“Well,” I said, picking up my backpack from the floor and unzipping it. “Maybe these will help you get some new clients.”
I retrieved three crystals, laying them carefully on the table. They pulsed with an eerie azure light, casting a glow that reflected on Isabel’s face as she watched them, mesmerized.
“Oh, Lou,” she whispered, picking one up. “These are… beautiful.”
I smiled. I wasn’t one to toot my own horn, but…
Who was I kidding. Tooting my own horn was one of my favorite hobbies. If there was tooting to be done, you could count on me to be there. Tooting. My horn.
These crystals were perfect. The crystallization process took nearly three weeks, and I had diligently checked their progression each day, making minute corrections to the salty solution. It was a master’s work; you couldn’t get it from a second-rate alchemist.
“They let you communicate with the dead,” I said. “If you’re already in tune with the spirit world.”
I wasn’t a psychic; when I had tried to use them, all I got was a monstrous headache. But I assumed Isabel would fare better.
“Are you going to use them to talk to your… family?” I asked delicately.
Like me, Isabel was an orphan. But despite that, she never ceased talking about her ancestors as if they were living and breathing. She visited them regularly. More than twenty of Isabel’s family members were buried in the King family mausoleum. I had been there with her several times myself, when we were younger.
“I don’t know.” Her face was lost in thought.
I cleared my throat. “Okay! Two hundred each, like I told you.” Normally, I’d charge three hundred, but Isabel and I went way back. Two hundred was just enough to cover the ingredient cost.
She hesitated. “Listen hon, I’m having a bit of a cash flow problem at the moment. Can I pay you next week?”
I shut my eyes, cursing inwardly. I should have known. The way she hesitated when she first asked for them, the widening of her almond-shaped eyes as I named the price. I had known Isabel for long enough that it should have been obvious. But I’d blindly followed along, wanting to help a friend.
“Damn it, Isabel,” I muttered. “ABC is paying me a visit tomorrow. I need this cash.”
“You owe money to Breadknife?” Her eyes widened. “Lou, after all we went through with that bastard—”
“It was an accident,” I protested. “I was about to pay him back, but then there was that fire in my shop half a year ago… and things kinda went to hell after that.”
“Aw, shit.” Isabel muttered.
I nodded and sipped my jasmine tea. It didn’t taste so great anymore.
“Listen,” she finally said, rummaging in a small purse. “I have a hundred and fifty. So maybe I can buy only one crystal, and pay you the rest later? Would that be enough?” She retrieved a few crumpled notes.
I did a mental calculation. Since I had collected an extra hundred from Ronald, one-fifty would be just enough for ABC. It would mean I didn’t have enough for rent, but that was a problem for another day. “Okay.” I plucked the bills from her fingers.
“I’ll give you a reading, free of charge,” Isabel said, her voice apologetic.
“You always give me readings free of charge. Anyway, there’s no need, I know my future. It’s fucked.”
She had already retrieved the pack of tarot cards from a shelf behind her. “I’m sure it’s not, hon. You’re the most resourceful person I know. You’ll make it work. Let’s ask the cards how you’ll fare this month. You’ll see—it’ll be much better than you think.”
I sighed as I watched her deftly shuffling the cards, her nimble fingers a blur. Then she held the deck for me. “Cut it.”
I pried the top card from the deck and held it to her, grinning.
“Always a smart-ass,” she muttered, taking the card and sliding it under the pack. She picked up the topmost card. “This is your current situation.” She flicked the card onto the table.
“Hardly surprising,” I muttered as I peered at the Fool. He was walking blithely, approaching the edge of a cliff, holding a flower.
She tapped a long, pink-painted fingernail on the card. “Nothing goes as planned. A situation that seemed straightforward turns out to be slippery. Your plans are foiled, and the best you can do is move along, laughing about it.”
“Gee, Isabel, you think? Could you be talking about the money that isn’t in my purse right now?”
“The second card,” Isabel said, ignoring my tone, “is the challenge ahead of you.”
She flicked another card on the table. The Emperor. Sitting on his throne, looking generally pissed.
“A strong, powerful man,” Isabel muttered uncomfortably. “One who cannot be resisted.”
I frowned at the card. It seemed the same as always, but when the light of the candles flickered, the emperor’s scepter looked like a knife, and his face bore an uncanny resemblance to Anthony Cisternino’s. I leaned to look closer, and the illusion faded away. My own subconscious playing dumb tricks on me.
“The third card will be your guidance,” Isabel said, trying to be cheerful, and flicked the final card.
I glanced at it, half expecting to see Death, and felt a moment of confusion. It depicted an enormous eye, burning with an unnatural flame, green scales around it. It almost seemed as if the card depicted only the eye because there wasn’t enough room for the entire creature on it.
“The Dragon?” I asked. “I didn’t know that was an actual card.”
She stared back at me, her face paler than I had ever seen it. “It isn’t,” she muttered. “Lou, what did you do to my deck? Is this your idea of a joke?”
“Nothing, Isabel, I swear!”
She picked up the cards, her fingers trembling so hard she dropped the deck. They spilled on the table, their faces up. I gawked at the chaotic spread, trying to make sense of what I saw. I knew almost none of these cards: The Lingering Shadow. The Closed Box. The Secret. Betrayal. Chaos.
My eyes scanned the cards, trying to piece them together, as if they were a picture book. The images were drenched in suffering and fear. There were six different cards depicting Death. Amidst them all, a card with a familiar figure caught my eye: a man in a long trench coat, standing in the darkness. I reached for that card, to look at it more closely.
Isabel snatched it away, and scooped the rest of the cards from the table. “I… I need you to go, hon,” she whispered.
“Isabel, what—”
“Please, Lou. Just go.”
“Sure.” I tried to shake off the uneasy feeling in my gut. Zipping my backpack closed, I stood up. “I told you my future is fucked.”
Chapter Four
I was brooding as I cycled back home, thinking of Isabel’s card reading, and her reaction. The cards had surprised her. Which meant either someone was messing with Isabel… or the reading had been spot on.
I had never seen her so scared.