Anemone gets her food (stabbing it very thoroughly, like she practiced), intentionally sits down at an empty table (after checking under it and under the seats, like she practiced), sets her deck of tarot cards beside her tray, and tapes up a piece of paper that says "DIVINATIONS FREE WITH SEATING" on the side of the table nearest the people coming out of the line with trays full of food.
She eats her food unhurriedly, waiting to see if she gets any takers.
She stands up the deck of tarot cards with one hand. "Well, what do you want to know? I'm not handing out anything high-powered for free, and with divinations high-powered generally means specific, but if you want to know what sorts of things you'll benefit from studying or improving, what dangers you ought to be most cautious of, what strokes of good fortune you should be on the lookout for, I can do that easy."
"Well, not if you just print some illustrations on cardstock in a factory and call it a day."
It's so unaesthetic to have to specify that your divination tools are enchanted, as if this is what makes the difference, as if ancient Roman diviners went around saying, did you find a magic bird to read the entrails of, but wizards don't really believe in most magic, and she supposes you can't really go around blaming their kids for needing to stick to the story they know.
"My grandmother enchanted them. I'm going to be better at divining than she is, someday, but she has more practice preparing the materials."
"All right! You shuffle, so they can get a sense of you, and I'll deal and read."
She deals. Nine of wands crossed by the star, ace of wands above, king of swords below, moon on the left, nine of pentacles on the right, and then four cards in a vertical line: death, six of pentacles, page of pentacles, and the empress, going up.
....this kid sure did draw "death" in the "you" spot, which is almost always metaphorical, but in this case, uh.
" - well, looks like you're going to have to work for your good fortune. You've got less stuff than other people do, says the six of pentacles, so you're going to have to be better than other people to get half as far as they do. But we asked about good fortune, and we got the nine of wands crossed by the star, which looks good to me, if measured. Nine of wands is stamina and perseverance, and the star is hope and inspiration, sometimes serenity. You can hope to persevere here, and you're strong enough to make it if you work hard - that nine of pentacles is in the future spot, and she represents self-discipline and self-reliance, so you might have to make your own way a lot in here. On the other hand, you're also a lot safer here than you were before you arrived. Moon in the past is associated with the terrifying and bizarre, did you have some close encounters with mals back home?"
"In the second I inducted, a mal came after us. My parents probably took care of it?"
"Oof. Well, at least here you have a shot. Okay, the advice these cards are giving is - the page of pentacles says be practical, be disciplined, don't expect stuff to just be handed to you. But if you work hard, the outcome slot has the Empress in it, symbolizing abundance, reward, and the natural world, which you'll note that we don't have a lot of in here. I think that means you have a real shot of getting back to the place where they do have it. I guess that's not the most uplifting thing ever, but they tell it like it is."
"Man, me too. I'm gonna miss water, I bet, I used to swim a lot, but I guess three hours is a bit early for missing swimming. I'm sure it'll be hitting me harder in a couple weeks. - I'm Anemone, by the way. Diviner, but I guess that's obvious. You?"
"Nia. Do your cards not say, what my affinity is?" It would sure be convenient for her if they did.
"Well, we didn't ask. But no, I don't think you can get something that specific from tarot, even enchanted tarot, it doesn't have enough symbols. I think to get a really definitive read on that stuff you'd need to do, like, inducing visions or something."
"Well, perhaps I will find in a class or a book something just right. I have not learned it yet."
"Yeah, that happens. I dunno if it matters much whether you know going in, I figure whenever you find it it'll still be extra easy for you and you'll pick it right up."
Well, hmm, she's reeled in a kid with no known affinity and no particular stuff, and probably no friends, although she's only inferring that last bit from the fact that she's sitting here with her and not with said friends. This could have gone better, probably, but the kid might still live - cards could have been a lot more doom and gloom than they were, and death in the spot that represents Nia really could just mean that the Scholomance is going to transform Nia into someone disciplined and practical and capable who makes it out on those merits, it's not half so horrible as death in the outcome spot, and the outcome was positive -
"Got yourself started on your languages? I'm hoping to pick up more in here, but I hear it's good to have some down pat."
"I have Swahili and Spanish! French has been recommended me for doing next."
"Ooh, I don't have Swahili, it might be one of the rarer ones. Got Spanish, though I'm no good at holding conversations in it, just reading. French is a good one, though, I think people wrote a lot of stuff in French a long time ago."
"I think it was big for poetry in, I dunno, the 1700s or something? I think if you go back far enough the European stuff's mostly in Latin."
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