming a recent chart hit in the bathroom, then grinning to herself as she rummaged through the fridge. What did she need to take with her? The usual collection of wallet, keys, phone? God, the whole thing was crazy.… “Crazy, crazy, crazy,” she chanted to herself as she clattered out of the flat and into the street.
After half an hour of wandering around, however, her newfound recklessness began to desert her. She kept checking her palm but the skin was unmarked. She felt cheated. Toby had said that thresholds popped up anywhere and everywhere, but what if there wasn’t one in this part of the city at all? The obvious thing to do would be to try Temple House again, but the memory of the ring of fire filled her with dread.
Then, finally, she felt it. A pins-and-needles sensation in her palm as she approached Seven Dials, a small junction between Covent Garden and Soho. The streets running off it were busy and brightly lit, and the column in the center of the crossroads served as a gathering point for people swigging from cans and chatting on phones. She walked up to the pillar, heart thumping. It was in fact a sundial about fifteen feet high, on a circular base with shallow steps. Just above the base she saw that the mark of the wheel, three inches or so in diameter, had been carved into the stone pedestal. Now what? Toby had said a coin would just “appear,” but the only money she could find was a penny lying beside a discarded cinema ticket. Feeling slightly foolish, she gave it a flip, and didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed when nothing happened.
Cat looked at the carving again. The closer she got to it, the more her palm tingled. Hesitantly, she reached out a finger and traced the lines of the wheel. Four spokes and a circle. As she closed the circle, she had to snatch her hand away, for the print of the wheel on her palm was now a burning silver scar. Instinctively, she straightened out her hand. And then, so quickly that she didn’t even have time to cry out, the circle on her flesh throbbed and solidified into a disc of metal.
It was blank-faced and heavy, made of some dully gleaming black metal. It looked just like the coin the doorkeeper had thrown to her on the night of the Lottery. The only marking on it was a little icon of a sword.
Cat knew that if she hesitated now, she would lose her nerve. And so, before she had time to think, she tossed the coin high into the air.
Though she’d thrown it clumsily, the coin landed in the center of her palm. The wheel there burned beneath it, flesh and metal merged into one, and the next second her hand was both empty and unmarked. She looked up and saw, with an incredulous jolt, that the world had changed.
It appeared to be dawn, for a primrose light was just breaking overhead. After the wintry night she’d come from, the air felt softer, fresh. It was eerily quiet—no traffic, no people, not even any birdsong.
Otherwise, her surroundings corresponded almost exactly to the ones she’d left behind. Even the shop fronts were alike, though their signs were unpainted and the windows bare or else boarded up. And yet … Her mother had had a kaleidoscope, like a little bronze telescope, which was now Cat’s. She had been fascinated by it as a kid, the way the shifting glass beads transformed into a myriad of different patterns as you turned the wheel. Looking at this other street, in this other city, was like giving the kaleidoscope the gentlest tap, the tiniest turn—the pattern of things was only slightly altered, yet completely different. Like the column: on her side, the stone was a light and rather grubby gray; here it was black marble and only had four dial faces at its top. But the carving of the wheel was the same, and when, with a trembling hand, she began to trace its lines, the burning in her hand told her the same dark coin was ready to appear and take her home.
Cat took her hand away before tracing the final curve of the circle. Then she clenched her jaw, lifted her chin and stepped down from the column into the cool summer’s morning of the Arcanum.
It was then that she realized she wasn’t alone, after all. A woman was standing under a lamppost about ten yards away, eating a chocolate bar and watching Cat through narrowed eyes. She had a shrewd, snub sort of face and was dressed like she was going to the gym. Now she tossed the chocolate wrapper to the ground and came over. “Who are you?” she challenged.
“I’m, uh …” How had Toby put it? �
��I’m a chancer.”
At this, the woman’s eyes widened, and she gave a bark of laughter. “Well now,” she said, “there’s a rarity.”
“Who are you, then?”
“Knight of Swords, of course. The mark on your coin could’ve told you that.”
So the coin didn’t just flip her over to the Arcanum; it also told her which of the four courts was in play there. “I see. So are you … do you, erm, have one of those cards?”
