by Catie Rhodes
“Oh, wow.” Dillon's voice came from not far behind me. The crunch of her footsteps neared. She stood next to me. “Better watch out, Kenny. My cousin’s a witch. She might decide to turn you into a toad.”
Kenny stared into my face. I made myself meet his gaze, even though I felt like overdone pasta.
“I ain’t afraid of her.” Kenny whipped his long blond hair over his shoulder. He probably thought he looked good with his open shirt exposing too many inches of hairy, over-forty chest.
I wanted to scare him more, but my head still throbbed from the Coachman stealing power from me. I wanted to put my hands around my aching skull to keep it from blowing up. But the power kindled and grew anyway, replenishing itself on my energy the way Mysti said it would.
“She ain’t gonna do anything.” Anita stepped up next to Kenny. Their bodies leaned together, and they glanced at each other, as though they’d been together a long time, long enough to read each other. “She presents a danger. How many more of us are going to come to harm while she’s here?”
“Peri Jean did nothing to call forth the Coachman.” Cecil moved to stand on the other side of me. He clutched my arm, and I realized how close he was to collapse.
Kenny shook his head. “Not good enough, old man. I’ve traveled with Sanctuary lotta years now. You tell that story every time we visit this campground. Nothing like this ever happened before. She’s trouble. You made a mistake bringing her here.”
Heat flooded through me, followed by an icy chill. I resisted the urge to shiver. This whole scene was close, too close, to something from Gaslight City. The weight of all those angry stares settled over me like an anchor pulling me underwater.
“I’m new here, so maybe I shouldn’t speak.” Danielle, the psychic medium and pickpocket, said from the log where she’d sat a lifetime ago to hear Cecil’s story. She hadn’t moved from there since her butt first made contact. She’d used her cellphone to call Finn and Dillon and warned them to get out of the Hollingsworths’ RV from that log. She’d cried for Zora from that log. Now she stood up for the first time, smoothing her caftan as she did. “This woman has had a difficult time, no one to teach her. I have faith she’ll get Zora back if it’s possible.”
I made grateful eye contact with Danielle. She gave me a supportive nod in return.
“You just want someone else to run the séances.” Anita waved a chicken-skinned arm at Danielle. “You lazy old pickpocket.”
“I am your sister-in-law. Why can’t you be nice to me?” Danielle glared at the other woman.
“Will all you just shut up?” Finn raised his arms to the sky, and his shout echoed through the trees. Tears streaked his handsome face. “My daughter is gone. Fucking gone. I don’t care about punishing anybody—”
“But when somebody wrongs one of our number, the price must be paid.” Kenny crossed his arms over his chest.
“Like we did back in Florida?” Finn’s face contorted, and his voice trembled. “There wasn’t no damn discussion about sending anybody into the fucking darkness. You just beat that poor guy to death, him begging you to stop.” He glared at Kenny until the older man dropped his gaze to his feet. Finn approached Kenny, got right in his face. “Now this is my daughter who’s missing, and I’m going to find her whether y’all like it or not. If my cousin says she’ll get Zora back, she will.”
Cecil put his arm around my shoulders and held me tight. I scooted closer to my great-uncle, grateful for his support. The sea of angry faces wavered in front of me and flickered and sharpened. The mantle, sensing a threat, gathered power. It came through the earth, from the fire, and from the wind stirring the trees. The black opal heated. I stiffened. This could get bad. The black opal would magnify whatever the mantle threw out. I focused on clearing my mind, on dismissing my anger. I couldn’t lose my temper. I’d already learned the hard way.
“I say part of the problem here is the leadership.” Anita spun around the group, making eye contact with each person, trying to get someone to agree with her. Some nodded. Others turned away. Finally, she turned back to my uncle, eyes glowing with hate. “Cecil, the time for your leadership has passed. You know it. Everybody here knows it. You just can’t protect us no more.”
Kenny crossed his arms over his chest and looked down his nose at Cecil. “Got to say that’s the truth, old friend. Your judgment's going.”
Next to me, Cecil stiffened.
“It’s time for you to step down.” Anita grabbed a handful of her thick hair and threw it over her shoulder.
