21 Ways — Step One
Step ONE: Sirian Starseed, Master of Orbs.
I’ve decided I want to learn more about this deck so have started anew.
The Master of Orbs shows a frowning shaven headed man perhaps in his 40s seated on a tall grey wooden throne with a repeated design composed of abstract curves carved on the two uprights at either side and the uppermost part of the back, which angles up at about 30 degrees to a point above him and just below the top of the uprights. He is wearing a high quality floor length royal blue robe with short sleeves and a thicker white patterned strip along the open edges where it joins at the front. Underneath this he wears a shiny, silvery white high collared and long sleeved one piece garment which also reaches all the way down, covering his feet. In places this has an appearance resembling crystal, transparent ice or a waterfall. The man holds a shiny, sharp looking silver sword across his lap, but is holding it in his left hand with a strange reversed grip - he could stab it forwards and down or hold it resting point down on the ground, but not slash with it as normally used. He appears rather to be examining the sword or possibly displaying it to an onlooker - the pointed end is resting on the four fingers of his open right hand and this grip of his left hand would be better for supporting the hilt which is also of silvery metal and so would be heavier than the pointed end. With the cross piece of the hilt held vertical, the cutting edge of the blade would be against his fingers, so perhaps he is feeling its sharpness or showing someone that he can hold it so steadily as not to cut himself. He is actually looking slightly upwards as if he has just raised his gaze from the sword towards an observer. There is some sort of indistinct object in the man’s right hand running across from the base of his thumb just in front of his wrist. It looks like a flat curved strip about an inch wide with what could be four letters or runes on it, and between this and his thumb and index figure is a strange looking black shadow or what may be some form of fingerless glove or strap. The letters, if that is what they are, look a bit like a V or inverted A, L, U or O and S. The throne rests atop a flight or terrace of 9 clean grey stone steps, although there could be more below the bottom of the image, becoming less wide as they ascend. These steps are very nearly level but slope slightly towards the man’s left, the same side as the heavier end of the sword. They look slightly worn or uneven in places as though old. Behind the steps can be made out a sea and low piece of land coming in from the left of the picture, but the background is very bright and the sea is hard to make out from the sky near the horizon. The scene behind the man is all sky blue and white, with fluffy white clouds and an enormous circular shape of sky blue to the rear of the clouds. This would probably be indistinguishable from the sky behind were it not outlined by a white light seeming to come from behind it. Moving down from the top this circle gets brighter, blending into the sky and white clouds half way down, then becomes even brighter towards the bottom. At the very bottom this circle if continued would be behind the base of the throne, but a brilliant white arc can here be seen on the topmost step on which the throne rests, and below this appears a hazy blue glowing arc as if the light had somehow come right through the structure, or maybe has been absorbed into the rear and re-emitted from the front in the way that heat might be. Near the top of the image, above the left hand pillar of the throne as we look at it, is a very small white point. If natural this might be the planet Venus or a nova - although Sirius is the brightest star in the sky I don’t think it could be seen in such bright daylight. Nearly in the top right corner can just be seen a faint mottled circular object which could be the moon, full or a little past, although this seems somewhat high to be a realistic representation.