---
"Thank you," said Amanises, reaching for the steaming cup of tea. She sipped slowly, letting the warmth seep through her body, washing away the chill of time long past.
'A little sweet and incredibly soothing,' she thought, savoring the taste that stirred old memories.
"As always, you never fail. It tastes just like it used to," she said, looking at Yerem with a complex gaze—a fleeting look, but one Yerem caught and chose not to question.
Instead of probing, Yerem changed the subject. "Would you like me to read your fate, Amanises?" he asked, a tarot deck already laid out on the table, his fingers beginning to shuffle, dancing like whispers through silk, as if coaxing secrets from the spaces between the cards.
"I never took you for a charlatan, Yerem." Amanises gave a real smile, watching the confident way he handled the cards.
Yerem responded casually, as if the subtle jab had gone unnoticed. "So? Are you here for a reading or just a bit of nostalgia?"
He glanced up, one brow raised. "Or maybe both?"
Amanises tilted her head slightly. "Maybe I just missed the theatrics."
Yerem chuckled. "Careful, Amanises. That almost sounded like fondness."
Amanises took a deep breath, pushing down a strange feeling that had crept in, then answered softly, her voice wrapping around the room.
"Alright. Show me. I'm curious if you still know how to read my fate." Her eyes were fixed on Yerem's pale hands, moving like a maestro who had done this a thousand times.
Reading a god's fate was no small matter. Such an act could ripple through the flow of destiny itself. Especially if the subject was her—once the goddess of misfortune.
"Oh?" Yerem raised an eyebrow, silver eyes gleaming, mock-offended. "Amanises, you still doubt me after everything?"
"Your humanity seems to be thriving," Amanises replied, noting his theatrical air. "And no, I don't underestimate you. I'm just stating a fact." Her tone remained calm, gentle, without edge.
"Facts, huh." Yerem chuckled, his eyes now fully silver, alive with energy. "Then let's find out."
He gathered the remaining tarot cards into a single stack and slid them toward Amanises. "So, what do you want to know?"
Amanises was silent for a moment, eyes on the cards. Memories surged—loss, silence, longing. But her face stayed blank; only her eyes revealed anything.
"The past, the present, and the future," she finally said—a classic reading she had often seen humans request out of curiosity.
Yerem nodded, as if he had expected it, and pushed the cards closer. "Shuffle and cut."
Amanises raised an eyebrow, a faint smile behind her sheer veil. "Why? Yerem, I thought you'd do it yourself. Didn't expect you to ask me."
She was referring to her old role—Goddess of Misfortune.
"It's not about that," Yerem said calmly. "This is just shuffling. But fate… fate can only be unraveled by the one it belongs to. I merely read it."
That was the limit of his power now—to glimpse, not to alter.
As he finished speaking, the light in the room dimmed suddenly, then went out completely. Darkness swallowed everything, leaving only the flicker of a lone candle on the table, trembling as if it might die at any moment.
A faint humming sound rose in the silence. The air grew heavy, charged with arcane energy.
A colorless river began to form around them, winding through the room as if to swallow everything in its path.
The River of Fate.
Yerem remained calm amid the shift.
But even Amanises—a goddess—was startled by its appearance. She sensed something had shifted in reality, but couldn't name it.
"Something's not right," she thought. Still, her hands moved, shuffling and cutting the cards before setting them down before Yerem, pushing her unease aside.
"Let's begin," Yerem said, then drew the first card and placed it to Amanises' left. "This represents your past."
The second, in the center. "This is your present."
And the third, to the right. "And this, your future."
Yerem looked into her, his violet eyes glowing sharp beneath the candlelight. "So, where do you want to begin?"
Amanises met his gaze calmly before replying:
"The future."
Yerem nodded slowly, then flipped over the card on Amanises' right. As soon as the card was revealed, the once-calm River of Fate turned wild and violent. Its current surged so fiercely that two mercury serpents—busy with their own agendas elsewhere—paused, sensing a disruption in the flow of time.
The card showed a skeletal figure clad in dark armor, riding a white horse. In its hand, it held a black banner marked with a white rose of five petals. On the ground lay the body of a king, surrounded by a young woman, children, and a bishop pleading in vain. In the corner of the card was the number "13."
"Death."
"Death signals both an end and a beginning," Yerem said, his voice soft but resonant. "It's an eternal cycle that spares no one—not even gods."
"Looks like your future won't be peaceful, Amanises. Maybe you'll—"
"Present." Amanises cut in sharply. Her tone remained flat, but her eyes were locked on the card, heavy with meaning.
Yerem didn't take offense at the interruption. He only offered a thin smile and spoke lightly. "Remember, tarot cards are only guides. Not absolute truths." He turned over the card in front of Amanises.
The image was of a great wheel turning. In each corner of the card, winged beings sat on clouds, observing the wheel. At the bottom was the number "10."
"Wheel of Fortune," Yerem said in a neutral tone. "A symbol of major change, luck, and more importantly, a turning point in one's life."
"Quite fitting, wouldn't you say, Amanises?"
"With everything that's happened, you're standing on the threshold of a new era."
Amanises gave a slight nod, her voice faint and distant, as though dissolving into the air. "Yes." She seemed unsurprised, as if she had foreseen all of this.
"And now the last one," she continued, her tone dropping lower. "The past."
Yerem's gaze shifted as he turned over the card on Amanises' left, his violet eyes reflecting a flicker of anticipation.
The card depicted a brightly dressed figure in tattered clothes, wearing a cap and carrying a stick slung over one shoulder with a bundle tied at the end. A small dog followed at his heels. At the bottom was the number "0."
"The Fool," Yerem said, his voice echoing through the room that was sinking deeper into darkness. The River of Fate, which had raged just moments before, froze in place—as if halting its flow to honor the card's presence.
The Fool? Amanises stared at the card, her expression unreadable. Her feelings were tangled, hard to define. Her eyes drifted upward, to the eternal black sky above the room, as if trying to pierce through it, searching for a gray mist and a distant, blurred doorway.
"Fascinating, seeing The Fool appear in someone's past," Yerem remarked, his silver gaze deepening as he smiled faintly. "It represents a new beginning—full of limitless possibility. Unlike Death, which signals closure, this one speaks of birth."
"Your past seems far from ordinary, Amanises."
The two of them sat in silence, locked in a quiet that carried weight. No words passed, yet much was said.
Then, without warning, Amanises reached out and took all three tarot cards from the table, her movement calm but undeniable.
"I'll be taking these." Her voice was flat, offering no reaction to Yerem's reading at all.
---