“Oh, hmm.” Marsha shook her head. “I can’t say I do.”
“Nothin’ ’bout bein’ a long time customer? Had a tab runnin’ here?”
“No!” Marsha shrugged. “Sorry about that! Is there anything else I can help you with?”
“No, that’s all right. But thank you kindly.” Seymour tugged on Sariel’s hand. “Let’s go.”
“Aw, leaving already?” Marsha’s eyes twinkled. “Did we not have that special something you were looking for?”
“Yeah, nope, sorry. Thanks anyway, but?—”
“Or was it asomeone?”
Seymour and Sariel exchanged a stare, and Seymour slowly turned back toward the woman. He really hoped she wasn’t some sort of monster, but it would certainly be on brand for the way today had gone so far. “And if I said yes?”
“You’re definitely searching for someone,” the woman said with a loud hum. “Or maybe it’ssomeones. How curious.”
“Uh, yeah.” Seymour cleared his throat. “But they’re not here, clearly, so we gotta be headin’ on.”
“Perhaps a reading would help you!”
“One of them tarot type ones?”
Sariel might have squeaked.
“I have my own special deck for divination I created myself!” Marsha clapped her hands. “Oh, please, please!Please, it would be my pleasure.”
Sariel had the same giddy, tight-lipped expression as someone about to explode from the cuteness overload of seeing baby bunnies for the first time. He gave Seymour a nod and eagerly squeezed his hand.
“Sure. Fine. Awesome.” Seymour walked up to the counter. “Okay, and, uh, what’s this readin’ gonna cost me?”
“Only a few minutes of your time!” Marsha grinned, and there was a deck of cards with swirling silver designs in her hands.
Seymour hadn’t seen where it came from, and his senses went on high alert. While it could have been a simple magic trick, he thought it better to err on the side of caution and assume Marsha could be magical herself.
And therefore, dangerous.
Marsha shuffled the cards and then set them on the counter between them. “Cut the deck three times, please.”
Seymour reached for the cards.
They were made of thick black paper and clearly made by hand, given the brush strokes and texture of the paint used to create the designs. Each one was an identical gothic frame with a big star in the middle, and it was hard to believe Marsha had achieved such a level of consistency without them having been stamped or printed.
Even as he cut the deck, he marveled at how perfectly they all matched. Maybe Marsha liked to paint miniatures or something. The cards were also oddly heavier than he expected, and he swore his fingers tingled when he pulled away.
“Now what?”
“Now we draw.” Marsha pulled seven cards from the top of the deck, laid them out face down in a neat line, and then set the deck aside. “Let’s see what the cards have to say about you!”
“Goody gumdrops.” Seymour faked a smile.
He’d never put much stock in this kind of thing, palm reading and any of this telling the future jazz. He had figured it was a bunch of hogwash and anyone claiming to have psychic abilities was a scam artist.
But he also hadn’t thought monsters were real up until recently, so.
Marsha flipped over the first card. “Ah! Last Hunter’s Call.”
The card had a white piece of paper glued to it, upon which was a detailed drawing in black ink with silver highlights of a sword, an old horn, and a big book. The items were sitting on a rock under a tree.
