By now you probably have discovered the true nature of your time spent with the Krewe.
So it confirmed one thing: this feeling like we had been on a thrill ride with the Krewe when actually we had viewed this night of terror from the center of the murderous storm. But then it changed course.
If you can bear the horror of being with them again, the plan you are considering is worth enacting.
It was true. I had already been thinking it over. Now I felt I couldn’t not go.
“This plan,” Lance said, tapping the screen, “can I get in on it?” His piercing gaze told me that he didn’t intend to take no for an answer.
“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” I said.
Lance stayed in my room the rest of the night, curled up beside me until the morning sun streamed in the window. My eyes opened bright and strong to greet it. My body felt awake, finally awake, fully myself again. The dull ache of my shoulder was at last subsiding, but the horror of my dreams remained fresh.
Still in my scrubs, I sat down at the desk, pen in hand, and transcribed the words I’d been going over again and again in my mind.
L—
Please forgive me for the other night. Can we start over? I do want to help you. But first, I need your help: Can you find out where the Krewe will be taking their next victims?
And also, I just need to know, for me: What happened on the nights when Lance and I were both tagged? Did we hurt anyone? I need to know whether we actually took part in the Krewe’s activities.
With affection, H
I dressed and wandered over next door long before anyone else in the house was ready to start the day. The window hadn’t been repaired yet so a clear plastic tarp had been secured over the outside of it. I could see the candle inside, along with another one of those bottles. The door was locked and now that the project inside had been completed, who knew when it might be unlocked. The few passersby seemed to pay me no mind, so I quietly dug the Swiss Army knife out of my bag and sliced open a small flap. I reached my hand in, pulling out the bottle, and in exchange, I wedged my note beneath the candle. Hopefully he would find it.
I waited until I was safely ensconced in the comforts of our courtyard before shattering the bottle. Inside, I found two crisply folded sheets of parchment.
The first was dated the day of Max’s birthday:
H—
Sincerest apologies for being away, but I have much to tell you now. Metamorfosi Day is in the offing. It has been set for the day of Mardi Gras. Let the planning begin. I remain forever indebted to you for your help. I will understand if, at any point, you decide it isn’t worth it to you to do this for me. You’ve already given me more than I deserve: hope. Meet tonight? I’ll signal.
Yours,
L
I read it through twice before the inevitable happened and it began to warm my fingers. Then I held it a few seconds longer and, when I couldn’t take it anymore, let it fall to the ground, where it caught fire and crackled before quickly turning to ash and disintegrating entirely. Then I unfolded the next note, dated just a day later:
H—
I’ve heard from the denizens of this condemned world of mine that you have been tagged and I’m racked with worry and guilt. Please let me know that you’re okay. Your safety is all that matters to me right now. I will not rest until I know you’re well.
Love,
L
I studied it, committing it all to memory. So this is what it had taken to get a valediction like that: extreme danger and an imminent threat to the health and stability of my body and soul. At least the trauma of the past several days had earned me some sort of perquisite. I would take it. In a flash, that note, too, became ash.
Lance found me waiting for him in the courtyard. “You did it?” he asked as we set off along Royal Street.
“Yep.”
He sighed with relief. “Okay. So now . . . ?”
“Now we just wait for him to answer my note. And we’ll need to talk to Dante because if you can’t shadow—”
He held up his hand to stop me. “Not a problem. Just tested it.”
“Really?” I stopped walking for a moment to register my surprise, which wasn’t lost on him.
“See, you’re not the only one who can pull off these tricks.” He smiled.
“I’m glad, trust me. I certainly don’t need this thing with the Krewe to be a solo act.”
“Yeah, I don’t think you can be trusted to be left alone for a little while,” he said. The quick glance he gave me from the corner of his eye showed me he was kidding, mostly. “It turns out you’re kind of a troublemaker.” He smirked.
“I get that all the time.” I smiled back.
Lance looked different to me now after the horrors of last night’s dreams and the madness of the tagging. I felt the shift; I felt close to him, as though we had been in quicksand, pulled away from each other, and now we were on solid footing again. I thought of what he had said last night and wondered, was it possible that he and I had come out on the other side of what threatened us, too? Could it be that we had made our way through that turbulence? I hoped so, because I didn’t like the way my world looked without him. I hoped he had discovered the same about me. I wanted to know for sure, but it didn’t feel right to ask. For now I would just revel in this hope that a piece of me had returned.
We made our way through the French Quarter to the dividing line at Canal Street—near Dante’s favorite shopping spot—and on toward the Warehouse District. The crowds soon diminished but the area, happily, didn’t live up to the image conjured by its name. I had pictured deserted structures in disrepair and street corners populated by unsavory loiterers. Instead, it seemed most of the storefronts housed charming art galleries and up-and-coming restaurants. As Lance and I moved along, so did our conversation to lighter, less loaded topics.
“The idea is to illustrate a bunch of the places where we’re all working and make the joke that we’re working so hard we’re always on the graveyard shift. Then tie in the cemeteries since they’re such a focal point of the city,” Lance explained of the float designs the group had begun work on while I had regained my strength.
