The seven-card Horse Shoe is a convenient, basic layout that can be used to answer different types of questions, especially concerning questions where insight would be helpful. Like several other spreads, it has cards representing the past, present, and future.
The pinnacle of the Horse Shoe, looking like the top of the mountain, shows the obstacle or challenge that needs to be addressed and overcome. Card #6 suggests a course of action to meet this challenge. The final card shows the outcome or future, should this advice be followed.
Other clues are provided in Cards #3 and #5, which indicate hidden or outside influences that come into play, affecting the journey to your goal.
Obstacle  The Magician |
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Hidden Influences  Queen of Wands |
External Influences  9 of Pentacles |
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The Present  Page of Wands |
Suggestion  Ace of Swords |
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The Past  Queen of Cups |
The Outcome  4 of Swords |
The Past Card represents past events that are affecting the question.
Queen of Cups
Beautiful, fair, dreamy – as one who sees visions in a cup. This is, however, only one of her aspects; she sees, but she also acts, and her activity feeds her dream.
Upright Meaning:
Good, fair woman; honest, devoted woman, who will do service to the Querent; loving intelligence, and hence the gift of vision; success, happiness, pleasure; also, wisdom, virtue; a perfect spouse and a good mother.
Page of Wands
A young man stands in the act of proclamation. He is unknown but faithful, and his tidings are strange.
Upright Meaning:
Dark young man, faithful, a lover, family intelligence, a messenger, favourable testimony. A dangerous rival, if followed by the Page of Cups.
Queen of Wands
Emotionally and otherwise, the Queen's personality corresponds to that of the King of Wands, though she is more charismatic.
Reversed Meaning:
Good, economical, obliging, serviceable. Also signifies opposition, jealousy, even deceit and infidelity.
The Magician
A robed figure performs the act of ceremonial magic in order to direct his will to perform his desires.
Reversed Meaning:
Mental illness, disgrace, manipulation, excessive force, misuse of power, backfire, troubles.
9 of Pentacles
A woman with a bird upon her wrist, stands amidst a great abundance of grapevines in the garden of a luxurious manorial house. Possibly it is her own possession and testifies to material well-being.
Reversed Meaning:
Roguery, deception, voided project, bad faith, insecurity, egotism, immodesty, self-centeredness, vanity, narcissism.
Ace of Swords
A hand reaches out from a cloud, grasping a sword, the point of which is encircled by a crown.
Reversed Meaning:
Conception, childbirth, augmentation, multiplicity, creativity.
4 of Swords
The effigy of a knight in the attitude of prayer, at full length upon his tomb.
Upright Meaning:
Vigilance, retreat, solitude, hermit's repose, exile, tomb and coffin. It is these last that have suggested the design.