Dillon appeared behind her. My cousin by marriage curled her lips in a snarl and grabbed Anita’s hair, winding it around her fist so fast the motion was a blur. She forced the other woman to her knees and stood over her. Kenny hurried toward the scuffle, and Finn stepped in his way, lip curled. The two men stared each other down.
“Never speak against my uncle or anybody in my family.” Dillon gave Anita’s head a hard yank. She gasped and yelped. “Never interfere with my family. Especially not my children.”
“I’m speaking for the good of the group.” Anita’s voice hitched with sobs. She held trembling hands out to Dillon in supplication.
“This woman can find my daughter. Speaking against her is interfering. Understand?” Dillon gave Anita’s hair another hard jerk, putting her whole body into it.
I watched the scene, frozen and fascinated. Suddenly, I knew what Finn loved about this woman, even though I feared her in that moment along with everybody else around me.
“Dillon, honey, no.” Cecil’s voice was paper thin, an old man’s voice, tremulous, ready to break at any second. “Maybe my time has passed, but now’s not the time to decide that. If we want a chance of finding Zora, we can’t stand around here bickering. We’ve got to get out there and search.”
“I agree.” I motioned at Dillon to let Anita go. To my surprise, she did and came to stand by my side. I caught Cecil staring, something brewing in his dark eyes.
“Where do you want to start, niece?” he asked.
“That direction, where I saw the carriage disappear.” I pointed. “Let’s go in groups. Nobody needs to be alone.”
“Who are you to give us orders?” Kenny raised his chin at me. “You’re just an outsider. An unwelcome one.”
“And you’re dangerous,” Anita cried. Dillon took a step toward her, fist clenched, and Anita cowered away.
“Don’t mess with me, Anita. Understand?” My own anger leapt at its leash. Cecil tugged at my jacket sleeve, but I ignored him. All eyes fixed on me. The effect made me wish I had kept my mouth shut. “Zora is my cousin, my blood. I will stop at nothing to find her. If any of you get in my way, I’ll burn you from the inside out.” I stared out into darkness, glaring at anybody who dared meet my eyes. “Whatever internal problems y’all got ain’t my problem. But listen to me and listen good. I’m going to look for my baby cousin. Ain’t none of you going to stop me.”
“What if you fail?” Anita stepped forward until she stood a foot from me. “What if you can’t find Zora?”
“In that case, I suppose I’m subject to your laws.” I met the woman’s crazy stare head on. I saw elation, excitement. Cold fingers danced up my spine.
A murmur went through the crowd, and people began to walk away. Finn and Dillon surrounded me.
“I’ll kill you, you don’t find my kid.” She leaned into my face, hands on her hips.
“I wouldn’t blame you.” For once, all my righteous indignation was dry as a bone. With the threat of that hateful mob gone, my mind replayed that ghost lifting little Zora up off the ground and pulling her into that carriage. I couldn’t live with not finding her. “Why don’t the three of us team up?”
Dillon went to get flashlights. Finn turned his back to me and stared out at the starry night. I slumped next to him. Tonight had turned into a shit sandwich with a cup of warm doo-doo on the side.
CECIL WENT to get his golf cart while Dillon talked Jadine into keeping Zander.
> “But it doesn’t matter that I can’t see.” Jadine threw her arms around to make her point. “I know things. I might be able to see where he took her.”
“Somebody’s got to keep Zander, and I refuse to not search for my own damn daughter.” Dillon’s tone could have made paint peel. “Keep your cellphone handy. If you have any insights, get in touch.”
Jadine picked up Zander, who’d been using his mother’s legs to hold himself upright. The little boy’s balance still needed some work. The two of them headed back toward the RV. After a few steps, Jadine withdrew a metal cane and extended it.
“Doesn’t somebody need to help her?” I whispered to Dillon.
“Yes, but she’d pull a fit right now if we tried.” Dillon stared out at the dark woods and shivered. “Zora’s probably cold wherever she is.” Her voice broke, and she turned away from me. “You really think you can find her?”
“I won’t quit until I do.” My family needed my help. It didn’t matter if I decided to stay in their lives. Memaw taught me to always help others. No matter the cost.
