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Adam held up his hands. “I really don’t know anything, though I’m trying to find out. Could you ask around for me, about the souls?”

“Sure,” they said.

“Just don’t forget the protein bars,” Joey added.

“I won’t. Next week. I promise.”

7

Vic wasn’t home when Adam entered the apartment.

Spider meowed hello from the blanket fort Adam had set up for him in the corner but he didn’t bother to emerge for a more affectionate greeting.

Adam’s phone pinged with a message from Jack as he set his backpack down.

There’s nothing.

What do you mean?

About the elven religion. It’s all been redacted, wiped. Not just from my systems. EVERYWHERE. All I’m finding are wikis from role-playing games.

How is that possible?

I don’t know, but there’s nothing in the library about it. There’s nothing on the net. Somebody powerful really doesn’t want that information out there.

Adam could read Jack’s frustration in his text. Somebody. Someone with enough authority to scrub all of the data sources Jack had access to. Adam could think of one or two elves with that kind of pull.

Thanks, Adam typed.

I’ve got one or two other ideas, but if they’re capable of this, then they’ve got hackers better than me. We may not be able to speak like this again.

How will I talk to you?

You might not. I’ll send the boggin file, but there’s not much there.

Jack logged off.

Adam’s email pinged and he opened the attachment.

Jack hadn’t lied. The pages of text, obviously written by an elf, probably Dautre, described the creatures in painstaking detail. They were spiritous, which Adam already knew. Their anatomy wasn’t unlike sea creatures, jellyfish specifically, which he also knew. What he found curious was what was missing. No mention of the Between, no mention of their origins, other than a note on them being extraplanar.

What were they so afraid of, and what did it have to do with their religion?

Adam set down his phone and then turned it off completely, just in case.

If technology wasn’t going to help, then he’d have to do this the old-fashioned way.

He hadn’t needed Jack in the old days, when it had been him and his great-aunt living in a trailer.

Adam took his tarot deck out of its decorative wooden box.

A Christmas gift from Jesse, hand-drawn and painstakingly detailed, the cards were Adam’s most prized possession. The box had been a good find at the antique mall.

He sat, making sure his legs weren’t crossed, and asked his question: “Where do I go from here?”

Into it he wound all of his worry about the future and the importance of stopping what he’d seen in the Between. He packed it tight with his need to know why the banshee had attacked the concert.

There were a lot of spreads for tarot reading. Some were complicated, but Adam preferred to keep it simple. The cards weren’t an oracle, just a channel for his Sight.