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Duncan

Membership in the Differently Voiced used to just get you snickered at, until three different members at three different hospitals predicted the Buenos Aires crash and people got spooked. There’s less snickering now. More suspicion.

“Do you think the voting public is ready for an openly schizophrenic candidate?”

“That’s pejorative,” says Duncan, “and shouldn’t you be asking the voting public that?”

“He has laid traps for you,” warns Temperance in his head.

“I know,” says Duncan.

“Let him burn,” hisses the Queen of Swords.

“What?” says the reporter.

The rest of his chorus, as usual, just laughs and laughs and laughs.

The Page

She knows everyone in the world, and these are their names:

  • The Magician
  • The Popess
  • Strength and her friend Temperance
  • Star
  • Death
  • The Knight
  • The King
  • The Queen of Swords

And herself, of course, the Page. So when she meets the man in the worn blue coat she doesn’t know what to call him.

“I’m the Emperor, my child,” he says. “Emperor Norton the First. Not Emperor here, of course, just a state visit, a diplomatic consort mission envoy. Where am I?”

“The world,” says the Page uneasily.

“Ah,” he says, “but what do you call it?”

She calls it Summersend.