“How else would I have got here? It’s my card that has made this move. You’re just a bystander, so you’d better not interfere.”
Cat ignored her sneer. “What prize are you playing for?” she asked.
“The Triumph of the Emperor.”
“Oh. Er … does that mean you’ll get to be a sort of … king?”
“I’ll get to be the boss. Leadership—that’s my prize. Once I’ve won the Emperor, I won’t have to take crap from anyone ever again. There’ll be no more glass ceilings to smash or greasy poles to climb. I’ll finally be where I deserve to be: at the top.”
“But what about the risks?”
“Everything in life is a gamble,” the Knight of Swords retorted. “The business world’s no different from the Arcanum in that respect.” Then she seemed to soften a little. “Still, here I am in my fourth move. Lady Luck hasn’t deserted me yet.”
“And if you win your fourth card, you’ll get your triumph.”
The woman gave another short, hard laugh. “If only. No, you have to play a triumph card to get its power. The fifth and final card in my round will be the Emperor himself. As for this one …” She felt in her pocket. “Take a look.”
Cat backed away.
“There’s no need to be afraid. It’s not a bad card to be dealt. Six of Cups, the Reign of Past Pleasure.”
Cat looked at the card. It seemed to have a faint glow about it, or perhaps that was just the hazy morning sunshine that had begun to fill the street. The picture showed two children playing in the yard of a great house. They were smiling, surrounded by jeweled cups that spilled over with flowers. The walls of the house behind them were high and golden, the sky a radiant blue. As she gazed at the scene, memories of lost and half-forgotten happiness began to stir.
“Pretty, isn’t it?” said the knight. She had a faraway look in her eyes. “For there’s beauty in this Game, as well as bloodshed. Wonder and glory, too …” Then she gave herself a shake. “But I can’t stand around chatting. It’s time to face whatever challenge this move offers. Wish me luck, Chancer.”
She gave Cat a brisk nod, then walked down the street to a door that Cat hadn’t noticed before. It certainly wasn’t there on the home side: made from ancient blackened wood and set in a narrow strip of wall between two of the empty shop fronts. It looked as though it hadn’t been opened for years. But it swung open at the Knight of Swords’ touch and a moment later she was gone.
The place felt even more silent and deserted afterward. Cat looked back at the sundial, but it would be lame to go home now, before she’d really seen or done anything. Her anxieties had faded away; somehow, the mere sight of the card had left her with a sense of peace. And she now saw that there was another door just across the street from the one the knight had gone through. This one was ajar.
Its wood was warm to the touch, as if it had been baking in the sun for a long time. Behind it, she could hear children’s laughter, high and clear, and her throat ached with some nameless longing: The Reign of Past Pleasure … She pushed the door open and stepped through.
It was as if she’d walked into the card itself. She was standing on a smooth lawn enclosed by high, golden walls. Pale flowers bloomed everywhere, their scent so rich she could almost taste it. Facing her was the front of a great and ageless house built of honey-colored stone. Its windows glittered, but where the rest of the garden should have been reflected, there was only the blue dazzle of sky.
It was beautiful. The most beautiful place Cat had ever seen. But even so, she wasn’t able to concentrate on it properly. What she really wanted was waiting for her in the house, calling her name, and the farther she walked, the larger the yard seemed to grow. She knew that this didn’t make sense; that there was a city surrounding the garden walls, and another city somehow beyond that, but it didn’t matter. For the first time since the strangeness of the Game of Triumphs had begun, she felt that she really could be in a dream.
At last, she reached the paved walkway outside the building. There was a glass-fronted door ahead but, like the windows, the view it reflected was disorienting: fragments of brightness where her own image should have been. As she walked up to it, the sweetness of the flowers and the humming of the bees, the warm blue air and distant laughter, surged over and through her. And somehow the glass surged too, a liquid dazzle that drew her in.
Then, suddenly, she was home. Her first home, her real home, with her mum and dad. The little terrace house that had faded to the memory of a memory, except for a few snapshots and a fleeting reference or two of Bel’s. She was sitting at her mum’s feet in the living room, and there was a toy truck nearby, but it didn’t interest her much because she was busy peering at the carpet. It had very fascinating swirls of cream and brown. Like ice cream. She pushed her finger into the nap and then sucked its tip hopefully, just in case. Something tickled and it was her mother, bending to kiss her, her long hair swinging over Cat’s face, shiny and soft and smelling like apples.
