multiversallogs | I want my money back.

Entry tags:

I want my money back.

Who: OPEN
What: cheap Tarot card readings
Where: Aspic, on the edge of the bazaar
When: all day!
Notes: Balthazar's permissions, especially important if your character has any supernatural aspects
Warnings: Balthazar is a creep! But he is also pretending to be someone else so he may be less creepy. Who knows.

Divination is an industry in Baedal: seers and those with farsight are fairly commonplace, and if you're looking for reliable, there are better places to go than Aspic's bazaar.

But if you're looking for cheap, or just for entertainment, then this teeny booth is promising. Many of the props Balthazar is using are real; for example, the tent, table, the chair, the deck of Tarot cards, and the sign with the prices ("past/present/future - ₭2") are all real and exactly as they seem. But the person lounging behind the table is covered with illusions. On the outermost surface, which is a thin glamour, it's a young lady with long red hair and dark eyes. She's wearing a heavy, shapeless black dress made of wool with tights, an overcoat, and a bright yellow scarf.

Beneath that layer is a middle-aged woman with fading red hair and tired eyes, in the same clothing. It's a much stronger illusion, more realistic than the pretty top layer, and has its own scent of bitter tea and harsh soap.

Beneath that layer is Balthazar as he often appears, a businessman in a three piece pinstriped suit, perhaps in his mid to late thirties. And beneath that, of course, is his true self, the rotten face of a demon. Anybody able to see that far in may pick up hints of sulfur. He's sure there are people who can see him as he is; some of them hurry past, some of them don't care. Some of them can only see the aging woman. It doesn't much matter to him. He huddles in the scant protection the tent covers, though of course he's never cold, watching those that pass him by, and tapping his fingers next to the worn deck as he waits.

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Shrieky props his elbow on the table, resting his cheek against his hand thoughtfully. Reaching forward, he taps his fingers against the table, in front of the first card, "You said it means transformation?"

His expression is a touch more somber now, as it has finally occurred to him that there is another fairly major change which he's recently undergone. Thinking about it makes him shift his hand from his cheek to the side of his neck, and scrape his nails uncomfortably across the scar tissue which had once been his gills.

His gaze shifts onto the next card with interest as she describes it. It sounds... good. Probably unrealistically optimistic, if he's completely honest. He tilts his head, studying the new card ponderously. "Were you born here?" He asks, declining to give any warning or explanation for the inquiry.

She watches that without comment. Balthazar's ability to tell what people are is occasionally handicapped in Baedal by the sheer variety of entities: humans, mostly humans, xenians, supernatural things, it's a vast sea in which he is but a tiny drop. Shrieky feels mostly human to him, but only mostly.

"No," she answers, because the way he tells it, the truth is almost always more misleading than a lie. Briskly, she turns over the next card. An armored man on a horse carries a long lance, looking forward.

"Your future. The Knight of Wands. It means there's someone in your future — someone unpredictable, with an unusual way of looking at things. He is a good man, a man who inspires with his enthusiasm and gift of language. He can see patterns and opportunities that others cannot. He would be a good ally and friend."

His expression deepens into a frown as she reads his third card, and he leans over the table to study the image closely, as if he'll be able to identify this mysterious man by memorizing the appearance of the knight.

"How will I know who it is? What if I don't recognize him and I..." Accidentally scream in his face. "...Cause him to dislike me somehow?"

Leaning back and taking a long pull on her cigarette, the woman seems to just barely repress a smile.

"You had better be careful then, yes?"

And then she deftly shuffles the card back into the deck, quite unconcerned for Shrieky's memorization attempt.

He frowns, staring a little despondently at the deck into which the card has now vanished.

"So how does it work? How did you learn to do it?"

He glances back up towards the woman holding the cards, not entirely thrilled about her advice (Because how could he be careful? He couldn't just stop shrieking in people's faces.) but still intrigued by what it was she's just done.

