I wanted to gather as many of the wraiths as possible and was delighted when I drew the heiress, a young woman with long dark hair and sorrowful blue eyes, a white dress accentuating her lovely figure. A golden belt was cinched at her waist, where a small dagger was sheathed in a bejeweled scabbard. When I tilted the card in the light, tears of blood streamed down the heiress’s cheeks, marring the ivory sheen of her gown. It was a disturbing sight, one that made me forget where I was until Phelan nudged my foot beneath the table.

“It’s your turn, Anna.”

“Will you trade with me?” I asked.

To my surprise, he did. I gave him the eight of clubs, and he gave me another wraith. The guard. He was decked in armor, his face obscured by a helm. But when I tilted the card, flames began to lick up his body, melting the steel into quicksilver, and I could see his face, screaming in pain. . . .

“You are terrible at this game,” Phelan drawled.

I ignored him and asked, “Do you know who illustrated these cards?” I had an inkling that his mother had painted them. I had seen her buying supplies in the art shop—a place I now wished I had never step foot in. She cast no shadow. And there was that uncanny portrait of the twin brothers, tucked away in Phelan’s desk.

“Yes, I do.”

“Who is it?”

He shifted in his chair. I sensed his discomfort, and his voice was wary when he said, “What’s this really about, Anna?”

I laid down my cards, faceup, so Phelan could see them. The two wraiths caught the firelight, gleaming as if they breathed, as if they lived, trapped on the paper.

“I think the enchantment surrounding these cards is giving the knight a way into dreams that are not his own,” I began.

Phelan frowned, contemplating. “Go on.”

I couldn’t tell him that my conclusion had not only come from the duke, but also from Elle Fielding in Hereswith, who had lost a round of Seven Wraiths and suffered a nightmare for it. A dark dream where the knight had trod. The cards and the armor, both made from different deviah magicians, were somehow linked together by nightmares. I just did not know how yet, and I hoped Phelan would give me insight.

“We know that whoever loses this game will have a nightmare as punishment,” I continued, tracing my fingertip over the burning guard, the weeping heiress. Both who had betrayed their duke a century ago. “I think the nightmares spawned by this game are providing doorways, or portals, for the knight, who is wearing enchanted armor, to physically pass into them.”