Gathering Deep

by Lisa Maxwell

  “Emaline,” I corrected, my voice breaking as I said the name. It hurt even to think about her, but I needed to remind everyone that girl back in June had a name. “Her name was Emaline.”

  Everyone at the table went still. I didn’t look up to meet any of their eyes, but from the way they shifted in their seats, I could sense them having a silent conversation about me while I was sitting right there.

  Finally Mama Legba reached out and rested her soft hand over mine. “You weren’t to blame for what Thisbe did to her, Chloe-girl,” Mama Legba said. “You know that, right? The death of that poor girl ain’t on your head.”

  She could say what she wanted, but that didn’t change the truth. “I let her come with us, didn’t I? Emaline might never have even been at the St. John’s Eve ritual if not for me. She would have been safe, maybe even still alive.”

  “Even so,” Mama Legba said. “You had no way of knowing what would be. You came out to the Bayou to celebrate a new season—to ask the spirits for blessings, not to harm. You didn’t have no way of stopping what happened to her.”

  I pulled my hand away from Mama Legba’s. Whatever she might say, I couldn’t shake the feeling that she was wrong. Everything had changed that night—that was the night my momma discovered I’d been learning from Mama Legba behind her back. It was the point when everything seemed to start spinning out of control for me.

  Or maybe I should say it was the point when Thisbe starting taking control, because after that night I started having hours and days disappear.

  “Now when that girl was killed—Emaline,” Mama Legba corrected herself, “everyone knew well enough that her throat had been slit. Couldn’t keep something like that out of the news when there were so many people around that night. But the police didn’t officially release none of the other information.”

  “You mean about the other cuts on her body,” Lucy said.

  Mama Legba nodded. “’Course there been rumors about the way her killer carved symbols into her arms and legs, but the police were careful to keep the specifics quiet. They showed me the pictures, though,” she said with a little shudder. “Over the years there’ve been plenty of wannabes ’round these parts, but something about those markings didn’t look like the work of no amateur.”

  Mama Legba looked around the table, meeting each of our eyes. “Just like Emaline, the pictures they showed me yesterday had a body with his throat slit clear across. The poor soul was wearing the exact same sort of markings on his arms and legs that Emaline had been wearing on hers. Ain’t no doubt in my mind that the same person killed him.”

  “You think it’s another ritual killing,” Piers confirmed.

  “Sure enough,” Mama Legba said. “But more than that—the ground weren’t near as soaked as you’d expect from wounds like that. Whoever killed the boy did it careful-like. They wanted his blood,” she said.

  “Which means that Thisbe’s making more of the thread again.” Lucy’s voice was strangely hollow when she spoke. “That’s what happened in my dreams—a girl turned up dead and a little while after that, Thisbe bound up Alex with the string she’d made from the girl’s blood. She’s going to find someone to replace Alex, isn’t she?”

  “That’d be my guess,” Mama Legba murmured, staring solemnly into her cup of tea. “But I don’t think she’d be able to do nothing right away. It’ll take her some time to make the thread, and more time to find an old enough and powerful enough soul to do her any good.” She glanced up at Lucy.

  “You mean a soul like me?” Lucy said softly as she raised her chin.

  Mama Legba’s mouth went tight. “We don’t know for sure that she knows what you is, Lucy-girl.”

  “Thisbe knows I could see Alex. I’m sure by now she has some suspicions about how I figured out who he was and where she was keeping him,” Lucy said. “And if it’s anyone’s fault that she’s desperate, it’s mine. It would make sense for her to come after me.” Lucy’s voice was steady enough, but I didn’t miss how her hands shook as she held her quickly cooling mug.

  “That’s true enough. We’d be mighty foolish not to expect her to try something.” Mama Legba frowned. “But there’s no telling about the where or the when.”

  “We can’t just wait for her to kill someone else,” Piers said, his voice tinged with frustration.

  But what if we didn’t have to sit around and wait?