“Where’s my Kitty-cat?” called a voice.
She stumbled to her unsteady toddler’s feet and ran to Daddy, who was standing at the door and swung her up and blew into her neck until she was breathless with squeals. And over his shoulder, she could see the hallway and the little strip of yard beyond, with her orange plastic slide and Mummy’s flowers. Only they weren’t there; there was just a muddle, shining, and so bright it hurt to look at. But it didn’t matter, nothing mattered, because she was safe at home with Mummy and Daddy like they always were and would always be, always, always, always.…
And then it was Christmas, Christmas with a real live tree all goldy-glittery with chocolate money, and a rainbow of greeting cards on every shelf. The money and the cards reminded her of something, but then Mummy came over with lots of boxes, and she forgot again, because the paper was slippery and rustling and she could stomp through it like puddles … and after that it was her birthday, and more boxes, with a fat pink cake and candles she wasn’t allowed to touch but were the prettiest things she’d ever seen, so Daddy lit them again, and blew them out, and lit them, and blew them out, again and again and again, just for her.
So many times … some of them flashing past quick as lightning, others languorously prolonged, but all of them, always, the best and most perfect.… Sometimes she was Kitty, tumbling about on the floor, and at others she was Cat, watching herself from a very great distance. Something about this bothered her, but only a little, like an itch she couldn’t reach. She knew that if she shut her mind to the itching it would go away, but this didn’t feel right, almost as if she needed the itch to be there.…
At last, there came an afternoon when she was playing in Mummy and Daddy’s room, making hidey-houses under the bed. But someone had been there before her, doing their own hiding: a card tucked into the frame, with a glittery picture on the front. Secret treasure!
There was something important about this treasure, something she wanted to remember, and so she took the card to the window, though the light was usually too bright and muddly to look at. But she did it anyway, and now she was looking through grown-up eyes, reading words that were funny scribbles to Kitty, but of terrible significance to Cat.
And afterward, when she looked through the window, the view showed somewhere different, somewhere wrong. Then the shining became so bright it hurt all over, and she dropped the card and squeezed her eyes shut and put her hands over her ears—but even that didn’t help because when she opened her eyes again, everything had changed.
At once
, she knew something terrible was going to happen, so terrible she couldn’t bear it. She tried to tell her mummy and daddy but they didn’t understand, they kept on tickling her with shiny-soft hair and swinging her over their shoulders and bringing her boxes and blowing out candles again and again and all the time she knew the terrible nameless thing was coming, just round the corner, and there was nothing she could do. Until there she was, Kitty, huddled on the stairs hours past bedtime, watching through a gap in the door as three people talked in the living room.
“This isn’t a game,” Mummy was saying, and her voice had a crack in it.
“It is the only Game,” replied a voice Kitty didn’t know. A murmuring voice, with a slight stammer. “And I intend to w-win it.”
“What do you mean by that?” her daddy asked.
“I mean that I’m going to t-take what’s due to me,” said the stranger. “Starting with the Arcanum’s card.”
Then Mummy and Daddy began speaking at once, high and quick.
“Please. There’s been some mistake,” Mummy was saying. “We can’t—” And Daddy began to shout, shouting at someone she couldn’t see, but there was a flash and two cracks and a burning smell, and Kitty crouched on the stairs and Cat floating at a great distance both screamed. Because hair had spilled across the carpet, the hair that smelled like apples and the carpet with the ice-cream swirls, both of which were now speckled with hot sharp red. And her screaming went on and on and into a terrible silence that became a surge of blackness and blindness and splintering glass.
The house reared up behind her, gray-faced, its windows gaping darkly. The paving stones were cracked, and greasy with rain. She began to sob. She was still sobbing as she lurched across the tangle of yellowing grass and briar that had once been a lawn, and shouldered her way through the shards of rotting wood that had once been a door. And she sobbed yet harder as she stumbled up to the sundial, traced the wheel and spun her cold hard coin up, over and away.