My aunt was all about not disciplining children, because she was a firm believer that they disciplined themselves. I wasn’t sure if Tony shared her belief. He worked as a mechanic and when he came home, he sat in front of the TV until bedtime. It was a habit he’d picked up right after the girls were born, which explained the hundred and fifty extra pounds he’d put on. He went from built to fat in nine years.
“How can I—” Aylen stopped midsentence and brushed past me, grinning. “You must be Cat’s new boyfriend.” She tried to hug Cruz, but he backed away.
My jaw prickled with heat. “No, Aylen. Cruz is the medical examiner,” I said.
“But your mom said you had a new boyfriend.”
“We broke up.”
“Already? How quickly do you go through men?” Aylen said. “Well, anywho, glad to meet you, Cruz.” She stuck out her hand.
His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he took it. I watched their hands for sparks, but of course, nothing happened. “I’m sorry for your loss. I believe Nova was your only sister?”
Aylen nodded.
“I’m going to retrieve my belongings from the inn,” Cruz said, making his way to the front door. “I’ll see you all later.”
Once the door shut behind him, Aylen whistled. “That’s the most handsome medical examiner I’ve ever seen. Besides you, Derek,” she added.
Dad gave her a small smile. “I’m an undertaker. Not the same thing.”
“Could I go down to see her?” she asked.
Dad nodded. “I’ll get the backhoe up and running.”
“Are you going to put her next to Mom and Dad?” Aylen asked.
“That’s where she wanted to be. I just never thought I’d be the one who’d have to dig”—he cleared his throat—“dig her resting place.”
“Why don’t you let Tony do it?” Aylen said.
“It’s okay. He’s busy,” Dad said.
She snorted. “Tony, get your ass off the couch and help Derek.”
Tony shot her a sour look, but got up and put his coat back on. After the door closed, she said, “Maybe I should’ve suggested he shovel by hand. He could do with some exercise.” She winked at me. “Girls, behave while I’m gone.”
“Yeah, sure,” they mumbled without looking up. They just kept tapping on their tablets while we headed to the kitchen. Aylen stared at the white door, and for the first time since she’d walked in, emotion flashed over her face. “Always thought yellow was too loud a color.” She dug a tissue from her cardigan sleeve and pressed it against the corners of her eyes. I never understood how people could keep tissues balled under their sleeves. It was weird and most probably uncomfortable. “You know, your mom always believed there was an afterlife. Not like reincarnation. More like your soul went on a journey to find the souls of departed relatives.”
“I hope she was right,” I whispered.
“I hope she was too.” Aylen blew her nose, then tucked the wet tissue back into her sleeve.
Slowly, we went through the white door and descended into the morgue. I let Aylen slide Mom out. When she pulled the sheet off her, I gasped.
“Why don’t you turn around, sweetie?” Aylen suggested.
When I didn’t, she tried to spin me around, but I resisted. “He didn’t prepare her!”
Aylen frowned. “What more did you want him to do?”
“Put some clothes on her, for one.”
One of Aylen’s eyebrows lifted. “Honey, are you feeling okay?”
“Yes. I feel fine.”
I pulled the sheet further down. “He didn’t even open her up,” I exclaimed. “How can he establish cause of death without—”
Aylen clapped her hand on my wrist. The one holding the sheet. “What’s going on with you, Cat?”
“What do you mean?”
“The stitches are right there. And she is dressed. He even did her makeup. She would’ve hated it, but hey, the dead can’t complain, can they?” She stroked my mother’s cheek. “Hey, Nova.”
Mom’s face resembled marble, white and veined. Not even a drop of makeup had been applied.
“Here, let me take off some of that purple powder,” Aylen said with a smile destined for my mother. She swiped the tissue she’d used to blow her nose over my mother’s lids.
“Purple powder?” I murmured. I blinked. Was something wrong with my eyes?
“I like the feather he put in her hair.”
This time, I didn’t ask what feather since clearly my eyesight was defective, or my aunt was crazy.