  I still wasn’t sure what to make of the visions I’d had, and I certainly wasn’t sure how they’d react to hearing that I was possibly seeing past events through Thisbe’s eyes, but I

  couldn’t shake the feeling that maybe, dangerous as those visions might be, they could help us.

  “What if there was a way to figure out what her next step will be?” I asked carefully.

  Mama Legba quirked a brow in my direction. “How you propose we go about doing that?” she asked.

  “Maybe something she’s done in the past might give some clue?” I asked, measuring their reactions and response to my words.

  Mama Legba made a surprised murmur. “That might work,” she said, but before I could tell them anything more, Mama Legba looked at Lucy. “How do you feel about taking a little nap and seeing what you can see?”

  Lucy looked startled for less than a second. Then, understanding dawning, she said, “You want me to dreamwalk?”

  “Last time, you was able to break from your past actions and follow that boy. Seems like you might could follow Thisbe just as well. Maybe there’s something we been missing from way back.”

  “But—” I started, confused at the turn the conversation had taken. That wasn’t what I’d meant at all.

  “Don’t worry yourself about it, Chloe-girl,” Mama Legba told me, misunderstanding the reason for my protest. “Lucy be safe enough trying this. Ain’t nothing can hurt a ghost in a dream.”

  I wanted to correct her, but Piers was watching me with a pinched expression on his face. Like he was waiting for me to prove him right about me needing a keeper. So I didn’t say anything else as Mama Legba got everything ready.

  I hadn’t exactly been myself when Lucy dreamwalked before, but from what I understood, it was an easy enough process. Lucy was an old soul, which apparently made her powerful, and she was able to access her past lives through her dreams about them. A few weeks before, though, she’d discovered that she could break free in the dreams and walk separate from her memories, making the dreams serve as a kind of portal to the past.

  She couldn’t change anything, because she wasn’t anything more than a memory in the dream, but she could see things and learn things. It was how she’d figured out what Thisbe had done to Alex back in the 1840s, and it was how they’d discovered how to free him and find Thisbe.

  Mama Legba lit a stick of sage and juniper and smudged the smoldering herbs around the room, clearing out any negative energy. Speaking in a soft, low voice she asked the spirits for protection and guidance before she let Lucy lay back on the couch. I settled back in one of the comfortable arm chairs, curling myself around a pillow, and watched as Mama Legba placed the smoldering herbs on the table and lit three white candles at Lucy’s head and three more at her feet.

  Little by little, Lucy slowed her breath and softened her features. After a few minutes, she drifted off into a deep sleep. Mama Legba and Piers watched her carefully for any sign of a problem, but it looked to me like she was resting peaceful. Occasionally, her forehead would wrinkle, like she was struggling with some sort of puzzle, but mostly she laid there, quiet and still as a sleeping princess.

  From the way Piers and Mama Legba were all focus and concentration, I knew something important was happening, but it wasn’t like we could see into her mind and know what it was.

  Since I’d had such a hard time sleeping the night before, I was tired enough that I almost started drifting off myself. Maybe that’s why I didn’t notice the way my neck was growing warmer and softer at first, like firm fingers were rubbing gently down my nape. Little by l
ittle, I relaxed into the cushions of the chair, almost humming at how soft and boneless I was starting to feel.

  They really think that’s gonna work? The voice came soft and low. Familiar.

  I blinked my eyes open. Mama Legba and Piers were still watching Lucy.

  “What?” I started to ask, but when I opened my mouth, I found I couldn’t speak. My words came out as a gasping breath as the soft, finger-like warmth at the back of my neck changed. I struggled to draw a breath as something took hold of my throat.

  The noise I made must have been loud enough to catch their attention, because both Mama Legba and Piers looked over at me, confusion on their faces.

  “What is it, baby?” Piers whispered.

  I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing would come out. My vision started to go dark around the edges as I tried to pull air into my lungs. As I struggled, I felt a breeze course through the room, swirling around and turning my skin to ice.

  “Chloe?” Piers was there suddenly, kneeling beside me. I could see his mouth move, but I couldn’t hear the sound that came out.

