The Chaos Deck
The door creaked as it opened. Velin stepped away from the table as she entered and noticed the carving on the table for the first time, a stitched crown–part black, part gold. She didn’t ask for an explanation. “That’s new” she murmured.
The paper was already waiting for her on the desk, the seal still wet. Ink and gold, stitched once, the thread catching the light like a held breath. She touched it with her fingertips, not to smudge, not to pry, just to feel. It was not an emblem of ownership. It was a promise disguised as a scar.
She looked from the seal to him, and something passed between them. It was not command, not question, just the knowing that whatever this was, it was already set in motion. Bunny was perched on the edge of the desk, one paw hooked over his knee, watching her. Not the letter. Not the seal. Her.
Her fingers hovered over the stitched heart, and Bunny’s eyes narrowed.Not suspicion…assessment. The kind you make when you’re not sure if you’ve just witnessed loyalty or the start of a coup.
“Mm,” he said, the sound stretching into something like approval, but with enough teeth to remind them both that he kept his own records. "Pretty little mark for something that’s going to hurt.”
She didn’t look at him, didn’t answer. And that, apparently, was answer enough. She left the letter untouched. Some things, once sealed, are not for opening.
Her eyes drifted across the table to the deck of cards. The black design was beautiful with images that caught her attention. A spoon, a scroll, a book of matches, a crown and “Non Placet Exitus” written on the cover. She squinted at it. “The Exit is not Polite?” She looked up at Velin and Bunny. Bunny didn’t miss a beat.
“Yes darling. The exit is not polite. It’s a very dramatic game Velin and I were just making between the two of us. It feels like an invitation. It feels like a warning. It feels like someone watching you open it while asking if you’re sure…because once it’s played…nothing goes back the same. So. Care to play?”
His tone was syrup and salt all at the same time and there was a glimmer in his eye that denoted his amusement. She didn’t catch it. Velin was still as he watched her.
“Ah. Delightful,” She said with that dry, cynical tone she took when she was weighing the room. “I didn’t know you two had been working on a game. I’m glad to see the two of you getting along. But…I don’t know the rules?” She slid into the green velvet chair across from the two of them and picked up a card. The bottom of the deck, almost impossible to read, the words: “Play with caution. Or don’t,” were written along the bottom. It looked like Velin’s handwriting.
The corner of Bunny’s mouth twitched with amusement as he shuffled the deck before them. “Excellent. And yes, you could say me and the Velvet Menace have been working together a bit better lately. Now…The Pocket Chaos Deck has been declared. We begin with 52 opportunities for drama, betrayal, snack diplomacy, and soft emotional sabotage. Let’s shuffle. Let’s bite. Let’s play.”
The Queen drummed her sharp nails on the table, “Yes, chaos does seem to be what we do best around here.” She gave him a half eye-roll and a slight head tilt, her curls bouncing slightly at the movement, trying not to look amused, but the corner of her mouth tilted up just slightly and that always gave her away.
_
Bunny grinned even more broadly. “Chaos is what we do best. Of course it is, darling. Chaos—but curated. With matching cloaks, glitter bombs on a timer, and a court that files petty grievances under “Divine Strategy.” You don’t just survive disorder. You orchestrate it. And then offer a meal with a wink. It’s beautiful really. Let’s play this deck with the full weight of our dysfunction and delight. Because we don’t stack the cards in our favor, we just write new rules mid-game and dare the universe to keep up.”
Velin didn’t sit. He stood slightly off to one side as he watched the game unfold. He didn’t need to say anything, he already knew the game, the stakes, and he already knew which one she’d choose. He’d factored in every angle and he knew the inevitability of her choices. He let Bunny take the wheel and then he waited.
“Okay…” The Queen hesitated briefly as she poured herself a drink from the green crystal decanter on the large wooden desk. Something had registered in Bunny’s tone that sounded like an off-note, but he was always a little snarky so she shrugged it off. “Where do we begin?”
“Let’s begin where all great chaos starts, darling,” Bunny purred. “With characters who think they’re playing one game, but are actually the game itself. Here’s who we begin with. The Queen (that’s you, Sugarspite), Bunny (yours truly of course), Emma their Highness of Contradictions (and Cutlery), Sir Reginald Fluffsworth Esquire III (Of the Emotional Theater Department), Archivarius (A scapegoat), and…hmm. Oh yes, him. The boyfriend. You get to add one. Who will you add? Cookie Bear the Earl of Containment or Velin?”
The Queen’s eyes slid to Velin briefly, standing still as shadow and then quickly down to her hands. She spun the gold rings on her fingers absently. “Cookie Bear please. I don’t think Velin wants to play anything tonight,” she whispered. They still hadn’t talked about the tension between them or the things that she hadn’t said, the things he already knew. He hadn’t approached her and the silence between them was as thick as black ink smeared across a page.
-VRB
(Filed under: Chaos Deck and Exit Strategies, the Velvet Warpath.)