“Are you going to remove the opal earrings before you put her below ground?” she asked me.
My gaze swung to her earlobes through which were speared her favorite pair of earrings. At least I could see those.
“She would’ve wanted you to have them. They were our grandmother’s, you know.” She wriggled her fingers in front of my face. “I got the ring; Nova got the earrings. Opal’s our family stone.”
“I know. Mom told me all about it. How it’s supposed to make us invisible to evil beings. Obviously it didn’t do her any good.”
“She died of a heart attack. Not from an attack,” Aylen said. “Your dad told me you were having a tough time accepting this, but you must, Cat. Or you’re going to make yourself miserable.”
She stared down at my mother, then bent at the waist and placed a kiss on her ashen cheek. She covered her in the sheet again and pressed her back into the dark metal hole.
“This must be that old casket she dug up,” Aylen said. She stood next to it. “She told me the ground gave in. Help me lift the lid up, will you, Cat?”
I nodded. Aylen grabbed one side and I grabbed the other, and together we heaved it up and leaned it against the wall.
“What the…” Aylen said. She raked her fingers through the petals, bringing a handful up. Some fluttered out and landed on top of the others. “Why are there rose petals inside the casket?”
“I was hoping Mom had told you about them.”
“No. The last time we talked, she hadn’t opened it yet.” She sniffed the pink petals. “These are fresh. They’d make an amazing soap.”
I wrinkled my nose. How could she entertain the idea of making soap with rose petals from a casket?
Aylen glanced around the sterile room. “Where’s the body?”
“There was no body.”
She dropped all the petals and rubbed her hands together. “You mean, I was snorting old ashes? Gross.”
I started to smile when my gaze settled over the lid. I crouched down in front of it. “What is that? An epitaph?”
Aylen joined me. “Nope,” she said. “That is a spell.”
“A spell?”
“Yes. Your grandmother told me about it way back when. She said that’s what our ancestors did. They’d write spells on the inside of their caskets. If it was read out loud by a descendent, they would come back to life.”
I blinked up at my aunt.
She squeezed my shoulder and gave a small laugh. “It’s just an adsookin…a legend, Cat.”
“What if it isn’t? Mom knew how to read Gottwa,” I said.
“Oh come on, Cat.” Aylen snorted. “Even I don’t believe this, and I’m totally gullible, unlike you.”
“Can you read what it says?” I asked her.
She eyed me, but then she underlined a word with her finger. “This word here is maahin. It means ‘come forth’.”
“Do you recognize any other words?”
Her brow furrowed in concentration. “This word—gwe—means ‘woman’.” She scanned the rest of the etching. “That’s all I recognize. I should really wash my hands. I was just fondling my ancestor’s ashes.”
“Use the sink here,” I said, dashing up the stairs. “I’ll be right back.”
I ran into the living room where the twins hadn’t moved an inch. As they tapped on their screens, I combed through the huge bookcase around the television until I found the book my grandmother had written. I raced back to the kitchen an
d hurtled down the stairs. Breathless, I sat down in front of the casket lid, and with the help of Aylen, we deciphered the spell.
From the past, I, a woman of Negongwa,
will come forth to avenge my tribe.
“Wow,” Aylen said, sitting back on her heels.
I felt as winded as she looked. “That’s why there’s no body,” I whispered, glancing around us to make sure we were still alone.
Aylen gaped at me and then she started laughing. “Sweetie, I will say this one last time, it’s a legend,” she said, drawing out the last word. “A silly myth.”
“But—”
“I wish the dead could walk the Earth. That would mean Mom and Dad and Nova would come back, but you know as well as I that death is final. But if you want to believe—if it can help you get through these hard times—then believe.” I’m not sure why but Aylen felt the need to hug me again. “You’re using my soap,” she said. “You smell so good.”
She smiled, ran her knuckle underneath her eyes, and then stood up. “I just heard the door. Tony and Derek must be done. Let’s go make lunch. They’ll be hungry.”
