“What fun would that be? I’m going to help you out. Dudley is down the corridor to the left. He’s heading the right direction, I’m pretty sure. You need to catch up to him.”
“Give me a ride?”
Brayden shrugged. “Sure, hold on to me.”
“Wait, if we can do this, why don’t you just take both of us to the end?”
“That’s not what the book said to do,” Brayden said. “Besides, it still gives Dudley a chance to make it into the third trial, which he’s poised to do.”
“All right, let’s see if we can steer him off course.” I grabbed Brayden by the shoulders and immediately felt my body go light before rematerializing right in front of Dudley.
“You two… working together.”
“I have a surprise for you, Dudley,” I said, lifting up Nico’s doll.
“Wait, you don’t underst—”
I squeezed the doll as if to constrict Dudley’s airway a little. I didn’t want to hurt him, just scare him enough to get him moving the other direction. But the look on his face wasn’t what I expected. His eyes turned red. As soon as they fixed on me, the red faded and turned to green. A familiar voice spoke from within.
“Miss Mulledy, it’s a pleasure to see you again.”
“Wait… Baron Samedi? How did you…”
“A part of me is contained within my aspect in all my initiates. While Kalfu has imprisoned my essence, he cannot contain all of me.”
I nodded. “Please tell me you’re the green Baron this time.”
The Baron nodded—with Dudley’s head, of course.
“Pauli had a vision. He saw Kalfu telling someone, one of the competitors, to bring him Nico’s soul. It was Dudley, right?”
The Baron shook his head. “What Erzulie intends to do… it is the way of the Bokors to manipulate souls, to deny them rest. I made a bargain with Nico, which I intend to uphold. You must stop whoever—”
There was a loud bang and a flash of light. Walls around us crashed down.
What was that! Isabelle screamed.
“That was lightning,” I said. “It has to be Sauron. Come on, let’s go!”
I made eye contact with Brayden, who looked back at me, a look of horror suddenly on his face.
I cocked my head sideways.
Brayden disappeared in a rainbow.
Another bang.
Brayden reappeared right in front of me as a lightning bolt struck him directly in the chest.
“No!” I screamed.
I turned around. Sauron stood there, her face aghast.
“What did you do? He was just a child.”
Sauron was speechless. Her jaw was dropped.
Brayden saved us…
I quickly knelt next to Brayden. His whole chest was charred. His shirt burned off of his body. I grabbed his wrist, looking for a pulse.
Nothing…
I placed my ear to his chest…
His heart wasn’t beating.
“Fuck these trials,” I said. “Isabelle, we have to save him.”
I glanced back, and Sauron was long gone—probably making her way to the bell after she’d murdered Brayden.
But I was going to save him. I had to save him.
I tried to draw whatever healing power I could from Isabelle and cast it into Brayden’s limp body.
I listened to his chest again.
Still nothing.
Annabelle let me take the reins!
I tried to let go. I tried to release my emotion. But I was filled with so much rage. So much fear. So much sadness.
“I can’t… my heart is racing… I can’t relax enough…”
Annabelle, you must…
I took a deep breath. Then another. By the time I finally calmed myself down enough to let Isabelle take over, it was too late.
There was nothing she could do. You can’t heal someone who has already died…
My emotion forced me back into control of my body, and I collapsed over Brayden’s body in tears.
“This isn’t fucking right!” I screamed.
The bell rang. Someone had made it to the middle. And then it rang again. And a third time.
Tressa, Sauron, and Dudley were all moving on. But I didn’t care. It was over. And Sauron had gotten away with murder.
Chapter Twenty
It didn’t matter that I’d used Isabelle’s powers. It disqualified me, but whatever. I didn’t ring the bell anyway. It was done. And I was done. Done with the Academy. Done with Voodoo. Done with all of it.
Why had Marie Laveau wanted me to call the Baron out of Dudley anyway? It didn’t do any good. All he did was tell me that Dudley wasn’t the one collaborating with Kalfu. Didn’t take long for Sauron to make that evident regardless.