"Tarot is a mirror, it is a story told in archetypes and common experiences. Every card has a meaning, and almost every meaning can apply to some aspect of your life."

She finishes the cigarette and extinguishes it on the table, turning her head so the smoke doesn't drift directly into Shrieky's face.

"But you chose the cards, so these are the ones that are most applicable." Pause. "Probably."

Shrieky tilts his head a little further, chewing his lip thoughtfully, as he considers this information. Then he glances down at the cards again, "So, could you apply these same cards to your own life as well?"

He puts his hand to his mouth, then glances up at her and smiles, "If I pay you again, then will you pick three for yourself? We could compare?"

And maybe her cards would apply to him as well! Comparing things was fascinating.

Now she laughs again, the real amusement in it strangely discordant, but it's over quickly.

"I could." She holds out her hand, already dealing herself three random cards seemingly without much thought at all. "But I am the one who knows the meanings, so you'll have to accept my interpretations."

Shrieky squirms forward in his seat, wincing as he tries to jam his hand into his pocket from this new angle. He watches her dealing the cards as he finally catches hold of two more of the coins, and awkwardly extracts them.

"How do you know the meaning of them? Is it in the pictures?"

He puts the shekels on the table and pushes them towards her, so that there's no doubt about whether or not he thinks her interpretations are acceptable.

"Sometimes. They all have names. I'm not going to teach you. There are too many and I don't care." It is, for her dour demeanor, a comparatively cheerful statement. She uses one finger to flip the first card over. A winged man in the sky blows a trumpet while naked people rise from graves in the earth. The woman smiles, more sardonic than pleased.

"This card is Judgment. Do you know of the Bible? The day the world ends? The dead rise up, and other various tiresome things. But for our purposes, it means resurrection. This is my past. I too was reborn, called to a new purpose. It is different from Death because it is not just personal, but speaks of new philosophies, of looking back on the life I lived and coming to a decision. You and I, we both changed. This is a common story for anyone who is not a child."

Shrieky leans forward, to stare at her first card with the same intensity as he had done his own. It's an especially beautiful image, he thinks, and what she says about it makes it sound somehow... more important than his first card had been.

"I got death, you got resurrection." He points out, although it may be an inane observation, "My change... apart from coming here, it was what you might describe as being a lateral step, rather than being definitely an improvement. Was yours certainly an improvement?"

He looks back up at her from the card, searching for her response with an earnest expression.

He might laugh or smile at the earnest question, but he doesn't. Sometimes it isn't funny, after all.

"That's a judgment we have to make for ourselves," she says, lowering her gaze back to the cards, and turns the next over without elaborating further. On it, a tower is struck by lightning while flood water rises all around it.

"This, my present, is the Tower. It means destruction, a time of major change. I am greedy, proud, and arrogant, and my fortunes will soon reverse. It need not be a bad thing, in the long run. But it will probably still hurt."

It's likely enough, but Balthazar puts no stock in worrying, and the woman's voice he uses remains clinical and unconcerned.

Again, he's leaning forward to study the new card intently. It reminds him of where he used to live, a little, so seeing it being struck by lightning pleases him, in an abstractly vengeful sort of way.

Spreading his fingers on the table, he glances up from the card to the woman, "If you were that greedy, proud, and arrogant, then why would you charge so much less than everyone else does for your services?" He pauses minutely, then continues, "Not that I'm saying you aren't all those things, you'd know better than I would, but surely those qualities would make you overcharge for doing this?"

He's not sure where he's going with this, she does seem proud and arrogant, possibly she's giving her skills away for cheap because she thinks people will be so impressed that they'll just hand her big piles of money. Still when someone foretells their own comeuppance, he makes a point of casting aspersions.

Inclining her head to acknowledge his points, she says, "Perhaps, if this were my life's blood. But it is not. Perhaps I am only greedy, proud, and arrogant in the way that most people are." She smiles very slightly for just a moment. "Perhaps not."

With that, she turns over the third card, which is upside down. A body lies face down on marble steps, ten swords pinning it to the ground.

