The Third Harrowing

As soon as the group returned from Queen Ileosa’s bloody proclamation, Wren felt a stirring in her pocket. The dust in the room began to swirl, and Zellara’s insubstantial form materialized. “The spirits!’ she moaned. “There are so many of them. They call out for justice, and in warning. Please – my deck. I must perform another reading.” Wren removed the Harrow Deck from its box and placed it on the table, and the cards sorted themselves. “The suit of Books – it holds the power we need this day.” Each person drew one card from the selected suit, then Zellara shuffled the cards together and began to lay them out in three rows on the tabletop.

“First the past,” she intoned as she laid the cards one by one. “The Uprising. The Snakebite. The Sickness. It is as expected – the plague that has beset the city, and which you have helped to end. The poison of The Snakebite represents not just the poison of the disease, but a poison of the soul that led to it. And The Uprising – it suggests again that you are caught up in something much more powerful than yourselves, something that is sweeping you along with overwhelming force.

“Now to see what the present holds.” Three more cards hit the table. “The Brass Dwarf. The Unicorn. The Marriage.” Zellara pondered the cards in silence. “The Brass Dwarf represents invulnerability. The danger that faces you is beyond your power to oppose it – at least for now. But the other two cards – they suggest an unexpected ally. Someone will emerge to aid you when you least expect it, a union of what should be opposites that share the same objectives. Be open to this aid – do not reject it out of fear, or prejudice.

“Let us peer into the future.” The last three cards arranged themselves in a column. “The Idiot. The Locksmith. The Rakshasa. The Idiot is a card of foolishness and greed, but in this position it is misaligned. It warns of a clever foe who feigns weakness to mislead his opponents. And The Locksmith – the key that you need to defeat your foe will present itself to you – or perhaps a key to the key.” She paused, her brow knitted in thought. “But The Rakshasa … Normally it represents oppression, domination, all things that seem appropriate to your situation. But the spirits are whispering to me. There is another meaning here, something outside of the Harrow.” She looked up at the party as her apparition began to fade. “Beware the Rakshasa!”