Endless Knight (The Arcana Chronicles #2)(21)

Strengths and weaknesses. I needed to ask Matthew what could take me out, besides the Touch of Death.

Finn sniffed to Selena, “Hide you with my illusions?”

I’d seen Survivor alliances tighter than mine.

He asked me, “What happens if one of us bites it due to natural causes?”

I didn’t remember the answer, so I waved to Selena.

“The Arcana closest to you gets your icon.”

“What happens to the losers?”

Selena answered him, “They’re reborn, with no memory of their past lives. Well, except for him.” She pointed at Matthew. “The Fool sees everything. That’s what makes him crazy.”

Matthew nodded happily at her.

Directing a scowl her way, I shuffled through some more cards, but Finn stayed my hand over one. “Wait, I’ve seen this guy.” His face paled.

“The Hierophant?” The image was of a robed figure giving a blessing to his kneeling followers. They all had milky white eyes. I handed Finn the card.

In a hushed tone, Matthew said, “Hierophant. He of the Dark Rites.”

I remembered Gran warning me about him: He’s a charmer, Evie, a spellbinder. Never look him in the eyes. You are vulnerable to him. And he’s not the only one. “My grandmother told me he can control your mind to make you commit monstrous acts. Once you do, you’ll be enslaved forever—even after his death, you’ll keep doing whatever it is he wanted from you. The monstrous acts vary each game.” Having been brainwashed in a nuthouse, I had a particular dread of mind control.

Eyes locked on the image in his shaking hand, Finn said, “He was with the cannibals. I think I can guess what the monstrous act is. He’s making people eat human flesh.”

“No one needs to force people to eat others.” Jackson was joining in the conversation? “In case you haven’t noticed, there’s no food in these mountains. None.”

We were going on months of empty grocery stores and zero crops growing. Few animals were alive to be hunted.

His voice a whisper, Finn said, “These particular cannibals feed . . . on the living. Not just raw. Living. Monstrous enough for you?”

No. No way.

Finn looked at Matthew, his gaze haunted. “These Arcana are sick, and they aren’t just fighting each other. What the hell is the point of our existence?”

Matthew glanced up, startled. “Point? Cachet. We are champions of the gods!”

“Gods?” I croaked, peering up at the low ceiling. “Are there, like, deities running around, controlling the game?”

“They left—”

Suddenly Jackson yanked his crossbow over his back, aiming out the hut’s opening. “We got company.”

Selena had already risen to one knee, her bow and arrow aimed—a little too close to my head. “It’s a wolf,” she said just as I spied gleaming yellow eyes in the burned woods.

Big yellow eyes.

Though Jackson relaxed his aim a fraction, Selena looked even more deadly. Before I could say a word, her arrow zoomed past my ear toward the animal.

When we heard the creature speeding away through the mud, Selena bit out a curse.

“Why would you kill it?” I demanded. “That might be the last of its kind on earth!”

Even Jackson—a seasoned hunter—was giving her a look that said, Not cool.

“That was no ordinary wolf.” Selena looked uneasy. Selena never looked uneasy. “We’ve been scouted by the Strength Card. The Mistress of Fauna.”

I remembered that card, and Gran’s words: Fauna can control animals, Evie, borrowing their senses and making them her familiars.

“Why didn’t we hear her call grow louder?” Finn said.

Selena had already strung one of her makeshift arrows. “Because she isn’t near us, not yet. Only her familiars.”

I scrambled out of the line of fire. “Why didn’t she sic the wolf on us?”

Selena shook her head. “I don’t know why, but Fauna just wanted a look-see. And I think . . .”

“What?”

“I think she wanted us to know she’s watching us. That wolf has been stalking us for days, but I never caught sight of it. Now it reveals itself?”

I swallowed, and Finn said, “What do you mean, watching us? And why would the Strength Card be involved with animals?”

I remembered this one—I’d had the same question eight years ago. “People only started calling her Strength in recent times. She used to be the Fortitude Card, referring to her single-minded purpose. She thinks the way animals do, like beasts on the hunt, with a sole, blood-driven resolve.”

I drew out her card, showing them a delicate girl in a white robe, holding the mouth of a ferocious lion. “Her card is one of the most literal. She can manipulate animals the same way I do plants. Like Gabriel, she has animal senses.”

Selena said, “Not only that—she can tap into the senses of nearby creatures.”

I nodded. “I remember that. If she wanted to spy on us, she could get a crow to fly over and see us through its eyes.” Even Jackson was listening intently to this. “And if she exchanges her blood with an animal, it becomes her familiar, connected to her forever. I don’t know how exactly. Selena?”

“Trade secret. Sometimes we don’t know all the powers. Though Matthew would.”