  Soon, baby girl. Soon. The echoing voice hummed along the inside of my skull. Reminding me, as the icy breeze lashed at my skin.

  But then Mama Legba was there, her soft hand warm on my arm, grasping my wrist like she meant to hold me there to the earth. The wind died and the icy fingers released their hold on my throat.

  “You okay?” Mama Legba started to ask, but across the room, Lucy’s unconscious form jerked.

  I took a gasping breath, trying to tell them. “Lucy,” I rasped through my still-tender throat, but the sound didn’t come out anything like her name.

  But Mama Legba understood at once. She turned and, seeing that Lucy had gone white as death, went to her side. “Come on, Lucy-girl,” she said, shaking her to wake her. “Come on,” she said over and over, but Lucy was deep, deep in sleep.

  Little by little, my lungs started working again.

  Piers had his arms around me, but I could barely feel the warmth of him and the only thing I could hear was the sound of my own breathing. I tried to push away from him, but before I could untangle myself, the icy wind was back.

  “What is that?” Piers asked, searching anxiously for some indication of where the breeze was coming from.

  One of the candles at Lucy’s feet sputtered, and we both turned to look at it just in time to see it go out.

  Mama Legba went still for a moment, and Piers tightened his grip on me.

  “What—?” he started to say, but before he could, a second candle snuffed itself out.

  Something inside me leapt at the sight, but I pushed it down and ignored it as I watched, one-by-one, the rest of the candles snuff themselves out. Sssst. Like wet fingers were pinching out the flames, so not even a curl of smoke was left behind.

  As the last candle died, Lucy’s eyes flew open and she lurched up, gasping and panicked like she didn’t remember where she was.

  Piers wouldn’t ease his grip on me, but for the moment, I didn’t mind. “She okay?” I rasped as Mama Legba rubbed Lucy’s back, whispering soft words in her ear until her breathing was almost normal.

  “She’ll do well enough,” Mama Legba said as she helped Lucy to sit upright.

  “What the hell was that?” Piers asked.

  “I don’t rightly know,” Mama Legba said, glancing at me from the corner of her eye.

  My stomach turned. It hadn’t been me. It couldn’t have been me … could it?

  “It all went dark.” Lucy had her arms wrapped around her middle, like she was trying to hold herself together. “It was the time I went out to Le Ciel with Alex. I was going to try to break away and walk to Thisbe’s place. I thought maybe I could find something there, but before I could even start, everything went black and the dream faded into nothing. I couldn’t move and I couldn’t find my way back … ” Her voice trailed off. “That’s never happened before. Alex was there and then he was gone … everything was gone.” Lucy’s voice rose in a panic as she looked at Mama Legba. “She can’t hurt him, can she?”

  Mama Legba gave her head a shake and cupped Lucy’s chin with her broad hand. “No, child. You made sure he was safe already. What’s done is done, and not even a witch as strong as Thisbe can change the past.”

  Lucy gave a tight nod, like she wanted to believe Mama Legba but didn’t. “I need to try again,” she said, determined.

  “I think you’ve done enough for one day,” Mama Legba told her in a worried tone.

  “But I didn’t get anything,” Lucy said, frustrated. “There has to be something there we can use. We can’t let Thisbe do what she did to Alex to anyone else.” Her voice went a little quiet. “I can’t have lost him for nothing.”

  “Oh, child,” Mama Legba said, patting her on her knee. “You didn’t lose him forever. You know that, right?”

  Lucy’s mouth went tight, but she didn’t answer. “At least let me make sure he’s okay.”

  Without another word, Mama Legba gathered the stick of herbs that had long since stopped burning and the candles that had gone dead. She dumped the whole bunch of them into the trash. “Not today. I won’t have nobody putting themself in any more danger till we knows what happened here.”

  “Mama Legba’s right, Lucy.” Piers glanced back down at me, but not long enough to really see me. Just long enough to check on me. “It’s not worth the risk.”

