[Game Thread] The Fortune Teller

[Trespasser]

Oh diviner of days uncome do tell,
Pry'thee pry part the pale with scrying spell.
Gaze in the glass, see destiny's due
And tell to me tales of my future true.

The Fortune Teller

The fortune teller knelt at the center of his tent with his eyes closed in meditation. Before him crouched a three-legged stool with clawed feet. It perched like some great bird or spider above a gilt egg brazier. From the holes in its surface leaked inky smoke, delicate like threads of frayed silk the smoke rose to the sky above. Intense aromas of qetoreh and myrrh filled the space and induced visitors to a light-headed reverence and awe. The moment the curtains parted and the woman crawled inside, the fakir leaned forward almost imperceptibly, his body tense with an expectation and suspense. The woman stopped before the table, her head bowed she did not look at her fortune teller. She spoke low and quick with a fear for him that consulted with demons.

She spoke of her child, a daughter that was missing. Her words tangled and repeated themselves and her head would twitch and her eyes would backtrack across the floor. The last night her daughter had gone out to walk the streets and take in the music of night-market buskers and play games of hiding in shadows made by the falling sun. Though that was her daughter's word on leaving, the friends were of little help. She had spoken to two, but they could not recall her daughter joining them the previous night. The perplexities of her disappearance, though not long ago, prompted the mother to seek the consultations of sorcerers, and such brought her to this mystic's abode. Unsure what else to say and perhaps intimidated by his presence she stopped and simply pushed forward a pile of her daughters fine clothing. It was always rumored that a magician in possession of one's belongings was dangerously empowered.

The woman was some rich merchant's wife, Lella Amidha Lahab, she came to this soothsayer on bended knee, her fine silks dragging in the dirt and bearing her daughter's clothes like offerings for a god. Such a pitiable sight brought some sorrow to a heart even as jaded as his. His usual queries were those of love unrequited, the advisability and fortunes of business ventures or any of the similar jejune concerns of the common. These could be answered generally by some combination of common sense and the acquired countless secrets, rumors, loves and guilt revealed to him daily in confidence. But this desperation cut close to his own.

For her own consolation he offered up the most complex and farcical rituals he could conjure. Humming low he leaned over the claw-footed stool, upon it rested an upward facing looking glass and a wide copper chalice filled of oil. Cutting his hand the blood dropped upon the looking glass as he brought it over the chalice where it dripped and swirled unmixing in the oil. Dipping his fingers in the mixture he polished the looking glass and gazed deeply at its smeared and impenetrable surface. The deep blue tent was pierced with a thousand pinpricks admitting light in a galaxy of tiny stars and under this facsimile night sky he offered an impressive presentation with every trapping of proper mysticism.

He stroked his beard with the careful consideration of an architect as he observed the clouded mirror...