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The Cartomancer's Last Hand

fantasy◐ Teen
5 contributors · 4 paragraphs deep

Mireille loses the first hand on purpose, watching the Queen's face. A year drains out of her, and her knees ache like an old woman's. But now she sees it: when the Queen wins, she leans left, guarding one sleeve. There's a card hidden there.

Mireille reaches across and yanks the hidden card from the Queen's sleeve. 'Cheater,' she spits. The Queen lunges over the table, fingers like cold hooks, and they both go down into the fog and mud.

↔ version 2 of 2 of this paragraph — hover its sides to flip. The card below is what happens next.

What happens next?

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A possible continuation

In the mud, Mireille presses the stolen card face-down into the river. 'Back you go,' she gasps. The Queen is dragged downward, screaming, painted thin again. The card floats up, calm and flat. Mireille pockets it and burns it at home.

BD
Bram de Vries
4 votes · future 1 of 1