joegoda | BP&G - The Mad Wizard

I'll be doing fragments of the story as they come to me... please bear with my mind as it tells me the story. When the whole thing is done, it'll go out on the website. Thanks! CJB

"Would you listen to that wind a-howl!" Flowerpot said to the walls of her little one room cabin. She painfully raised herself up from the cook pot and made her slow way to the window. She looked at the trees brushing the sky and watched as they bowed to each other first to m'ladies, then to m'gents.

"Them trees will be doing do-si-do any moment now," she said, turning away from the window and crossing back to the only table in the house. It was a small, square table, with ornate trim legs and years of age on the top. Dark wood went into the making of this table, and love as well. The single chair scritttttched across the floor as she moved it back so she could sit.

She turned the wick up on the single oil lamp in the center and picked up the deck of cards that lay at her place. Shuffling, became and art form in her hands, and could last a good five minutes. She shuffled with the tip of her tongue poking out the side of her wrinkled mouth to help with her concentration.

While she shuffled, a wind snuck in through a crack at threshold of the door. It blew round the room, and touched all it found. It swam across the wall where a picture of a wooded landscape hung, painted years ago. It passed over a shelf holding memories of children no longer here. It drew its fingers through tapestries of wars never fought, and purchased so long ago the colors had faded to merge with each other, proving that in war, nobody wins.

While she shuffled, the wind wrapped itself around her, snuggling her like a lover. It tousled her graying hair and played with the thin beard on her chinny-chin-chin. Smiling from the tickle, she paused her shuffling long enough to shoo the errant breeze away.

The wind, properly chastised, settled behind her, to watch as she drew first one card, and then another, to lie upon the table. With each draw, Flowerpot would smack her lips or make an uh-huh or raise a wild eyebrow. Her eyes, brown and gray, but once upon a time the very brown of a new born colt, shone out through cataracts and squints to view the story as it played out on the table.

"See here?", she said in crackly voice to the table and tapping the first card. "Here's his old self, holding that sword and thinking he's all mighty." Fingers swollen by arthritis hovered over the next, "and here, he had his little party... all the hearts surrounding him and him feeling so gay."

Third card up brought a chuckle, followed by a coughing fit. When breath came back, she said "And here is where he ended, enthroned. My, my, my. What follows next, do you wonder?" She pushed her chair back up on two legs, and then had to catch herself against the table to keep from tipping over. Her eyes rolled up to stare at the cobwebby ceiling, searching, searching.

"Gonna be a cold winter, this year. I can feel it in my bones." The chair cracked back down on to the floor and she whipped off the fourth card. Meager riches. Five of points. "No surprise there. Things not bad, things no good. Things just normal."

"Ohhhhhh," she whispered at the face up fifth. "Changes is blowin' in." The card was the Ace of Storms. Mister Death. Black as coal.

Sixth card was the joker, the fool. "Now that's interestin'. Change being chased by an idiot." She reached up and tweaked one of the hairs on her ear, "Or... maybe change is caused by an idiot. Let's go see." The wind crept a bit closer, its curiosity aroused.

Seventh card lay over the sixth. Two of doves. Peace lay over the fool. "Odd. Not something you see very often, huh? Love and peace upon a fool? Who'd a thunk it? Big powers at work, I imagine." From an old and cracked mug she took a swallow of bitter brew, dark and brown.

Eighth card, covering the fifth, Lady with Storms. "Huh!" she puffed out, surprised. Lady with Storms was her own card. It was the one she chose as a girl, the one she slept with, the one she made her own. Lady with Storms lives alone, and keeps her own dark company. Covering the Ace meant the storms were greater, and the greater the storm, the greater the change.

"What the hell do I have to do with it?" she wondered aloud. She looked for the shadows to appear, looking left and right. "I'm too old for this crap." She sighed and made a sigil in the air. "If it will, then it will," she sighed.

Ninth card was no surprise. "Yep. Fool comes here, it may not be pretty." Five of clubs. Arguments may occur, but compromise is possible. Covering the fourth card, the five of points, meant that both sides would gain, if agreement was reached.

Another throne covered the third card. The throne of doves. The throne of peace and love. Bushy eyebrows raised above cloudy brown eyes. "Huh. That would be something. Not impossible, mind you. Just not expected."

Doves again on the tenth card. Covering the nine of doves. More peace or love or happiness. "This is getting ridiculous!" Flowerpot sputtered. "Whoever this guy is better be ten foot tall, shoulders five foot broad. Nobody can be that happy all the friggin time!"

She closed her eyes, tight, not really wanting to see what drew next. "No throne, no throne, no throne." Trembling fingers pulled the card from the top and placed it face up on the first card. One eye opened, squinted at it, and then both flew open.

"No! There's not another joker in the whole stupid deck!" she cried. Again, she looked for shadows, craning her neck to and fro until the cracking became too audible. Not finding anything, she settled back, breathing hard. "Gods and Goddesses on the march tonight, I swear." She stroked the grinning face of the card with trepidation. "Joker covers Lord. Takes his place in time and space."

"Card thirteen, what will it mean?" she patted the deck, not wanting, not daring to pull the card up to see. She knew she would, but not now, not now.

The door to her tiny cabin flew open with a crashing thump, causing her to jump and throw her chair to the floor. The wind, which had been hovering nearby, was startled up to the ceiling to hang amid spiders and their lunches.

"Scuze me, ma'am... or sir. I didn't mean to startle you, but it's been a hell of a trip. Can I camp out here for the night? I'll be gone by morning light."

Flowerpot just stared. The figure at the door wasn't very tall, and certainly wasn't very old. He had a shock of blue-black hair and a generous face, with eyes as black as the ace of storms.

"Uh... ma'am?" The figure moved closer. "Are you all right?" The boy picked up the chair from where it had fallen. "Maybe you better sit down."

Flowerpot let him help her sit, not knowing what else to do. Her eyes flowed to the cards laying face up, and sought the fool, grinning back at her.

"Playing a bit of old sol? My grandmother used to do that." The boy reached toward the deck, plucked the top card off, and placed it face up at the top of the layout.

Flowerpot chuckled. Flowerpot laughed. She guffawed, coughed, and gasped for breath, and it sounded as if she was saying "Gods and Goddesses" over and over. The boy edged toward the door, saying "Ooooookay. I can see things are just a bit... odd here. Never mind."

"Get your ass back here, fool." Flowerpot said gruffly. "What's yer name, son?"

Still at the door, unsure as to take flight or not, he said, "My name's Weehawk, ma'am."

"Well, Weehawk, get your butt back in here. There's a change in the weather, and you'd rather be here than not this night. You can bunk in the corner." She got up, went over to her cook pot, turned and asked the boy, "How do you feel about stew?"

"I feel that stew is just about the best thing in the world, ma'am." Weehawk answered.

"Call me Flowerpot," she said. "'s not my real name, but it's the name I go by."

"Ok... Flowerpot."

The wind, tired of watching the spider's picnic, dropped down to hover over the table. It was curious about the thirteenth card, the card that told the end of things, the culmination. If the wind had a mind, that mind wouldn't know what to make of what it was looking at.

The thirteenth card was blank.