“So, judging by your speed at this sort of thing, it should take another ten minutes to finish, right?” I joked. He had apparently managed to wrap up work on the crypt yesterday morning. “We can totally catch a movie or something before tutoring.”
He rolled his eyes. “Sorry to disappoint you, but we’re working with the whole city-wide volunteer program, not just us—”
“Ohhh, so you have to dumb down your skills a little. No hammering nails with your bare hands.”
“Yeah, and you may want to cool it with the flying objects,” he swiped at me sweetly.
“Duly noted.”
It wasn’t until we reached the area’s outskirts that we happened upon a real warehouse worthy of the district’s name, a huge hangar-like monolith with sides that opened like garage doors. We slipped around back as Lance led the way in through a loading dock. The sound of drills, hammers, saws, and all manner of mechanized tools greeted us. Inside, the place teemed with our fellow interns—as Lance promised, not just from our house, but the entire group, all bustling with purpose, swarming around four multiwheeled platforms to be pulled by trucks on the big day. So far these four floats were all black. But surrounding them, our peers toiled on miniature versions of the city’s landmarks— from Jackson Square to the Superdome to the Lake Pont- chartrain Causeway. A banner unfurled on the floor read NOLA NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL VOLUNTEER NETWORK stenciled in giant letters. Meanwhile, our fellow angels had annexed a corner of the space to work on scaled-down replicas of some of the more famous crypts in Saint Louis Number One.
Lance had begun building the trees for the cemetery portion of the float and drafted me to help him. “Try not to saw off an arm, okay?” he said as he planted me in front of a table saw.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said. He thought ab
out it for a moment.
“Yeah, never mind.” He shook his head. “Just look busy and when it’s time to nail these together and paint then we’ll put you to work.” That sounded a little more doable.
Someone tugged on my sleeve and I turned around: Emma stood beside me, a clipboard and pen in her hands. “Okay, you two. Costume committee,” she said. “I’m taking a poll. Should we be skeletons or some sort of zombie-like creatures or lost souls or . . . ?” We both stared at her blankly. “What do you want to be? On the float?”
I was on the way to the community garden with Dante the following morning when I found another bottle waiting for me next door. The message inside:
H—
Whatever you’re thinking, I don’t approve, but I promised to help you. They always begin their sprees at Congo Square, midnight. I suspect they’ll be going tonight. Please promise me you will be careful. It kills me that I can’t be there to guide you. Leave word here tomorrow so I know you’re all right.
As for the other matter: I’ve been asking around and I have it on good authority from those who were there that neither you nor Lance committed any of those heinous acts. You were spectators but not participants. For the most part, those in your group have been exceptionally strong and haven’t been active players in the crimes during their tagging episodes.
Yours,
L
30. Don’t Say Another Word
Dante fortified Lance’s fleur-de-lis charm and reinforced mine. “You’ll be fine all night, but at sunup, or in any direct light, you’re obviously in trouble,” he warned, as Max looked on, his expression grave.
Connor had come by before we transformed to wish us luck. “Just be smart, guys, okay? If you’re in danger of being detected, bail out,” he ordered. A crease had begun to form between his eyes in the past few weeks, a sign that the weight of this war was taking its toll on him.
“One last thing,” Max piped up. “This is something we’ve been working on. It’s not there yet but if you scatter this at their targets right before they’re attacked, it may protect them. That’s our hope, at least. Test it out for us, okay?” He handed each of us a red-powder-filled bag.
As there were no other directions to be given, Lance and I looked at each other. “Ready?” I asked. He nodded. He put one hand on the leather bracelet at his wrist and bowed his head. I held my pendant and focused as I felt my form slip away into that haze.
We made our way to Congo Square, stealthily creeping along the more deserted streets, blending into the night so that we could barely even see each other; Lance and I were just dark smudges. If we stayed away from lamplight, we really were invisible. Our greatest challenge would be to not lose each other throughout the course of the night.
As we neared the meeting place, we heard the murmur of voices. Ahead of us, a few figures made their way over the top of the gates. But just because we were camouflaged didn’t mean we could go slipping between the bars of the park’s fence. As Dante had explained it, “It’s like a paper bag has been thrown over you— you’re still there, but you just don’t look like you.”
So, as we had so many times at the cemetery, we scaled the entryway. We ran up to the gate and grasped at the metal bars, trying our best not to rattle them. I heard Lance’s soft footsteps land on the pavement on the other side. Mine followed a second or two after. The light of the archway caught his shadow for a moment and the sight comforted me. We ventured farther into the leafy park until we happened upon them at last. There were at least two dozen people huddled together, talking, chanting, swaying as though to the same silent beat. Spirits bright, they had the buzzing pulse of a crowd waiting to be revved up and set loose.
