“Sent me here because I couldn’t turn a blind eye to the young doll he bought a house for and fathered a child with. Fancy a reading?” She put a worn-out tarot deck on the table.
I kept my face impassive, all my attention on the broth. Was this some trick by the nurses?
“Why would you do that? I have nothing to trade with,” I said, putting the spoon into the bowl and flushing the foul taste down with some water. It only made it worse.
She shrugged, setting the cards in even lines on the table.
“Let’s say I’d do it for free. We have to kill the time here somehow. Also, I’m dying to hear some news from the world beyond these walls.”
“Well, it’s not for free then.”
Someone behind me started screaming. I resisted the urge to press my hands to my ears.
Her dark eyes flashed with something wild, untamed.
“Nothing is free here, darling. How do you think I get decent food and clean clothes around here? And warm bath water, hmm?”
I leaned forward. “You’re reading for the nurses?” I whispered.
She nodded. “It’s their game, girl. Their rules. All we can do is adapt and take advantage.”
I tapped my fingers on the stained, sticky wood. So, they were not driven by pure malevolence. Perhaps I couldbargain with them. But what could I offer that might be of interest?
“Pick a card, darling,” the woman urged me.
“My name is—”
“Shhh. Names don’t matter here. Pick a card.”
Alice was watching us from the door. Maybe getting along with the nurses’ favorite could give me some privilege, too.
I shrugged and pulled a card.
A cloaked figure stood by a river, five chalices at their feet.
Looking over my shoulder, I handed it to the woman.
A movement caught the side of my eye.
A young man pushed himself up from the rough bench, tipping over his bowl. He started pacing behind us, wringing his hands. The skin on his temples was blackened and covered in blisters, oozing blood and some clear liquid.
My heart sank.
He looked so young despite his powerful frame, and there was no madness in his eyes—just raw pain and despair.
“The Five of Cups. Your past is full of loss and sadness. You lost someone dear to you—in a river? The grief still stains your heart, darling. Don’t let it eat you up,” she said, putting the card aside. How could she know this? Reminding myself that this was a game I played to get on the good side of the nurses, I looked around.
“Who is he?” I asked, following the frantic pacing of the young man with a tight chest. I was sure the nurses would punish him for that.
“Someone who stood up against his father and rejected an arranged marriage. His father sent him here to be ‘fixed’—as he prefers the company of gentlemen. You cannot help him, darling. Pick your next card.”
I stared at her, wondering if I’d become so calloused if I stayed here long enough.
When the next card was turned, I felt it before she even saw it.
A deep, twisting dread in my gut.
The Hanged Man dangled upside down, bound by one ankle, his arms limp at his sides. His face was serene, unbothered by his own entrapment as if he had accepted his suffering as something inevitable. Waiting. Enduring. Caught between past and future, neither alive nor dead.
