When the Chips are Down (Harvest)

[Rhodes]

He was trapped. The dark room, the lingering scent of smoke despite the ban on indoor smoking being in force for years.

There was no-where else to go. End of the road. All or nothing.

The blonde man, probably, 50ish? He set his jaw, staring at the path in front of him.

Slowly he pressed the last of his chips into the pile. “Call.”

Rhodes could taste it in the air. The tingle of Fear growing, slowly, delicately, like watching a tea flower expand into full bloom in a pot of boiling water. The blonde man was bluffing, he knew. The fool had hoped for a better hand, for the cards to fall his way. He was desperate. There was a lot of money there. And the cards had not gone his way after all. But to the Dread Lord of Autumn the money had become frighteningly inconsequential. This man was the kind that he waited for, the kind that was already struggling, desperate. Emotionally invested in the game, so much so that logic and thought was overridden.

And now, he was here, with at best a prial using the Red Queens on the table and everything he had riding on it. Mortgage money, no doubt. College fund for a kid. That money his trophy wife of high-school sweetheart has scrimped and squirreled away. Blondie seemed the type. Too far into the hole, certain they could pull off one big win and all would be over, past sins forgiven.

But not tonight.

Slowly, very slowly the Fairest set his overlaid cards face up on the table, and revealed the one underneath. Savouring the moment he knew was coming. A Full house.

There.

That was the moment.

Fear rolled off the blonde man as his gaze hit the floor. A smile touched the Fairest’s lips as he tested the raw emotion in the air. The dealer reached for Blondie’s cards and turned them. “Two pairs. Mr Rhodes wins.”
The Flowering rose slowly and walked around to the blonde man and clapped him on the shoulder. “Sorry, old boy. Just not your night, eh?” He breathed in slowly, drawing in the Glamour dripping with the man’s Fear and suffering, sharp and fresh. Fear was so often fleeting, but this… this man had been harbouring it, nourishing it, and was now utterly petrified of what might happen next. Fear not just of now but those of the past that had lead him here, and the Fears yet to come. Probably had been running deeper into debt and been planning this for days. Rhodes had clocked his underlying nerves the moment he had approached the tables. Smirking, the changeling slipped a 200-dollar chip into Blondie’s pocket and edged away, motioning to the dealer to gather his winnings and sliding a similar chip his way as a tip. Always tip when you win. The staff remembered, and favoured you. Besides, this was only money. The Dread Lord had won in more ways than one tonight.

Rhodes tried to relate. Every once in a while, he tried. But he couldn’t, not anymore. Read, interpret, understand…. but not empathise. This man, this naïve fool, living his suburban dream life, had risked his certainty with the chance of more and failed. Better he learn that here and now than in the Hedge, and he, Rhodes, was that teacher. And it felt good.

Did it even matter? They were all the same. Small. Simple. Bags of emotion to play with and wrap around one’s fingers.

Is this how she felt?

It was so hard to care about them. Those who had not suffered. Weak. Ignorant. They lived their carefree lives unaware that him and his ilk that stood between them and possible decades of torment.

I am nothing like her.

At least, that was what he told himself. The Autumn King knew he got a sadistic pleasure from ramping up the fear of his human prey, letting his envy of their untwisted lives run rampant and soothing the bitterness just for a moment with a malicious release for the sweet reward of their terror-filled emotion. Had he liked toying with people before Ophelia got her green fingers into him? Had he always been so indifferent? He couldn’t recall. It was so easy to call it a seed of the Fairest spite that bloomed like the flowers on his head, so easy and possible that he never thought about whether or not it was true.

Rhodes had his prizes. Did he even care what happened to the man after that?

[Rhodes]

Closing the Thread.