Stragglers joined the Krewe: an older man walked up from the direction we had come and with each step closer his form metamorphosed from gray-haired and hunched over to vibrant, young, and strong. He greeted them with handshakes. Others leapt catlike into the trees, then dropped down onto nearby benches, only to spring up again onto other branches. Many shape-shifted before our eyes, assuming entirely new physiques. A familiar man, blond and slim, wandered in on the arm of a tiny figure shrouded in black; as they neared the light, we could clearly see Sister Catherine transforming into Clio, assuming the young demon’s enviable statuesque form, even borrowing her usual costume of minidress with cowboy boots. Her escort was our own fallen compatriot, Jimmy. I reached for Lance to point this out, but it took several tries until my hand grazed what I thought to be his shoulder. I felt him squeeze my arm in understanding as Jimmy took his place beside a guy with a familiar blue streak in his hair: Brody. Jimmy smacked him on the back as they spoke, like he was giving him encouragement. Ever so slowly, Brody morphed from the long-limbed, laid-back skater we knew into a musclebound all-American quarterback with a square jaw and short-cropped red hair.
Without warning, Clio sprang up into the air, landing atop a bronze sculpture, which was the bust of a jazz musician. She perched on his head like a bird, her legs crossed, gazing down at her followers, that manic smile playing at her full lips. Lance tugged me to the base of the nearest tree. We stood invisible beneath its full canopy, free to watch.
“Bienvenue!” she greeted them, and they called back the same welcome. “I see some have begun celebrating before the work has been done.” She pointed in our direction. Dangerously close to us, beneath another nearby tree, an embracing couple locked in a kiss appeared disengaged from the gathering. “Wylie, you should know better,” Clio said playfully. He stood now, bowing his head at her respectfully. “Save that for later. It’ll be even sweeter after the thrills that lie ahead.” Barely breathing, I drifted nearer to the couple. It was that woman, the tall one with the cascading brunette mane.
“You all know about the quota, right? While we always need new members, we need supplies as well. Choose wisely, mes chéries. Save the best, use the rest,” Clio trilled as though it were their own personal advertising slogan. “New recruits, don’t be shy. Enjoy, and I’ll see y’all back home with your trophies,” she said in the sweetest drawl—if you didn’t know better you’d think she was the perfect southern belle hosting a garden party. She clapped twice, which seemed to be the signal they had all been waiting for. They let out a communal roar, and then scattered into the night like a pack of wild dogs, everyone racing to throw themselves over the gate.
It took Lance and me a moment to move, overwhelmed by the sudden mass exodus into the Quarter. Together we darted out from our spot, trailing Clio. She pushed to the front of the group until they reached Bourbon Street. Then her masses fanned out, like planets orbiting the sun. She circled a trio of men clutching beers as they walked down the middle of the street and made eye contact with one, then skipped ahead of him and glanced over her shoulder, lassoing him with a look that begged him to follow. And he did. The closer he got, the faster she walked, backwards, smiling, weaving through crowds, leading him along as she darted down street after street. Within just a few blocks, she had maneuvered him into an alleyway between a pair of storefronts. Alone. We hung back and I flattened myself against a brick wall and felt for that bag of powder, getting ready to throw it.
“You caught me,” she said to him.
“I guess I did. Hi. What are you doing out all by yourself in a place like this?” he slurred.
“You from around here?” she asked, running her fingers along the wall, as she walked slowly toward him. She glided, trancelike, until a quick loss of footing made her trip—but she caught herself with a smile. Her quarry was so transfixed he probably didn’t notice. But my stomach dropped as it occurred to me that she must have stumbled over a shadowy Lance.
“You’re a cute one, aren’t you?” she purred at the man. He was barely her height and his body was soft, without being plump, rather just encased in a layer of insulation where muscle tone may once have been—someone perhaps who had replaced playing sports with watching them. She wound her arms around his neck as though about to kiss him, but something shiny
glinted in her hand.
It happened too fast, all at once. I reached into my pocket, gathering a handful of the powder to throw as the masses descended. One of her female followers knocked right into me. I dropped the powder just as Clio plunged a knifelike spike into her victim’s neck. I tried to stifle my gasp, stumbling away from the pack. Vultures, they swooped in, picking him apart. Then just as fast, they dispersed, some transforming into various alter egos.
But a few hung back. “Clio, I almost thought you were going to keep him around.” It was the girl who had bumped into me. Her long hair hung in a wispy braid swept to one side.
“I know.” Clio sighed, lighting a cigarette with her index finger. “I thought about it. He seemed kinda sweet. But I prefer to start the night with a body, not a soul. Just sets the right mood, y’know? Plenty of captures out there to be had. They need to be really somethin’ special to be one of us.” They seemed to float back out into the night. The man lay on the ground in a pool of blood, his chest split open. I wished I hadn’t looked.
“I was too slow,” I heard from the shadows across the alley from me. A regretful Lance.
“Me too,” I said, the words sickening me.
“Next time,” he whispered, his footsteps nearing. “C’mon, before we lose them.” We began running until we landed back on Bourbon Street. Clio had reconnected with Wylie and his paramour, and this time we stuck close to him. He clutched the girl to his side, his arm holding her against his hip, shielding her as they wandered through the crowd, scanning faces. Bourbon Street was so bright, we had to be careful, keeping our distance from the neon bar signs. We found it was safest amid the crush of people walking in the street, near enough to Wylie to catch bits of his conversation.
Infatuate Page 29
