Nine of Swords and Ten of Swords

The dread and the thing itself. The Ten is a figure face down with ten blades in the back and the sun rising behind. The tradition reads this run as the feared thing arriving, and is emphatic that the arrival is usually less unbearable than the nights before it.

Associated with an ending that had been anticipated for a long time. Read as grief with relief inside it.

The dismissal or collapse that was expected. Frequently read as the end of a much longer period of fearing it.

Ten swords is more than anybody needs, which the tradition reads as theatre. This is the bottom, and the light on the horizon is part of the card rather than consolation added to it.