"My future, the ten of swords reversed. It indicates overconfidence, short term gains only. I will soon be tricked by someone, due to poor research or sheer gullibility. Maybe you will not see me again."

Shrieky doesn't need to look at the card for long to recognize that the end which it depicts is not a pleasant one. If he reflects, he can see how the first two cards could apply to his own life, but the third, he hopes is exclusively for the fortune teller.

"If it tells you that this will happen, then can't you be careful? Don't trust anyone with anything important in the near future?" He touches the table just beside the third card, tapping his fingers lightly against the wood, as if he's anxious about making contact with the card itself. "It doesn't need to be something important, that you're tricked about."

Then a thought occurs. He could trick her. He could just snatch the four Shekels that are sitting on the table and run, and she would have been tricked all this time into thinking that he was a paying customer. He would fulfill the prophesy, her future would have arrived without any cost to her lifeblood, and he could give her the money back at some point when disaster wasn't immanent.

Would it actually avert her being tricked though? Or would he only be adding another misery to an unhappy future? Making decisions was difficult.

Grinning, she puts her hand over his. It's a cold touch, but not unnaturally so.

"Yes, now I can be careful, though I am always careful. And if you try to take your shekels back I will hang you by your toe and let the goats lick out your eyeballs."

There are probably goats somewhere here, right? Possibly, he should quit flirting with people while wearing a woman illusion. But that might require him to not be terrible, which is impossible.

"What? How did you--"

The Cards!

He stares at her in distress for a moment, before reaching up to clap his free hand over his eyes, as if this will somehow keep the abstract threat of the goats from getting to them. "I won't try to take them back."

His voice is slightly strained now. He's not sure how he feels about this 'people seeing into the future' thing.

Now she laughs, and laughs for real, peals of helpless laughter, even withdrawing her hand now to wipe at her eyes. Balthazar himself is doing no such thing, though he is somewhat amused. "You are an open book. I cannot see the future, nor your thoughts. Where do you come from, a place with no guile?"

He pulls his hand back quickly once her own is withdrawn, spreading the fingers on the one covering his eyes so that he can look out at her from behind it. His expression is slightly more guarded now, but he still practically bleeds discomfort.

"Not a place with no guile. I just... I've never had much cause to hide anything."

Telling her that he lived in a moat won't help here. It'd only make things more awkward.

Still chuckling, she scoops the coins off the table with one hand into the other. It's simple sleight of hand: one of them is replaced by another, different coin, similar in size and weight but with whatever once decorated its faces almost worn away. A special coin.

"You have made me laugh, therefore I refund your reading fee," he has her say, holding her hand out, ready to drop the coins into his. Hopefully if Rundas notices at all, she'll take this as a compliment rather than biting her style.

Shrieky frowns, because a minute ago trying to take back those coins would have resulted in his eyes being fed to goats. On the other hand, he still doesn't have a job, and he's not going to just turn down money. After a very brief period of hesitation, he extends his hand to accept the coins back.

"Don't take this the wrong way, but you are unlike anyone else I've encountered here." She's strange. She's really, really strange. "Are you going to be all right in the future? With being tricked?"

She nods once, to his assessment, then again to answer his question. "This is life. This will happen whether I see it coming or not. I rarely look at my own cards. I don't care. But perhaps I have you to thank."

Leaning back in her seat, she shakes out another cigarette and sets about lighting it, still watching him but laconic about it now.

He frowns, running his thumb over the coins contemplatively. "It seems like a bad idea, in retrospect. Having your future told."

He edges his seat back, preparing to depart, "Thank you anyway, though. I hope your comeuppance is indefinitely deterred."

She smiles, slight again and somewhat sardonic, returning to her cigarette.

"Well, thank you. Good luck, guileless man."

He bobs his head politely, scraping the chair back against the floor, and rising to depart.

"Good luck to you as well. And Goodbye."

And with that said, he wanders back off into the Bazaar.

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I want my money back.

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