It's All In How You Shuffle

Writers: AmajoS, Estelle
Date Posted: 28th April 2019

Characters: R'fal, Dorana
Description: R'fal meets Dorana again, and teaches her another card trick
Location: Dolphin Cove Weyr
Date: month 10, day 6 of Turn 9

Dorana spotted the young brownrider sitting by himself and grinned.
She'd been hoping to run into him for a while, when neither one of
them was busy. Which, considering their occupations, was even less
frequent than one might imagine. But, finally, there he was!

She hurried over, pulling something from her pocket as she went. When
she reached him, she plopped down beside him and before he could do or
say anything, she exclaimed, "Pick a card, any card!" She fanned out
the deck of cards she held in her hand with a mischievous grin.

"Dorana!" The young man's eyes lit up as he recognised her. "You're up
and about at last." It seemed like such a long time ago that he'd met
her, when he'd been a weyrling and helping out in the infirmary. So much
had happened since then that he almost felt like a different person, but
he still remembered how much fun they'd had when he'd been visiting and
teaching her card tricks.

He reached over and pulled out a card from the pack, carefully
concealing it in his palm. "How are you feeling? You look much better."

"I've been up and about for a little while, though I've only been free
of the sharded crutches for a couple of sevendays. The knee kept
popping back out of joint," she grimaced even as she held the deck out
for him to put his card back in. The ankle, which had fractured, had
healed much cleaner, though the healer warned her that when she got
older, it might bother her some on damp, cold days. The knee had been
a constant, painful, struggle for a while.

R'fal winced as he slid that card back into the deck. "That sounds
awful. But it's fixed now? You're back to work, and everything?"

"Oh, yes. Have been, on light duty, for a little over a month. Just
back on regular work for the last couple of sevendays." She cut the
deck and shuffled it as she spoke. "But, yes. It was awful. Believe
me, you never want to fall down a flight of stairs."

When she finished shuffling she held the deck up and began wiggling
her fingers over it. She wiggled her eyebrows too, and grinned as one
card began rising up from the deck, as if by magic. "Your card?" It
had taken a long time to get the trick right, but it had helped pass
time while she was injured.

"Yes! That's it!" R'fal applauded. She had clearly been practising - he
hadn't even seen the moment when she'd flipped over the deck. "Now
you're on your way to being a mistress of the art of card magic, and can
astound your friends with your skills."

"Thank you, I had a lot of time to practice," she grinned before
shoving the deck of cards back in her pocket. "So, what has been going
on with you since I saw you last?" She'd hoped to see him again while
she'd still been in the infirmary, but he had likely been busy. And
she'd heard some rumors about goings on with his family back home.
That had probably kept him occupied as well, if they were true.

"Well, I graduated from weyrling training!" R'fal pointed to his
wingrider knots. He could still remember that moment of sheer relief
that after all those months of working at his writing, he would be able
to join the Wings with his friends. With everything that had happened in
his last month of training, he'd almost convinced himself that he wouldn't.

"Congratualtions," Dorana responded with a sincere smile that very
carefully devoid of any of the slight but sharp sense of bitterness
she felt. She wondered, once again, what part of her was missing or
lacking, that she was left standing alone, clutch after clutch. She
pushed the thought away before it could cloud her expression.

"Thanks! Marlath is happy. He gets so excited, every Fall. And the best
part is I can go..." R'fal caught himself. He'd been about to say how he
could now go and visit his family whenever he wanted to, but he
remembered, just in time, that Dorana was not on good terms with her own
parents and it might be tactless. "I can go flying with him, out of the
Weyr. As long as I don't have duties, or drills. There are a lot of those."

She sighed wistfully, "That does sound like fun." Then she laughed and
added, "The flying anywhere part, not the duties or drills part."

"Yes. Those other two aren't fun," the young brownrider agreed. "Watch
duty is kind of boring, especially if it rains. But I don't mind
sweeprides. You get to see the land we fly over without having to worry
about Thread, and sometimes there's a flag with a message or a passenger
to transport. You don't know what it's going to be until you get there."

"What's the strangest thing you've been flagged down for?"

"Well, I haven't seen anything really interesting yet," R'fal said. "But
one of my wingmates was saying he once stopped off at this tiny little
cothold in the foothills. There were three men there who were watching
over a herd of cattle, and it turned out they'd spent the winter
building a still and the night before, they'd finally made it work and
had a wild night, trying out the stuff they made. Anyway, when they woke
up the next day, they were outside with sore heads and there were three
of the beasts in their cot, and they couldn't figure out how to get them
out."

Dorana laughed at that, she couldn't help it. "It must have been a
wild night, if it ended with cattle inside. What happened next?"

