Spells Trouble (Sisters of Salem #1) - P. C. Cast Page 0,81

the stained earth? Hunter gripped her opal pendant. Maybe the earth hadn’t called her to this spot. Maybe this was the guidance of her god. “Tyr led me here,” she said and let the pendant fall back into place.

Mercy bit her lip. “Well…” There was that guilty look again. It wrinkled her round nose and pinched the corners of her eyes.

“You have to trust me, Mag.”

“I do!” The words rushed out too quickly.

Hunter bit the inside of her cheek and turned back to the matter at hand. She’d figure out what was going on with Mercy later. Right now, magic called to her and she wouldn’t keep it waiting. She situated her knees against the edge of the ring of blood and set the deck in the middle of the crushed and stained grass. Hunter didn’t follow any specific tarot spreads, and neither did her cards. She did what felt right, what the deck asked her.

Reveal yourself, reveal yourself, reveal yourself. The intention chanted between her ears as she cut the deck with her right hand, rolled her amulet between the fingers of her left, and stacked the halves back together on the grass. A new set of cards was on top. The right set of cards.

Hunter released a measured exhale. One breath per action, one breath per question. It’s what felt right, what the cards demanded. She turned over the first card and set it face-up next to the deck. She couldn’t release the rest of her breath. The deck still called to her. She turned over another card and placed it face-up on the bloodstained grass. Her palm still itched, the tarot calling out for another turn, and Hunter flipped a third card. The feeling ceased and Hunter let loose the breath stored in her chest. The face of each card was milky white, held in blank suspense as they awaited further instruction. The cards would get their questions. And soon.

Another inhale and exhale to place the remaining cards on top of the velvet satchel Hunter had left on the ground outside the circle of blood.

Mercy squatted down next to Hunter. “There’s nothing there,” she whispered as if the cards would be offended by her comment.

Hunter’s cheeks lifted with a grin. Knowing her tarot cards, they just might.

“They’re waiting for questions.” Hunter rubbed her palms together and exhaled as she held her hands over the three blank cards. This moment she took to double-check the readiness of her magic usually felt like warming her hands over a fire, comforting and soothing. But this time was different. This time was more—a fierce, blazing excitement that sent waves of need rippling from her fingertips to her toes and back again.

“We want to know if anything came through.” Mercy continued to whisper. “That’s what you’re going to ask, right? Will all three cards tell you or—”

“Mag!” Hunter curled her hands into fists and rubbed them against her thighs. “I know what I’m doing. Let me do it in my own time.”

Mercy chewed her bottom lip and nodded. “I’m just excited.”

Hunter understood. Excitement dripped from her pores like sweat. She passed the back of her hand along her forehead. She needed to finish this spell and close the channels of power that lit her from the inside out.

Inhale. She pressed the fingertips of her right hand against the first card. Exhale. “Did a creature, a demi-god, come through this gate?”

A sound like splintering wood and the card’s white face dissolved into the ghostly image of a creature hunched over, blurry fists pressed against the ground like a gorilla. Around it, each half of the split olive tree.

Mercy’s brows lifted. “I’m taking that as a yes.”

Inhale. Hunter moved to the next card. Exhale. “This thing that came through, did it hurt anyone?”

Hunter already knew the answer. Whatever it was had killed Earl Thompson. Tyr wouldn’t have led her to his blood if it hadn’t.

Smoke rose from the ground beneath the cards, beneath the blood, beneath the flattened grasses. The earth sizzled and the crushed grass turned black and formed a perfect imprint of where the life had gone out of old Earl Thompson.

Mercy shrieked and hurled herself backward. She landed in the tall grass with a muffled thud. She held out a trembling hand and pointed at the space where she’d squatted only moments before, her jaw bobbing open and closed—the words just out of reach.

A fresh wave of smoke snaked under Hunter’s nose as she followed her sister’s outstretched hand. Hunter blinked