I closed my grandmother’s book and held it against my chest as I trailed Aylen upstairs. While I set the dining room table, all I could think of was the engraving. No, that was a lie. I also thought about the fact that Aylen had seen my mother clothed and embalmed and I hadn’t.
CHAPTER 7 – IRON
“Is Cruz at the inn?” I asked Blake the second he came through our front door that evening for the wake.
“Hello to you too, Cat. And no. He came by this morning and then he left. He’s done here, isn’t he?”
“Um…yes.” I peered behind Blake’s shoulder at my dad helping Bee out of her long coat. “Sort of.”
“Catori?” someone said, grabbing my elbow. It was a very short woman with a wide face and high cheekbones.
“Yes?”
“It is me. Gwenelda.” She must have caught the blank expression on my face, because she added, “You probably do not remember me. I am one of your cousins. From Canada.” She didn’t look much older than I was. If she had a decade on me, that was it. She pushed a long strand of black hair behind her ear.
It still didn’t ring a bell. “Of course. Gwenelda,” I said. “Thank you for coming. It must not have been easy to travel in this weather.”
“The weather could not keep me away,” she said. She had an accent—Canadian maybe?
“Hi, I’m Blake.”
She smiled, but kept her teeth clenched. It was a little weird. “What happened to your face, Blake?”
Color tinged his cheeks. “IED blast.”
“What is IED?”
“A sort of bomb.”
“Bomb like boom?” she asked, throwing her hands up in the air.
“Yes, like boom,” Blake said, raising the eyebrow that hadn’t been singed off. I knew him so well that I could tell he was thinking Gwen-something was a little cuckoo.
“Catori, may you take me to see your mother?” she asked.
“She’s right through that door,” I said, tipping my chin toward the dining room in which Dad and Tony had placed the open coffin.
Gwen latched onto my arm. “Come with me.”
“I—I’d rather not,” I said. “It’s hard.”
“I can take you,” Blake offered.
She looked up at him and her black eyes seemed to flash. “Someone is calling you.”
I hadn’t heard anything, but Blake had. He walked toward Cass who was talking with a group of our high school friends. They’d all flown home to be there for me. When they saw me staring, they gestured me over.
“Bring me to her,” she said.
How I wished I could go to them. “Fine,” I said, dutiful as I was.
Every step was painful, almost more painful than the tight grip Gwen exerted on my forearm. When we arrived in the room, the crowd parted around the coffin to let us through. My gaze fell on Mom’s ghostly face. I froze. Her cheeks were completely caved in now and her skin had taken on the sallow tinge of a decomposing body.
“Who prepared her for her slumber?” Gwen asked.
“A coroner that Dad hired.”
“He did a lousy job, no?” she asked, keeping her voice low.
“I know,” I said absentmindedly, but then jerked my gaze down to Gwen’s face. “What do you mean?”
“I mean what I mean,” she said cryptically before dragging me back out to the overcrowded living room. Her gaze rested on Aylen for a moment, then lifted back to mine. “Nothing was done to her.”
“You can see that?”
“Yes. I have the sight, and apparently you do too.”
“The sight?”
“Keep your voice low,” she whispered.
“What’s the sight?”
“Something that allows you to see through the gassen.”
My brow furrowed.
“The dust,” she translated. “Walk with me.”
“What dust?” I asked.
She yanked me past the front door. “You know nothing of our family?” she asked, as we walked down the porch steps.
“I should get my coat,” I said.
“You will not freeze.”
“Why are we going outside?”
“The conversation we are going to have, it is better we have it out here. I do not want people overhearing it.”
I heaved my arm out of her reach. “I lied earlier. I don’t recognize you. Who are you?”
“There.” She gestured toward the circle of trees. “We will talk there.”
“No. This is far enough. No one’s around.”
