“She looks like trouble,” Cal says.
“‘Led the king’s troops at the Battle of Caravan, 1000 ED (Era of Deia),’” Shadow reads. “I think she sounds amazing.”
So are you, Cal wants to say. But he doesn’t. They continue on, stopping at various portraits to read about the nobles who once walked these same halls. Cal is so caught up in it he almost forgets these are Renovia’s long-established enemies.
“Ready for another?” Cal asks, holding up his empty glass. He wants to leave the exhibit. Nothing of use here, and they need to stay on track.
Shadow says, “Sure,” even though he knows she’s enjoying the portraits.
Since they’re so close to the end of the hall, Cal keeps walking rather than go all the way back from where they came. It’s darker that way, fewer candles lit, but he saw some people go in that direction. He’s sure either passage leads back to the ballroom.
They turn the corner and find a wrinkled elderly woman sitting at a cloth-covered table in the hall. Her frizzy gray hair is tucked under a black cap and she wears a shapeless black cape and sacklike dress, so it looks a bit like her head is emerging from a pile of bedclothes. She is shuffling a deck of cards with long, gnarled fingers tipped with bold red nails. Others are fanned out in front of her, facedown. The cards’ backs are plain black except for the triple eternity circle etched in gold.
He has the sudden urge to turn back, but his pride won’t allow him to do that. It would look cowardly. He wonders why he finds the old woman so unsettling. Keep walking. Look straight ahead. Don’t make eye contact.
“My lady,” the old woman says, lowering her head when Shadow passes.
Shadow stops. “What are you playing?” she asks the old woman. Cal frowns. Why did she have to stop? Nothing good can come of this. Phony fortune-tellers just prey on vulnerabilities and draw out people’s fears, and that’s the last distraction Shadow needs with so much at stake. He’s seen plenty of these women; they target people who seem friendly, malleable. They take advantage of the fervent desire people have to reclaim magic, to control their own fate. Also, he has to admit he’s a bit superstitious, even if he doesn’t believe in it.
“It is no game, my lady,” the old woman says. “It is destiny.”
“No, thank you,” Cal says, trying to move them away. He hates hearing that; fate has had its way with him too much already. He’d rather avoid hearing anyone’s destiny, especially Shadow’s.
The old woman doesn’t acknowledge him. She stares at Shadow. “For others, I charge. For you, nothing. Your soul is calling to me. You have questions. Doubts. I have answers.”
“Come on, Shadow. Everyone has questions and doubts. We have business to attend to, remember?”
“My aunts could do this. Or something like it. They used rocks. With symbols.”
“Ah yes. The Seeing Stones. Come here, my lady,” says the crone.
Cal stands back, powerless to stop Shadow. He relents. What’s the harm? The crone will give her a vague reading and that will be the end of it. He’d wager a gold coin that as soon as it’s done, she will advise Shadow to meet with her elsewhere, except not for free.
She hands the deck to Shadow. While she shuffles it, the old woman says, “Let your energy mingle with the cards. The more you think, the more they know.”
Shadow hands them back to her. She cuts them in three piles. “Stack them,” the fortune-teller orders. Shadow does as she says. Then the woman pulls six cards, placing them facedown in a diamond pattern, with one in the middle. The last one, she lays across the bottom card.
“Are you ready to see your destiny?” the old woman says.
Shadow nods.
She flips over the first card. “Ah. The Empress. This represents you, the fertile young maiden. You find peace in nature, yes. Yet you also hold the crown and the scepter with grace and authority. Let’s see what hovers over you.” She turns the card at the top of the diamond. “The Queen of Wands. An older woman in your life. Your mother? Your aunt? She possesses great power, and believes in peace. And yet . . . the black cat sits at her feet. She holds a secret, a darker side. Something hidden. On either side of you . . .” She turns the cards to the left and right of the Empress. “The King of Pentacles and the Knight of Swords. One holds power and a large gold coin in offering, the other—strength. Protection. Loyalty. A choice. At your feet is the path you walk . . . which will you choose?” She turns the card below the Empress. She gasps.
“What is it?” Shadow cries out.
Cal rolls his eyes. Here’s the hook. Though he admits he’s ever so slightly worried about the cards—they seemed strangely . . . accurate. You’re falling for it too, he tells himself. He looks at the card the woman turned over.
“The Tower,” the old woman says. “A disaster. Crisis.”
“What does that mean?” Shadow says. “What will happen?”
“Let’s turn the last card, your destiny.” She turns it, then sits back and crosses her arms. Satisfied. “See? All is well. After the storm, the sun.”
Cal looks at the calligraphy at the bottom of the card: The Wheel of Fortune.
“Fate,” the old woman says, “always wins.”
CHAPTER FORTY
Shadow
WE’RE SITTING AT BREAKFAST THE next morning, back at the duke’s estate, Cal with a strangely foul mood about him. He seems irritated, but I don’t recall having said or done anything to upset him last night, nor do I remember anyone else causing concern.
A footman arrives to deliver a pot of fresh tea to the table. “Excuse me,” I say to him. “But could you possibly bring me a sprig of peppermint from the kitchen?”
“Lady Lila, if you require anything, please feel free to come to me first. I am your hostess,” the duchess says. She reaches for a slice of toasted bread, muttering, “Directly addressing the staff, imagine . . .”
“Maybe that’s your major disaster,” Cal says to me out of the corner of his mouth.
Ah, so it was the fortune-teller—after that he went from having a wonderful time to wanting to leave and go to bed. Except he didn’t even believe she was a real wise woman, and besides that, nothing she said was terrible—I can’t remember every card exactly, but I do remember she said all would be well in the end. Though I suppose she could say that to anyone? I’m not certain how that type of thing is supposed to go. I’ve only had my fortune read once.
On my thirteenth birthday, when I was finally old enough to practice some magic, my aunts cast Seeing Stones for me, as they had done when they turned thirteen. At the time I thought they were the most beautiful things I’d ever seen: translucent rose quartz, polished smooth, with carved symbols accented in gold leaf. Moments after they were thrown, from a pouch Aunt Mesha’s great-grandmother had made, into a circle drawn with coal, Aunt Moriah gathered them back up and shoved them in the bag.