Besides, I felt responsible. The Coachman came here for me. Didn’t he? I thought back over the encounter. Had he engineered it all to get Zora? Maybe. Why did he need both of us?
Cecil approached in the golf cart. “Why’d y’all let Jadine wander off alone?”
Finn shrugged and got into the passenger seat. Cecil turned to him. “Not this time, son. Peri Jean and I need to talk.”
Finn frowned but got into the cart’s backseat with Dillon. The two of them clasped hands like teenagers. I sat next to Cecil.
“Just pass that bag back to Finn if it’s in your way.” Cecil gestured at a dark canvas bag on the golf cart’s floorboards.
“It’s fine.” I reached to move the bag, and something clanked inside. “What’s in here?”
“It’s my ghost fighting stuff. Stuff I ain’t used in some thirty years. But I still know what to do.” Cecil maneuvered the golf cart onto a wide path going into the woods. It ran alongside the route through which the Coachman had approached. “The woods end at an open field. I’ve never seen a spirit take a human and can’t imagine he could’ve carried Zora far. That field would be the first logical place for them to stop.” He drove a bit without speaking. “The story I told at the campfire was the one I was trying to tell you back in the RV. Seems so unimportant now.”
I’d almost forgotten. “I’m sorry we kept interrupting you. Tell me what you know.”
Cecil thought for several seconds. “You know Samantha worked most of her adult life for the Lakeworth Brothers Circus?”
I shook my head.
“Well, she did. They called Samantha the Gypsy Woman. She read fortunes, but really she was a witch, just like her mother, Priscilla Herrera.” He paused, maybe thinking about Samantha. An orphan most of her life, she must have been a tough lady. “The circus went belly-up in the early nineteen fifties. Samantha and one of the other performers bought an old farmhouse just up the road from this place. Gone now. There’s a neighborhood built on top of where it was.”
Travis’s neighborhood, I’d bet.
“The story I just told those people is one my sisters and I first heard from Samantha. She told it each time my parents passed through here on their lost highway.” Cecil spoke so softly I could hear the sound of his lips forming the words. “You know, I’m like you. Seen the dead all my life. But I never saw the Coachman and never gave any thought to the story being real.” He stared out into the darkness. A gasp came from him, and it hit me that he was crying. He saw me watching, pulled his cigarettes out of his pocket, stuck one in his mouth, and offered me the pack. I shook my head but lit his cigarette and got my own. He swiped a hand over his face.
“Do you know what parts are true?” Stories like Cecil’s were usually about seventy-five percent bullshit.
“No idea.” Cecil shook his head. “I can tell you the story was prevalent in this community. It wasn’t just Samantha who knew the story. The kids from down the road knew it. The kids from church knew it. They all had different versions. The story I told tonight was made of everything I remember.”
I brought up the part still bothering me. “No ideas why the Coachman would want Zora and me specifically?”
Cecil smoked and drove. “Our family’s magic is old. When someone has a dose of it, the way you and Zora do, it’s strong.”
I’d felt Zora’s magic but still hadn’t identified it. “What is Zora? A medium like you and me?”
“Oh, baby.” Cecil laughed. “You’re a medium. I’m just an old man who sees ghosts. But Zora’s something else all together.” We came to the field, and Cecil let the golf cart roll to a stop. “She can make dead things live again. Never seen anything like it.”
The dead bird. No wonder Zora had wanted to help it. She’d also thought she could help the ghostly horses. If the Coachman wanted to come back to life, Zora might be his chance. But he’d need a body. Maybe that’s why he wanted both Zora and me. The idea raised the hair on the back of my neck. I shuddered.
Cecil passed out flashlights. “Just look for signs of magic. Peri Jean and I should be able to feel the presence of a ghost as powerful as that one was, even if he’s already gone.”
We walked the perimeter of the circle. I opened my senses, feeling for cold spots. Sometimes ghosts left behind the odor of rot. I also looked for signs the carriage had come through, grass pushed down, broken branches.
A white building peeked through the trees. I nudged Cecil. “What’s that?”
