There are only a few moments in a lifetime when the world slows down long enough to realize how fragile it is.
When the Deck is drawn, time pauses. Every breath is counted. Every blink feels like thunder. And when the card turns over—when the arcana reveals itself—the world remembers that mortals are not the only ones who decide fate.
In Deckrea, very few ever draw.
To most, the Deck of Many Things is more myth than tool. It is a relic of divine caprice, a remnant from when the stars and gods played games with mortals, and the echoes of those games still shake the bones of the world. Only a handful of draws occur in a generation. Fewer still are sanctioned. Fewer still survive.
And yet, ten years ago, I stood before the Deck myself.
My name is Arno. I was thirteen, and for reasons I did not understand then and still question now, I was permitted to draw from the Deck of Many Things in front of the entire village of Eldermire, in the Republic of ViaVia.
It was not a coming-of-age ritual.
It was not a reward, nor a punishment, nor an act of divine intervention.
It was a prophecy.
An old one.
One that had never been verified, nor traced to a known temple, nor even inscribed in any formal scroll. It had been passed down orally—mother to daughter, priest to apprentice, stranger to dreamer. The wording changed depending on who told it, but always, it ended the same way:
"And when the moon is devoured, and the three keys hang in the dusk, a child born without omen will open the Deck and draw not a fate, but the space between fates. And from silence, the game shall resume."
No one knew what it meant. Most assumed it referred to a future war, or perhaps a celestial convergence that had yet to happen. Some believed the prophecy was nonsense. A few—only a few—believed it pointed to me.
I had been born during a lunar eclipse that coincided with a rare triple-star alignment, which the village astrologer insisted was "a sign of a sealed fate," though he was never brave enough to say what that fate might be.
I did not ask for destiny. But I was told it had asked for me.
The ceremony was held at dusk, in the center of Caerlin Hollow, beneath the broken-branch tree where the old priest kept his sacred tools.
I remember standing still, barefoot on the polished stone platform, my breath fogging in the spring chill. The sky was clear, unnervingly so, and even the wind held its tongue. Around me, villagers gathered—silent, watchful, uncertain. Most had come out of curiosity rather than reverence. Drawing from the Deck was dangerous, after all, and danger makes for excellent gossip.
The Deck itself was not made of paper or wood, but of something stranger—thin, flexible plates of celestial glass, each inscribed with a symbol older than any written language. The cards shimmered faintly with their own light, and when laid out across the altar, they pulsed in slow rhythm, like a heartbeat syncing with the stars.
I was told to clear my mind. To think only of truth—not desire, not fear. The priest placed his hand on my shoulder and whispered the invocation. The crowd held its breath. The stars did not move, but they watched.
And I drew.
My fingers brushed against the edge of the card, which felt warm—uncomfortably so, like skin under fever. I turned it over with a care that bordered on reverence, expecting to see a symbol flare to life, to feel the magic crash down on me like a wave.
But the card was blank.
Perfect. Untouched. Empty.
I stared at it for several seconds, waiting for something to appear—for the symbols to burn into being, for the stars to shift, for the priest to say something—anything.
Nothing happened.
The priest leaned forward, his brow furrowed. He examined the card, turned it over, and turned it again. Still blank.
No flame. No vision. No fate.
Just silence.
The silence did not stay silent.
In the days that followed, the whispers began—soft at first, then louder, and always shaped by the sharp edge of fear. No one had ever heard of a blank card. The priest insisted that the Deck does not make mistakes, and if a draw failed to reveal itself, the fault must lie in the soul of the one who drew it.
Some claimed I had corrupted the ritual. Others said I had drawn something so terrible it could not be named, and the card had erased itself rather than speak. A few said I had been chosen not by the stars, but by the space between them—an idea that even they could not fully explain.
My father, a mason, stopped speaking to me entirely. My mother wept when she thought I wasn't listening. My childhood friends avoided me. The priest refused to perform a second draw, citing ancient laws that forbade it. He told me, in no uncertain terms, that I had been given my chance—and that I had received the gods' answer.
By the end of the month, I had been politely asked to leave the village.
Not exiled. Not formally. Just encouraged to live "a little farther out," where people wouldn't have to glance at me and remember the silence that had once filled the square.
And so I went.
Ten years later, I live alone.
My home is a shack on the edge of the pinewood, built from the bones of old wagons and salvaged beams from abandoned inns. The roof leaks when it rains. The stove hisses when I cook. The birds no longer scatter when I move through the trees, and even the wolves pass me by.
No one visits. No one dares.
Most people in Caerlin Hollow still refer to me by my birth name, if they refer to me at all. But beyond the village—among travelers, hunters, and those who whisper by firelight—I am known by another title.
The Abandoned One.
They say I am a blank in the stars. A break in the great game. A scar left by a card that never should have been drawn.
They're not wrong.
But they're not right either.
Three months ago, I began to dream.
At first, the dreams were hazy—swirling lights, whispers I couldn't understand, impressions of cards turning in impossible hands. I would wake up drenched in sweat, the scent of burning paper still clinging to my tongue.
But the dreams grew clearer. More precise. I began to see a card—just one—floating in a void of shifting stars. Unlike the others, this card did not shimmer or pulse. It was not decorated with celestial script or sigils. It was blank, just as mine had been.
Yet when I looked at it, I felt something stir inside me. Recognition. Dread. Longing.
And then the voices began.
Soft. Patient. Never quite audible, but always just close enough to hear if I strained. They whispered truths I didn't understand.
"You were not seen because you were hidden.""You are not a mistake. You are the piece the game forgot.""Draw again."
This morning, I found a card in the snow.
I had gone out to check my traps, thinking only of rabbits and weather. But as I reached the stream, something caught the edge of my vision—something pale and smooth, half-buried under the frost.
A card.
Not a paper card, but one made of the same divine glass I remembered, cool and unblemished despite the cold. I knelt, brushed the snow aside, and picked it up.
It was warm.
Not like a sun-warmed stone, but like skin. Like breath.
It was blank.
But not empty.
As I held it, the air grew still. The trees ceased their rustling. Even the birds fell quiet. And somewhere behind my eyes, I felt a pressure—a slow, building weight, like a hand reaching down from the stars.
The card did not speak.
But I heard it anyway.
"Draw again."