She scanned the cemetery. “You are wrong. We are not alone,” she murmured. Her eyes glowed like candlewicks as she peered into the night. “I must go, Catori.” She reached out for my hand, pulled my fingers open, and pressed something cool inside my palm. “This will keep you safe until I can return to rouse the others.”
I spread my fingers and unraveled the long silver chain. A large oval pendant swung from the intricate metal. It was smooth, with milky white, fiery orange, and neon green veins. An opal. Mom’s favorite stone. When I looked up to ask Gwen if this was a family heirloom, she was gone.
“What the hell,” I murmured to myself. Had she run away? I spun around to survey the graveyard but there was no movement. When I whirled back toward the house, I came face to face with Cruz and shrieked.
He clapped his hand over my mouth to silence me, but yanked it away immediately. Plumes of smoke curled away from his palm. “Fuck,” he whispered.
I bounced away from him, keeping my gaze leveled on his still-fuming palm. “Is your hand smoking?”
He glowered at his hand, then at mine, and then at the opal pendant. Slowly, his expression smoothed out, and he held his palm out in the space between us. His skin was pale and glowed, but it wasn’t on fire. “Not anymore,” he said.
“But it was?”
He didn’t answer.
“Static shock can’t set fire to skin,” I said.
“Can’t it?”
I shook my head no, all the while wondering if it could. I was being ridiculous. Of course it couldn’t. “What did you do to Mom?”
“I didn’t do anything to your mother,” he said.
“You’re lying!”
“No, Catori, I’m telling you the truth. I didn’t do anything to your mother. I didn’t prepare her. I don’t know the first thing about embalming a corpse. Or about autopsies.”
“I knew it!”
Cruz turned his face away and I was left staring at the pale curves of his profile.
“Why am I the only one who sees it?” I asked.
He returned his gaze to me. “Because I dusted your mother.”
“You what?”
“I put magical dust all over her. It creates an illusion.”
“Magical?” My skin prickled with goose flesh that wasn’t brought on by the frigid air.
“Did your aunt see your
mother’s real face?”
“No. She saw makeup.”
“And your cousins?”
“I have no idea. I didn’t ask them.” But then I realized the absurdity of our conversation and squashed my lips together.
Cruz was watching the necklace clenched in my hand. “A gift from Gwenelda?”
My mouth unbolted. “You know Gwenelda?”
“I know about her. I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting her yet.”
“She said that it would keep me safe from…” I frowned, trying to remember her exact words.
“From whom?”
“She actually didn’t tell me.”
“She didn’t?”
“No. She didn’t have time.”
“Do you mind getting rid of it?” he asked me.
“Why?”
“Because if you don’t, I’m going to have to leave.”
“That wouldn’t be such a bad thing,” I said.
“That’s not very nice.”
“Why should I be nice to you? And besides, why would a necklace make you leave? Are you deathly allergic to semiprecious stones or something?” I asked, more as a joke than anything else.
“It’s not the stone I’m allergic to, it’s the metal.”
“You’re allergic to silver? What are you, a vampire?”
“No. Vampires don’t exist.”
“Oh good, because I was starting to think I was losing it.”
“I’m allergic to iron.” He watched me, as though gauging my reaction. “Like all faes.”
“Faes?” I croaked.
He smiled, seemingly amused by the disbelief that must have been printed on my face.
“But you look human,” I said.
“Faes are humans. On the outside we’re the same; on the inside, we’re a little different.”
“Different how?”
“We have, um…we have powers.”
“Like superpowers? Is magic dust one of them?”
“Yes. And this.”
Cruz raised his hand that started to glow whiter. Suddenly, blue flames sparked and darted over his palm, making the frigid air ripple with heat. Even though I wasn’t standing close to him, I could feel the heat from the fire. Cruz snapped his fingers shut and extinguished the fire.
“Some so-called magicians can do that too,” I said, shooting my gaze back to his face. My brain was desperately attempting to remain rational and desperately failing.
Rose Petal Graves (The Lost Clan #1) Page 4
