Episode 15 - Cards

## Cards

A white drawing on a black background of a hand with long pointed nails holding 7 white cards in a fan. On top of these is a red card with a pine tree on it, named "ace of pines". There is another white card just visible inside the hand's sleeve. The image has a white border, each corner has one of the traditional card suits.

### Author

William A. Wellman

Ricou plays a dangerous game, Olivier chooses their fate, and Hector walks back from the edge. The theme of tonight’s episode is Cards.

***Content Warnings:**Static, death + injury, blood, gambling, alcohol use, abuse, birds, kidnapping + abduction, suicide, emotional manipulation*

## Intro - Ace of Pines

Nikignik tells the story of the listener choosing from three piles of cards: a large one, a small one and a crooked one. You choose the crooked pile and pull three cards. Your past is the six of shadows, which tells you that you've been running from something. Your present is the eight of masks, which tells you that you're still hiding parts of yourself. Your future is the ace of pines, an all-consuming, inevitable welcome to the Hallowoods.

Nikignik is speaking from a hotel bar. The bar is the last refuge from the world outside, with real bourbon, but the inhabitants show signs of the world outside. A green man at the card table prepares to play for his life.

## Story One - The Devil's Game

Ricou sits at the card table opposite Barb. The other players seem confused as to why he's there, but Barb greets him warmly and asks what's caused him to leave his bog. Ricou tries to keep his face emotionless and says he's here to play cards.

Barb says he's surprised Ricou hasn't learned his lesson, since his thirteen years of service are almost through. Barb is happy to gamble with him though, especially when presented with Ricou's trinkets and treasures.

Grug, a froglin who doesn't seem to grasp the idea of a poker face, is the first to lose the game. Mx. Morell, the proprietor for the Museum of Broken Promises, is the next to go, after they fail to handle their drink. The remaining players are the true threats, Ricou knows, and he won't make the mistake of playing by the rules again as he did in the past.

The Quilt is the next player ejected. The mass of mummified skin and ribbons is usually a formidable player, but Barb seems determined to get it out of the game. The Countess eyes Ricou suspiciously, but bows out as Barb raises the stakes even higher. Finally it comes down to Ricou and Barb. Ricou decides to try one final bet: if he wins, his debt is paid in full. If he loses, his contract with Barb goes on for life. Barb gleefully accepts these terms and Ricou is worried for a moment that Barb can see everything that he can, and that any moment everything will come crashing down.

The next round is even harder than the previous, but Ricou manages. Barb seems to get more agitated as the game goes on, allowing Ricou to make his moves immediately. Suddenly, a patron crashes into a waiter carrying drinks and glass crashes everywhere. Barb glances at the disturbance for a moment and Ricou feels a card tucked into his palm.

Barb seems to realize that something has happened and looks around as if he's dropped something. His agitation grows. Barb lays a straight flush on the table, relishing his victory until he sees Ricou's five of a kind. After a moment's hesitation, Barb summons Ricou's contract and burns it to ash. Ricou leaves the table and the winnings, not stopping until he's well outside of the hotel. Once far enough away, he and Nolan hug.

### Interlude One - Night Life

Nikignik speaks of the variety of nightlife in the Hallowoods. Most of it wants to kill you, but some of it is worth exploring. You can easily enter the Resting Place Hotel, but might not leave with your sanity intact. You probably won't be invited the the Pendulum or the secret bar beneath the Spirit Sky Observatory, but even if you did you'd have terrible nightmares afterwards. There is also a bar tucked away in the labyrinth of the Downing Hill Public Library.

## Story Two - Choose A Card

Olivier spent most of the morning putting herself back together with magic. Her bloodstained cloak and bruised face don't worry her, though. Her record, now with the failure of capturing Riot on it, does. She has never failed before.

She sits in a room with the Omen, a creature made of a mass of ravens and Olivier's rival for the director's attention. Olivier thinks the Omen is enjoying watching her squirm. It was already celebrating victory. The space around Olivier changes and suddenly she is no longer in a sitting room, but the office of the director.

