Carte Rouge - Day Three

It’s been a busy couple of weeks - foster kittens, coronavirus, trying to ‘reopen’ at work. Sooooo much going on. But it was nice to sit down, virtually, with my puzzling pal and take another crack at the puzzles of The Enigma Emporium’s Carte Rouge. The kittens offered to help, but I’m afraid they were easily distracted. Nor do they know any runic languages.

Thankfully, however, I’d stumbled across one of the scripts on the cards while looking for something else entirely - if anyone knows where I can find a self-inking rotary date stamp with pretty calligraphic fonts, please let me know. The script that I came across is called Enochian, and in the cards, it can be found on:

• Jokers - intermixed
• King of Clubs - border
• Jack of Clubs - border

We started with the King of clubs - it turns out to be counterclockwise: THE TSAR HAS BEEN ADDRESSED - THE THRONE CAN BE REPOSSESSED

Then, the Jack of Clubs reads: BEST TO ACCEPT AND ASCEND - EACH OFFER CONCEALS AN END

We work on the Jack’s chest. Starting with the alphabet: N A E V K A Y E L K R E T I Y I A. (Assuming left to right orientation, not up-down)

Following the directions on the King’s chest: A N G V K N Y G S K R G T I Y I N

From the numbers side: I K D F L P J S R B N C G M E H A O Q. Again, assuming left-right, A=1. Following the flip side directions, we get: R K D F L T J C I B N S G M E H A O Q

Gobbledygook. 

Let’s try instead from top to bottom: (A=1)

I F S C K L R G D P B M H J N E A Q O. Other side: 

N E A K V Y R A K E E I A L T Y A I 

If we interweave them, we get: INFESACKKVLY....  Still gobbledygook. We have a look at the runes on the spades, but honestly my brain is fried - it’s been a long week and it’s only Tuesday. Time for kittens. Always time for kittens