He dropped his head and rubbed his temples, hoping to ease the lingering ache. Why am I being such a dick about this? Cass hadn’t struck him as a drama queen, so if there was something that worried her, he needed to listen.
Resolved, he lifted his head and took in the ten-card spread. “All right, tell me what we’re looking at.”
Cass searched his face, probably trying to see if he was serious. He waited her out. The tension in her body slowly faded, and she turned back to the cards. “Do you know anything about tarot?”
“Outside the fact that it’s a divination tool, no.”
“Right, so this deck has been in my family for generations.” She fanned out a few cards from the pile she held, showing him the vibrant imagery. “The Alcmene women descend from a line of Greek Seers, hence the gods and goddesses instead of the typical Major and Minor Arcana titles.” She set the stack of unused cards aside and then went back to the ones lying on the table. “This layout is a Celtic Cross, and it can either provide in-depth answers to specific questions or help guide you on general ones. Since I couldn’t nail down what’s bothering me, I needed something to help me cut through the noise. I wasn’t intending to ask anything specific and was surprised when you became the focus.”
He studied the striking artwork on each card. It was vivid and mesmerizing and, despite its age, didn’t look like it had survived generations of hands and shuffling. His attention drifted back to the Magician card. “Why Hecate’s card?”
Cass’s shoulders went solid, and she tucked her hair behind an ear, a nervous tell he’d spotted earlier, right before they kissed. What she didn’t do was look at him as she spoke. “Depending on its position, it can represent someone who doesn’t let emotions rule but uses them to enhance their skills. This person tends to be detail oriented, extremely good at what they do, and an inspiration to others.”
He could recognize some of those traits in himself, but no one was that good. “Sounds a little too perfect to be me.”
That brought her head up, and a flash of humor was there and gone. “Oh, it’s not all rainbows and glitter, because it can also represent someone unsure of themselves and their abilities, leaving them constantly off-balance. They may be more inclined to talk a big game than actually pull it off, which makes others wonder what they’re up to.”
“Not sure I like any of those either.”
She gave a soft chuckle. “This card fits you in that you’re steady, you know what you want, and you’re sure of your skills.”
A warm feeling wrapped around his heart. “Okay, I can work with that.” He decided to move them along. “And that one?”
“That one would be our current problem. The Erinyes card tends to signify some kind of illusion or deception.”
“I’m not hexed.” He didn’t know why her continued insinuation irritated him so much.
“That’s not what I said, Grayson,” she shot back with strained patience. “I said you’re being negatively influenced somehow. Look.” She got up on her knees and started pointing out the various cards, beginning with the one to the left of Hecate. “This represents your past—things that are impacting the now.”
The card showed a woman lying in a flower-strewn pool, her eyes half open as if asleep or dreaming, but it was upside down. “Naiads? What’s it mean?”
Cass looked uncomfortable. “It’s the ten of cups, reversed. It signifies a broken family, disharmony, conflict, and emotional turmoil.”
He tensed, not liking how close her interpretation skirted to the truth, but before he could comment, she moved on.
“This one”—she touched the card sitting to the right of his card—“indicates the possible future if we don’t change things.”
It was heavily shadowed, with a bare sliver of moon illuminating a male profile with an angled chin. The name at the bottom said Erebus. His stomach knotted as he noted that it, too, was upside-down.
“The Page of Swords, reversed, indicates that if things remain the same, you’ll start to question what’s real.” She reached for the card sitting above his. It reminded him of Cass—dark hair, golden eyes, and witchy face set against a star-studded sky and surrounded by shadows that could be either grasping hands or feathered wings. “This is the best outcome if we continue forward without making any changes.”
He read the name at the bottom of the card. “Chaos? That doesn’t sound good.”
That earned him a small smile. “Actually, the Ace of Swords in this position shows you’ll eventually see through the lies.”
“How about not having to deal with them in the first place?”
“Yeah, that would be ideal.” She skipped over the grim visage of the card sitting directly below his, instead picking up the last card of four placed in a column to the right. “This is the Knight of Pentacles, Zephyros, which warns us to move carefully as we deal with all of this.”
This card was done in shades of white, gold, and silver. A man with gold wings faced to the left, his profile lovingly detailed but his body a vague impression of smoke.
“And this one?” He took the card she had skipped over. It showed a black-armored, horned, helmeted warrior holding a three-headed puppy. “Let me guess—Hades is the Devil?”
She nodded as she took the card from him and put it back. What she didn’t do was talk.
“Cass, what does it mean?”
Instead of answering, she said, “I made a call to Des and asked him to do a search on Russ.” She took a deep breath and faced him. Her gaze was worried but steady. “He found out that Russ is an Auctori mage.”