I got into my Camaro, turned on the angriest scream-metal track I could locate on my phone, and drove. I drove fast and hard. I hit Interstate-10, toward Lake Pontchartrain. I didn’t know where I was going. I just needed to drive. Drive away. As far from Jackson Square, as far from Vilokan, as I could get. I glanced at Death Rites sitting in the passenger seat.
That fucking book…
My phone rang.
It was Ashley.
I hit ignore.
It rang again.
Mikah this time.
Again, I hit ignore.
Annabelle, please stop… slow down…
Isabelle didn’t have an ignore button. If she did, I would have pressed it a hundred times. I wanted to blame her for not being powerful enough to heal him. But it wasn’t her fault. It was mine. I couldn’t let go fast enough… I couldn’t focus. I couldn’t save him.
Brayden died to save you…
I slammed my fist against the steering wheel and pressed my foot on the accelerator. Ninety miles per hour down the interstate. I could go faster… I would go faster…
A bright light flashed in the passenger seat.
A giant rainbow-colored snake appeared.
“Slow down, bitch!”
I glared at Pauli. “Not the time, Pauli. Please go away.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“I said please, Pauli. I’m not in the mood for your shit.”
“Bitch, please. Do you think I don’t get it? Look at all the shit I’ve been through the last few months.”
“And that was my fault, too. If it wasn’t for me…”
“Girl, you need to stop talking right now. I’d say talk to the hand, but… never mind. What happened to me happened because of Kalfu. Not you. What happened to Brayden—”
“That was Sauron, and I’m going to kill the bitch. Send her straight to the land of the dead.”
“You’re not going to have that chance if you kill yourself on the highway first. Slow down, Annabelle.”
I took a deep breath and lifted my foot from the accelerator.
“I brought you something,” Pauli said as he uncoiled his body. It was a small porcelain jar.
“What is it, a jar of Skittles?”
“No, it’s Brayden’s soul. Remember what the book said. You must finish the Death Rites…”
I bit my lip. “I don’t think that’s what it was talking about. It was talking about Nico.”
“Maybe it was. Maybe it wasn’t. But if you don’t honor Brayden the right way, if you don’t finish the Death Rites properly, he’ll be completely justified to haunt your ass forever.”
I wiped a tear from my eye, took a deep breath, and pulled over the car.
“Grab the jar.”
I shook my head.
“Just grab it.”
“Fine.” I reached over and took the jar that apparently contained Brayden’s soul.
Pauli quickly wrapped himself around my body. The next thing I knew we were standing beside Lake Pontchartrain. My feet stuck in the mud.
“Couldn’t pick a dryer spot?”
“I’m winging it here… just go with it.”
“What am I supposed to do with this thing?” I asked, examining the jar.
It wasn’t anything special. Just a plain porcelain jar, a lid tightly screwed on top.
“Why don’t you rub it three times and see if I’ll grant you a wish,” the voice of a young boy said.
I quickly turned. Brayden’s translucent form stared back at me.
“What are you looking at?” Pauli asked.
“It’s Brayden!”
“Yeah, in the jar.”
“No, he’s standing right here. You don’t see him?”
“I see nothing.”
Samedi’s aspect… It allowed me to see the dead. I’d only really seen ghosts a couple times before—an old deceased Mambo at my parents’ assisted living facility, Père Antoine, and a few apparitions back when Ashley and I were investigating the paranormal. I knew what I was looking at. Brayden’s transparent form stood there, smiling at me.
Pauli left my shoulders and curled up in the mud—apparently content to allow me to experience whatever it was that was happening.
“Why are you smiling?” I asked. “You’re dead… and you shouldn’t be. You should be pissed.”
“If I let anger consume me,” Brayden said, “I’ll end up a desperate wraith trapped in the land of the dead.”
I nodded. I’d been there, I’d seen the wraiths, and if there’s one thing you don’t want to end up in the afterlife, it’s a wraith trapped in the in-between. Stuck in purgatory. “You might be cool with it. But I’m not. I’m so fucking livid. I could rip Sauron apart.”
