Homecoming by Amber Benson Read Free Book Online

questioning was moot. Dev would just have to see what the cards had to say.
    â€œA number, please,” Dev said. “Whatever first comes to mind.”
    â€œSeven,” Eleanora replied, without hesitation.
    Dev counted out seven cards and placed The Fool—one of her favorites—into the first position of the spread. There was something poignant about the naïveté of The Fool’s golden face, the way the sun hung above him, without judgment, even though it could see how precariously close its charge stood to the cliff’s edge.
    â€œThe Fool, eh?” Eleanora murmured to herself. Then she said to Dev: “The cards have a will of their own today.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?” Dev said, furrowing her brow.
    â€œI don’t think you’re interested in my question, are you?” Eleanora said to the cards. She looked at Dev and continued, “The Fool is not Lyse, and they know that I know this.”
    â€œHow can you—we’ve barely begun,” Dev said, her palms already slick with sweat.
    â€œI wanted to know about Hessika’s dreams. I wanted the cards to confirm them. That’s not what’s happening here.”
    â€œI believe you,” Dev said. “Shall we continue?”
    Eleanora nodded, eyes locked on The Fool, whose borders blended with the yellow of the tablecloth, so the card appeared printed onto the lemon damask.
    â€œAnother number, please.”
    â€œSeven,” Eleanora said.
    Six cards were disregarded before Dev came to the seventh, which she flipped over to reveal The Devil. She knew this wasn’t a reference to the literal Devil, but the instinctual repulsion she felt whenever this card cropped up in one of her readings was hard to ignore.
    â€œAnother number—” Dev said.
    â€œSeven,” Eleanora replied, interrupting Dev. “And seven again for the fourth card.”
    Dev stayed her hand, uncertain.
    â€œAre you sure?”
    Eleanora nodded with vigor, but the action seemed to wear her out and she rested her head in the crook of her left arm, breathing heavily.
    â€œJust read the cards,” Eleanora said, her voice hard. “There’s something strange going on here and I need you to do as I ask.”
    Dev didn’t appreciate being snapped at, but Eleanora looked so pathetic, her pale cream blouse barely concealing her excavated collarbones and sharpened shoulder blades, that Dev let it pass without argument. Flipping over Eleanora’s next card, she set The Hierophant down on the table above The Fool and The Devil.
    â€œHmm,” Eleanora murmured, then watched as Dev drew the last of the chosen cards.
    â€œThe Magician,” Dev said, holding up this fourth card for Eleanora to see before laying it down on the table beneath the other three cards.
    As seen from above, the cards now formed a truncated Christian cross, but one that held an empty space in its middle. This was where Dev would place the final card: a card Eleanora hadn’t consciously chosen but was a synthesis of the other four—and would be the card upon which the rest of the spread depended.
    In her head, Dev totaled the number values for The Fool, The Devil, The Heirophant, and The Magician, and with this knowledge laid down the fifth and final card of the spread:
    The World.
    Eleanora seemed to glean the spread’s meaning instinctively, shaking her head as if she could hardly believe the audacity of the cards. Dev, on the other hand, had barely processed what she was seeing, let alone come to any conclusions.
    â€œWell, now, isn’t that the darnedest thing,” Eleanora said, slapping the top of the table with the heel of her hand before shaking her head one more time in disbelief: “Looks as though someone has hijacked my spread.”
    She sat back in her chair, her sharp eyes scanning the kitchen, looking—it seemed to Dev—for something . . .