Devil's Advocate (The X-Files: Origins #2)(11)

Behind them the register went cha-ching again. It seemed to break the spell of the moment. There was a blackboard on an easel just inside the side door to announce what classes were being offered that day. Right now there was only one, and Dana squinted to read it.

“Psychic Emergence…?”

“Oh, sure,” said Melissa, nodding. “That’s supposed to be great. It’s taught by that guy Sunlight.”

Dana raised an eyebrow. “Sunlight? His name is Sunlight?”

“That’s what he calls himself. Haven’t you see him, Dana? He’s so mysterious and gorgeous. He’s Corinda’s business partner and owns half of this place, though she runs it. Oh my God, there he is.”

A man came out of the room and paused to talk with two other arriving students, both girls from FSK High.

“Isn’t he awesome?” asked Melissa dreamily.

Dana had to admit that her sister had a point. The man called Sunlight was tall and thin with very dark hair and pale gray eyes. Dana thought that he looked like a poet, like Percy Shelley or Lord Byron. Full, sensual lips and an aristocratic and intellectual air about him. At first glance she thought he was forty, but she corrected herself. He was probably around thirty, but there was a sense of age and authority in the way he stood and moved. The students coming out of the class all smiled at him and nodded to him, and generally seemed dazed just to be in his presence.

“Isn’t he amazing?” enthused Melissa.

Dana nodded to a second, slightly shorter man who came and stood with Sunlight for a moment. Younger, maybe eighteen, with thick black hair and dark eyes. Where Sunlight was thin like a dancer, the younger man was muscular, like a gymnast.

“Who’s that?” asked Dana. Melissa must have caught something in Dana’s voice, because she gave her sister a knowing grin.

“Oh, him? That’s just Angelo. He helps with some of the classes here. I see him around school sometimes. I think he works part-time there, too. Why?”

“He’s kind of cute.”

“Not compared to Sunlight.”

“Oh,” mused Dana, “I don’t know about that.”

“Ah,” said a voice, “my two favorite red queens. Sorry I’ve been keeping you waiting.”

They turned and looked up to see the co-owner standing there. The sight of her always lifted Dana’s heart. Corinda Howell was an overgrown waif, with masses of wavy blond hair atop a willowy body that was nearly six feet tall. There were streaks and swirls of brown and red in that mane, though Dana could never tell if it was natural or a good dye job. There were thin braids mixed haphazardly in with the natural waves, and the looser strands were so fine that even the faint breeze when customers entered the shop made them lift and flow. She had a pale face and a splash of sun freckles, green eyes that she emphasized with too much eyeliner, and thin lips she tried to make larger by painting outside the lines. Her legs were long, and she wore lots of ankle and wrist bracelets. Dangling earrings, necklaces, and occasionally a stick-on glitter bindi. She was not particularly pretty but was very earthy, and a lot of men who came to Beyond Beyond seemed enormously attracted to her. Corinda wore swirling peasant skirts and blouses that were either batik, tie-dyed, or silk-screened with images of Hindu gods. Today was a batik day, and her colors were muted golds and plum and brown.

“Hey,” said Melissa.

“Hey yourself. So, what can I get you? Wait—let me see if I remember. Coffee with triple half-and-half for you, Melissa, and some of my special tea for little sister.”

“Right,” said Melissa. “And muffins. There must be muffins, or it’s curtains for the free world.”

“Be right back,” said Corinda, and she vanished, leaving behind the mingled aromas of good perfume, incense, and vanilla. Melissa stared after her with a kind of starry-eyed adoration, as if Corinda was everything she wished she could be when she was older. Corinda returned almost at once with two cups atop which plates bearing fat muffins were balanced. She set everything down without spilling more than a couple of drops, fetched silverware and napkins, and a bowl in which stood a small pyramid of half-and-half.

Corinda began to turn away, then paused. “So sorry about what happened to your friend. Such a loss. A candle blown out so soon.”

Dana said, “Thanks, but she wasn’t really a friend. I never met her.”

“You don’t have to meet in the flesh to be connected by spirit,” said Corinda. “You knew her.”

“No, not really,” began Dana, and then she stopped as something occurred to her. “Wait, how did you know about what happened to Maisie?”

“You mean how do I know that you spoke with her in your dreams? And she appeared to you today at school?”

Dana gaped at her. “W-what…?”

Corinda straightened and raised one eyebrow, and she held her arms out to indicate everything in Beyond Beyond—the soul attunement crystals, the display cases of tarot cards, the divination bone sets, the bags of rune tiles, the casting sticks, and hundreds of other objects. “I don’t want to sound pompous, girls, but it’s literally my business to know.”





CHAPTER 10

Kakusareta Taiyou Dojo

5:23 P.M.

The knife came in so fast that Dana had no time to think, block, or even move. A flash of silver and then the feel of the cold edge against her throat.