“You have to let go of the hate, Annabelle. Let go of the anger.”
“That isn’t something someone can just decide to do.”
“Why not?”
“Because you died, Brayden. I know we didn’t know each other well, but you were one of like four people at the whole fucking Academy I felt I could trust. You’re my friend. I think I have a right to be pissed.”
“You also have the right to be free. And your anger is going to consume you, Annabelle. Anger is as damning as fear. You have to let it go.”
“But this wouldn’t have happened if not for me. That bolt was meant for me.”
“You are too important, Annabelle. I had to… and I don’t blame you. You didn’t pull me in front of the lightning. I did that on my own. It was my choice. It’s a choice I have to live with… or die with, as the case may be.”
“It’s still not fair.”
“Life isn’t fair. Death isn’t fair. It just is. But I have one thing to ask of you.”
“What is that?” I asked, tears welling up in my eyes.
“Don’t let my death be in vain. Don’t let anger prevent you from doing what the queen meant for you to accomplish.”
“But it’s over. I’m out of the Trials.”
Brayden shook his head. “Winning the Trials wasn’t the point, Annabelle. You know that now. You have to prevent Kalfu from claiming Nico’s power. That’s why I sacrificed myself for you. So I’m asking you, make my sacrifice worth it. Let go of your anger.”
I wiped a tear from my cheek. “I’ll try. I’ll do it. It’s just so hard. So much shit has gone on ever since I joined this damned Academy.”
“And if you hadn’t been there all this time, you don’t know how much worse it might have been.”
I took a deep breath. “Finish the Death Rites. That’s what Pauli said we needed to do.”
“He’s a good friend,” Brayden said. “He saw to it to contain my soul in the vessel. He gave me a chance to speak. Now you need to let me go.”
“Just throw the jar to the rocks?”
Brayden shook his head. “A jar containing a soul cannot be so easily shattered. You need something more. Something that could help ensure my passage to the other side.”
“Beli… my soul blade.”
Brayden nodded. “I’ll be here beside you. At least my apparition will be. But what you see is just a projection. Once you destroy the vessel, I’ll move on. I’ll be at peace.”
“Damnit, kid, I wish I could hug you.”
Brayden smiled. “Someday. On the other side.”
I nodded and took a step back. I called to Beli. I felt the dragon elemental form in my hand, but he wasn’t forming as a blade. Beli took the form of a crossbow… the form I’d struggled to manifest before, the one I couldn’t maintain. But this time it felt sure in my hand. It felt right.
“No more fear. No more anger,” Brayden said as I set his jar on the rocks and took a step back.
I aimed at the jar. “I don’t want to… I want to keep you here…”
“It’s okay, Annabelle. I’m ready.”
I nodded, and with tears filling my eyes I aimed at the jar. “Goodbye, Brayden.”
“Until we meet again…”
I squeezed the trigger.
The jar exploded, and a massive rainbow shot from the jar into the sky. I looked to my side. Brayden was gone. Pauli slithered beside me and curled around my ankle.
“That was beautiful.”
“It was,” I said, smiling down at Pauli. “Thanks for that. Brayden isn’t the only one who saved me today.”
“Aw shucks, Annabelle. If snakes could cry…”
I chuckled. “Care to help me out of the mud? We need to get back to the Camaro and back to Vilokan. We have to get back before the third trial.”
“But you’re done, Annabelle. You’ve been eliminated.”
“I have been eliminated. But I’m not done. Not even close.”
Chapter Twenty-One
I sent Pauli ahead to ask Ashley and Mikah to meet me back at the plantation. I needed them to know what was happening. If there was one thing I’d learned over the last several months, it was that when dealing with shit like this, shit with cosmic proportions, it was the height of arrogance to imagine being able to handle it alone. Not to mention, I needed a strategy.