"They flagged down my wingmate. I suppose they thought a dragon could
help, but he really didn't." He smiled, remembering all the colourful
details the bluerider had given when he'd been telling the story. "He
tried getting Valtath to roar at them and drive them out, but they only
panicked and, well. Made a mess of the cot. Then they tried tying ropes
around the beasts and the other end to his riding straps, but one got
stuck sideways in the door and wouldn't budge. I think eventually they
had to go to the nearest hold for a beastcrafter to sort it all out."

She shook her head in amazement. "How do you suppose the cattle got
inside in the first place?"

"I've no idea! It must have been some good moonshine." The young
brownrider grinned, feeling a little more cheerful than he had these
past few sevendays. "I keep hoping that I'll go out on a sweep and
encounter something that'll top that story, but so far, nothing yet."

"Well, be careful what you wish for," Dorana cautioned. "Some day you
may get more excitement than you would like." That had been one of her
father's pearls of wisdom when she'd been a child. 'Don't wish for
exciting times, or you just might get more excitement than you can
stand.' The thought of her father made her frown sourly for a moment,
but then she shook it off.

"Though, if you do find yourself in the middle of an exciting story, I
want to hear about it," she grinned.

"You'll be the first one I tell," R'fal promised. "Anyway...would you
like to see another card trick? This time, you can try and guess how
it's done."

"Sure!" She had enjoyed learning the one she knew. Practicing it had
been a very good way to pass the time. She was busier now that she was
better but she thought she could still make time to practice a new card
trick.

"Okay, in this one, you have to find the aces. It's a good trick to
impress people with, but you have to be careful who you show it to or
they'll never agree to play dragon poker with you again," he said,
shuffling the cards and dealing them into piles, then shuffling again.
"Here we go. Aces to the top!" He snapped his fingers over the piles,
then turned over each of the top cards in turn, revealing the aces of
each suit.

She watched, impressed, and as before unable to see where he'd done
the trick. She knew a bit more about card tricks this time though. "Is
it like with the other one where you've got the cards flipped in the
deck?"

"Yes, it's a bit like that. The secret is to get the aces at the bottom
of the pack to start with. Then, if you watch my shuffles, you'll see
that they stay there until the end, when I deal them onto the top of the
piles." He demonstrated, more slowly. "So I know for sure they'll be
there when I - snap, snap, snap, aces to the top!"

"That's a neat trick," Dorana pulled the pack of cards she kept in her
own pocket now and began picking through it for the aces. "Where did
you learn all these tricks?"

"My Da taught me. He loves playing cards..." R'fal sighed, remembering
that where he was, his father would be unlikely to be doing any such
thing. "Mostly, he taught me ways to do well at games, but I haven't
really used them much here. Magic tricks are less likely to get me into
trouble."

"Well, anyone can play card games," she replied cheerfully, having not
missed the sigh and figuring she knew the reason for it. "But how many
people can do card tricks?"

"Not so many. But now there are at least two of us." He brightened.
"Okay, now you have a go. You just need to make sure that when you
shuffle, the bottom cards stay where they are."

She tried the trick and managed to keep all but one of the aces where
it was supposed to be. "Darn, missed one. I'll have to practice that
so it looks more natural too."

"Yes, once you can do it without thinking, then you can talk while
you're doing it. That way, the audience pays attention to what you're
saying and not what your hands are doing." R'fal smiled, recalling how
his father had told him the same when he'd been teaching him the trick.
Perhaps he should do some more practice, too. Those were good memories.

"How is your father?" Dorana asked gently, seeing the wistful
expression again and wondering if he wanted to talk about it.

"I'm not sure." He sighed again, idly shuffling the cards. "I'm not
allowed to see him, until he's released."

Dorana reached over and gave his arm a gentle squeeze. "I'm sure he's
alright," though of course she couldn't be sure of any such thing.
"And, just think, when he's released, you can visit him any time you
want."

"Yes, I suppose. I just...don't know if he'll be the same." R'fal had no
idea what conditions in those prisons were like, how his father would
live alongside hardened criminals. He tried to smile, weakly. "At least
he knows we'll be here for him, when he does get out."

"And that might be exactly what gets him through it," she replied bracingly.

"I hope so." He tried to put his concerns aside - it wasn't fair to
burden Dorana or anyone else with his family problems - and managed to
smile. "Why don't you try that trick on me again? Go slowly, and see if
you can find all the aces this time."

She smiled agreeably and began cutting the deck again, being more
careful to keep the aces where they were supposed to be.

Last updated on the May 3rd 2019

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It's All In How You Shuffle