“Damn. I need a job,” I muttered to myself.
She winked. “I recommend fortune-telling. The customers usually hate what you tell them, but it pays well. They don’t call me Lady Fortune for nothing.”
Jaxson grunted. “You didn’t count the money this time.”
Lady Fortune stuck a hand on her hip and raised her chin. “With a lady present? Never. Anyway, you tipped well enough last time that I don’t think I have anything to worry about.”
At least Jaxson was generous with his money, if nothing else.
She pushed a clipboard with a pen and contract across the table.
“What’s this?” I narrowed my eyes.
“Liability release. Just in case you want to blame me for a bad fortune or any of the crazy things you’re going to do once you hear it.”
I glanced at Jaxson, becoming less certain of this plan every second. He nodded, so I skimmed the agreement and signed, hoping I hadn’t just sold my soul.
The seer began shuffling her cards impossibly fast, then she slammed the deck down on the table. “Now, you’ve come a long way from Wisconsin. Tell me what it is that you want to know.”
Hell, how much did she already know about me? I had so many questions eating at me that I could feel them trying to tear their way out of my chest. Could I only ask one? “Why are people hunting me, and who are they?”
Lady Fortune rested her long pink nails on the top of the tarot deck. “Two for the price of one? Cheeky, but I’ll indulge you since you’re new to town. Let us see what the fates have to say. Watch out. Magic is about to happen, and it scares the willies out of me every time.”
Electricity crackled through the air. The candles dimmed, and the scent of fresh coffee filled the tent. I heard the sound of a heartbeat pounding deep in the earth, shaking the space around us. My own heart began to beat in time, faster and faster, and my breath caught as darkness swirled around the room. The shadows became serpents, constricting around us, squeezing the air from my lungs, and whirling like a hurricane. Darkness swallowed us, and my stomach lurched, as if falling from the sky. I grabbed the table to steady myself and to fight the rising nausea.
The only light left came from a single candle, flickering overhead.
I looked to Jaxson with frightened eyes, but he nodded calmly and touched my hand. Electricity jolted between us, and he pulled his fingers away as if stung. His eyes flashed honey gold.
But his weren’t the only eyes watching me. The hair on my neck stood upright. There were other watchers in the darkness. Invisible. Waiting.
The seer cleared her throat.
“We draw three cards—one for each of the fates.” She slid them off the top of the deck one at a time, keeping them face down. As soon as she was done, the deck vanished.
She flipped the first card over with her long pink nails and paused, her hand hanging in the air above.
“The Moon. Very strange.” She glanced between us. “It was the first card I drew for him.”
I leaned forward. The card showed two wolves sitting on opposite sides of a river, howling up at a smiling moon. As I looked, the image began to waver and move, as if the wolves were alive and the stream was flowing.
I blinked. It was just a card.
She flipped the second. “The Lovers.”
Again, the seer looked between us and raised an inquiring eyebrow. I blushed. Hopefully, she hadn’t drawn that card for him as well.
After a pregnant pause, the seer hooked a nail under that final card and flipped it over. “The Wheel.”
Her magic swirled around me, and the distance between us seemed to fade. Soon, the only things left in the room were the cards and her brilliant eyes, which turned pure white. My heart clenched, and I sucked in a sharp breath.
The seer spoke in a voice that was not of this earth. It was hoarse, and infinitely old. “Your path ahead lies in peril, but the river of fortune draws you onward. You cannot run, and you cannot stop your fate. If you do not find those who are chasing you, they will find you. If you do not destroy them, they will destroy you. You must betray yourself to save yourself. You must betray us all to save us all. The end is inevitable. Darkness will fall.”
A deep and unrelenting dread coiled in my stomach, and I reached sideways for Jaxson’s hand but couldn’t find it. I couldn’t find him at all.
The seer’s eyes flickered and returned to brown. I brushed Jaxson’s hand and pulled my fingers away. It was like he hadn’t been there at all for a moment, and then was.
I clenched my shaking hands into fists. “What does it mean?”