The director asks what Olivier is today, and Olivier replies, "she". The director asks if Olivier failed in her task, leaving the Instrumentalist's mission incomplete. Although she tries to explain herself, Olivier admits that she did not complete the task. The director presses on, asking why there is now a girl who claims that Olivier gave her a library card. Olivier says that she thought the girl's talent might be useful to the director, and the director says that she hopes the girl will be more useful than Olivier. Not only did Olivier fail, but they gave a library card to a nobody. There is a weakness in her, the director says, and if her record hadn't been so good she would have been fed to the books already. Instead, the director will let Olivier choose her fate.

The director pulls out three cards, face down, and asks Olivier to choose: life, death, or the void. Olivier chooses the card on the left.

### Marketing - Business Training

Lady Ethel Mallory gives a training program about the importance of first impressions. It's best for the people taking the program to appear healthy, wealthy, and better than everyone around them. She announces that only six trainees will remain by the end of the program.

### Story Two, Continued - Choose A Card

Nikignik says that they have never changed their appearance for business, but admits that they have been doing their job for a very long time. Being yourself will get you to the place in the universe you are meant to be.

After choosing her card, Olivier is suddenly out of her own body and watches as Clara meets with the director. She apologizes for Dogsmell, who doesn't seem to like the director very much. The director acknowledges that Clara doesn't really know what's going on, but they'll all know the next step if she picks a card. She summons three cards, face down, in front of Clara. One, the Director explains, is very good, one is very bad, and one is unspeakable. Olivier, in her out of body experience, begs Clara to choose the left card. Clara chooses the center card, unable to hear Olivier.

Clara flips over her card and it says "life". She has been accepted as a student at the Downing Hill Public Library. Olivier realizes that her own card is in her hand and she quickly flips it over. It reads "The Void." The Omen cackles behind her and says that Olivier will be returned to the Instrumentalist, who will be allowed to exact whatever punishment he deems fit. She is expelled from the Arcane Program and banned from the Downing Hill Public Library.

### Interlude Two - Shreds of Photographs

Nikignik discusses the questions they've been getting from dreamers, asking if they know the endings to the stories they're telling or if they can see the future. While they are in many places at once, they are not omniscient. They don't know what will happen in these stories. They are simply the reporter of these horrible things.

## Story Three - Ignore The Stars

Hector has faced down death many times before, but only now, looking at the Faceless King, does he falter. Its hands are still dripping with Jonah's blood and he canhear hands closer to the Faceless King still cracking his bones into ever smaller pieces. The Faceless King, however, doesn't move any closer. Hector realizes that Heidi, his Hallowed dog, is between him and the creature. She growls, and the Faceless King backs away and emits a painfully loud shriek. Hector covers his ears and falls to his knees. Heidi howls at the creature and it retreats back between the pines.

Hector and his dogs begin to leave the clearing, but not before Hector takes one last forlorn look at the puddle of blood where Jonah had been standing. Suddenly, he doesn't want to walk anymore. What's the point? He was sick of trying to beat the odds and losing. The odds of meeting someone like Jonah had been so low, and the odds of losing a loved one in these woods were so high.

Hector can't bring himself to go any further, so he slumps against a tree in the hopes it could shield him from the Faceless King if it was to return. He stares at the stars in the sky and thinks that if he died right then and there, no one would miss him. His trance is broken by his dogs, who he realizes need him. He will get out of these woods for them.

To calm himself down, he begins to take inventory of his pack. At the very bottom he finds the copper library card that he recovered from a body before finding Jonah. As he stares at it, the words change. It tells him to ignore the stars and to walk straight for two miles. With nothing else left to try, Hector decides to follow the card's instructions.

## Outro - Homes

Nikignik closes the broadcast by speaking once more about cards, a fascinating aspect of human culture. They think humans must like the symbolism of a card game, with random aspects of chance and luck that mirror life. Perhaps it comforts us to hold a little bit of that fate in our own hands, and it may distract us from the darkness looming outside our small sphere of existence.