“There was once an African-American community here. Blessed Union, I think the name was. That was their schoolhouse. A historical group has taken it over, been restoring it.” Cecil reached the building. “I’m sure it’s locked, but…” He trailed off, staring at the door. It stood half open. I cut around Cecil and went inside.
I shined my flashlight around the empty room. Someone had pushed all the desks to the room’s perimeter. Residual magic crashed against my magical core. My head swam, and I grabbed the wall.
Dillon shoved me out of her way. “My kid in here?”
“Nope.” I held an arm out to keep from going farther and pointed at a mess surrounded by a bunch of tracks on the floor. “But somebody did some serious magic in here. Recently, by the feel of it.”
A familiar creaking and popping drifted into the old building. All of us froze.
“That’s it,” Dillon whispered. “The carriage is right outside.”
She ran back through the door. The rest of us followed. The area around the old schoolhouse was still empty, but the sound of a horse snorting drifted through the trees.
“Mama,” came a small, terrified voice.
Dillon crashed off in that direction. I stared into the woods where we heard the sound, trying with all my might to sense the presence of the ghost. Nothing.
I took a few steps running after Dillon. “No! It’s a trick.”
Dillon screamed. Water splashed. Finn and I charged into the woods, Cecil trudging after us.
Underneath the noise, I heard something else. A very young child crying. Zora. This was real. I turned away from my cousins and crashed through the brush and brambles in the direction of the cries. Dead vines clung to my jeans. Branches, stiff and dead with winter, slapped my face and scratched it. The crying was barely audible but seemed to come from the field we’d just left.
I took off that way, making enough noise to alert people all the way on the other side of the county. Sweat dampened the layer of clothes closest to my skin, and the scratches on my face stung. I listened for the Zora’s sobs and heard nothing, so I stopped.
The air chilled more. The feeling of being watched crept over me. I wasn’t alone. The presence came as a whirl of emotions in my head, words not quite whispered, shadows not quite seen. The hair on the back of my neck stood up, and the black opal heated. I walked faster. Maybe this was it. I’d get my little cousin away from this ghost. Show him how the cow eats cabbage.
/>
Across the moonlit field stood a shadow. The mantle turned over, and the tide of power rushed through me. Moonlight shone down on longish blond hair and a lanky frame. I knew this body, had known it almost as well as my own at one time.
“Chase?” I whispered his name, not quite ready to believe. The day of his funeral, I’d watched him walk into the light and had thought him gone for good.
He raised his head, and I saw the high cheekbones and that dimple.
“Chase.” I ran for him, totally forgetting about Zora. It had been so long, and I’d wanted to talk to him so many times, just to know he was okay.
From somewhere far away, I thought I heard Cecil’s voice. “Peri Jean, don’t. It’s not who you think.”
I ignored Cecil’s voice and kept running. Then Chase and I stood pressed together, his arms around me, his chill spreading through me. He tilted his head toward mine. I stood on my tiptoes, heart jittering, eager for his kiss even if he was just a ghost. Our faces inched closer together until our lips were only centimeters apart. I’d never made out with a ghost, but there was a first time for everything. I parted my lips and stopped.
What was that smell? I sniffed. It reminded me of roasting meat, of barbecue. No. That wasn’t right. I took a deeper breath. The smell became more pronounced. Panic ran wild through my chest, and I tried to move away. The arms around me tightened, solid and hard for belonging to a ghost.
The stench intensified, and Chase’s face came closer, the skin bubbling and breaking open, blackening and peeling. I tried to break out of his embrace, dug my heels into the dirt, and stiffened my knees to keep him from pulling me closer. Still he came. The foul odor filled my nose. Vomit stung the back of my throat. I thrashed, trying to get away from the smoking corpse. His mouth fell open, and his teeth began to pop out of his mouth. One hit me in the forehead. Warmth streamed down my face, and I knew it had broken skin.
This wasn’t Chase. It was the Coachman, back for another round.
I drew in a breath and screamed. It tore at my parched throat. The arms held me tight like a lover. A light smoke came from Chase’s open mouth and probed at my lips, trying to find a way inside me. I pressed my lips together, drew on every ounce of power I had to keep it out of me this time.