Finishing Brayden’s death rites gave me peace—but it didn’t remove the pain. It didn’t keep my mind from spinning. Ashley and Mikah would ground me, help me see the big picture. Not that Pauli wasn’t helpful, but he was more of a doer than a strategizer. The guy would face demons for me, harness the souls of the departed in little jars, and even allow himself to be possessed. He does. He acts. He doesn’t think things through. Ashley and Mikah, on the other hand—that was precisely their forte.
One problem. I had the Camaro. No way both of them would fit on Mikah’s moped. They’d have to ride the rainbow Pauli-style. I almost laughed at the thought. Ashley hated snakes. Nothing against Pauli. It was just his species. She couldn’t handle it. Sorry, sis! But conquering fear is apparently in season.
I looked at my grandmother’s grandfather clock—I know that’s a mouthful, but that’s what it was—and started tapping my toe. What was taking so long? Five more minutes. Ten. Fifteen. Half an hour.
Then I heard a rumble outside.
I walked briskly to the front door. Outside was Oggie’s Hummer, Mikah in the driver’s seat and Ashley next to him.
Pauli appeared on one of the columns in front of the house—who knows if he’d been riding with them or not. He certainly didn’t need to, and I didn’t bother asking.
“Dude!” I shouted at Mikah. “How did you convince Oggie to let you take the Hummer?”
Mikah shrugged. “He leaves the keys hanging next to his door. And his door was unlocked. So…”
I laughed out loud. “So Oggie has no clue that the object of his mid-eternal-life crisis is in the hands of the boy who, last I checked, had a track record of causing accidents?”
Mikah smiled, showing off his white teeth. “You could put it that way.”
Ashley ran to me and gave me a hug. “I’m so sorry about what happened… with Brayden.”
I hugged her back. “That’s what we need to talk about. There’s some foul shit going on.”
“Like always,” Ashley said, shaking her head.
I nodded. “And it has to do with more than competitors murdering each other. It’s bigger than that.”
“What do you mean?
” Mikah asked. “Did you figure something out from Laveau’s book?”
“Yes and no.” In truth, I hadn’t even looked at the book since everything went down. I probably should have. Something might have made sense. But I was still in coping mode. I was going to have to go through the stages of grief pretty quickly. Denial. Check. Anger. That one took a toll. Bargaining. Hit that one briefly. And I still felt some of the depression—but I was quickly moving toward acceptance. I had to. Besides, Brayden made me promise to… I guess that was a part of the bargaining stage.
“What happened in there exactly? We couldn’t see anything.”
I took a deep breath. Telling the story meant visualizing it again. But I suppose that’s also a part of grief, a part of acceptance. “Sauron tried to kill me.”
“She what?”
“We were making our way through the maze. Brayden transported me to Dudley because we thought he was the one we had to stop.”
“Stop him why?” Mikah asked.
“Pauli had a vision. He gets flashes. Probably because Kalfu is still using his body.”
“I saw Kalfu talking to someone,” Pauli added. “He was telling whoever it was to bring the prize back to him after the Trials.”
“Dumballah’s blessing?” Mikah asked.
I shook my head. “That’s not what the victor gets. Erzulie intends to fuse Nico’s spirit with the victor. Give them his power and use them to fight against Kalfu.”
“And Kalfu has someone in his back pocket,” Pauli added. “He wants them to deliver Nico’s power to him on a platter.”
“Who would do that?” Ashley asked.
“I thought Dudley at first. Since he was nominated for the Trials anonymously. But it must’ve been Sauron.”
“But I thought she loved Nico. Why would she bring him to Kalfu?” Mikah asked.
“That was my thinking, too,” I admitted. “And I’m not sure. Maybe he has something over her. Maybe she’s caught in a bargain. Either way, we have to make sure she doesn’t win. If she does, if she gets Nico’s soul…”
“Then Kalfu gets it too,” Mikah finished my sentence.
I nodded.
“And one more thing,” I said, looking at Ashley. “Mercy is involved, too.”
“The vampire? What does she want? Did she have news about Mom and Dad?”
Death Rites Page 11