  “But my dreams are the only lead we have right now,” Lucy pushed.

  “What if they’re not?” I said softly.

  Everyone turned to look at me, but I ignored the unease I saw in their eyes and forced myself to say what I knew I needed to say.

  “I didn’t only lose track of time this morning. Something happened out there at the cabin.”

  In a rush of words, I told them everything about the visions I’d had before I could change my mind again. “ … It’s like the present world sort of fell away, and I was back there—back in her world. It was almost like I was in her skin. I don’t think what I saw was random,” I said. “I think I’m seeing what Thisbe saw way back when, and I feel like I’m dreaming about pieces of her past.”

  “That sounds a lot like what I experienced when I dreamed about Armantine in the past with Alex,” Lucy told me, her forehead wrinkling in confusion.

  “I don’t see how that could be.” Mama Legba was considering me with an uncomfortable intensity. “We took care of the link between you and your mother when we took the charms in your hair.”

  “But what if you didn’t?” I pressed, voicing the worry that had been plaguing me ever since those bottles at my house fell from their strings.

  Mama Legba grimaced like she didn’t enjoy being contradicted. “You have any other markings on you, Chloe-girl?”

  I shook my head. “Not that I know of, but maybe you were wrong about what the threaded charms in my hair did. Maybe they weren’t meant to let her control me. Or maybe they weren’t only meant for that,” I amended when Mama Legba frowned at me. “Maybe they also kept me out.”

  “Kept you out of what?” Lucy asked.

  “Out of her head. Out of her past, maybe?” I asked, voicing the fear that had been plaguing me. “I never experienced anything like this until my hair was gone.”

  “That only makes sense if Thisbe knows we cut your hair,” Mama Legba said.

  I thought of the fingers rubbing my throat, the icy grip that tried to strangle me. “Maybe she does know,” I said, unable to keep the unease out of my voice.

  “You think she’s watching you?” Lucy sounded horrified.

  “If that’s the case, maybe it’s nothing you’re doing to get these visions,” Mama Legba said darkly. “Maybe it’s still Thisbe pulling the strings, making you see what she wants you to believe.”

  “But even if Thisbe’s the one doing this,” I said, “it doesn’t mean we can’t still use the visions I’m having. It happened so fast the first time, it took me off guard, but if I could touch that charm a
gain, maybe we could figure out what’s happening. Maybe even figure out what I’m seeing. If Thisbe’s still manipulating things, maybe she’ll give something away, and if she’s not, if it’s really just a vision of the past, maybe we could learn something more about what she’s trying to do, or why she’s trying to do it.”

  “Does it matter why?” Piers asked.

  “It might,” I said, not at all liking the way he was looking at me.

  He thought about it for a moment, not even blinking as he stared at me. And then, finally, he spoke. “Absolutely not,” he said stiffly, shaking his head.

  The abrupt finality of his words had me on my feet. “Why not?” I challenged. “You were willing to let Lucy try looking into the past.”

  “Yeah, and look what happened.”

  Without thinking, I rubbed at the sore spot at the base of my throat. “I’m willing to take the risk if it could help us find her—”

  But I couldn’t finish before Piers cut me off. “Did you stop to think that if you opened a connection between you, you might let Thisbe in again?”

  My stomach twisted. Of course I’d thought of that. All I’d been thinking about was how I’d lost hours at the cabin that morning. Hearing him say it out loud, though, made it all that much more real. But it also made something else painfully clear.

  “You really don’t think I can fight her. Even with my hair gone, you think she’s going to win, don’t you?”

  “It’s not about that, Chloe,” he said, but the way he was holding himself off from me told me it was exactly that.

  “Piers is right to be careful,” Mama Legba said gently. “But you also got a point. That charm might indeed be one place to start.”

  “So you’ll let me try?”

  “Not until I know for sure it’s safe, child.” Mama Legba gave me a doleful look before turning to Piers and Lucy. “Do you think I can get a look at that charm?”

  Lucy shook her head. “There’s no way my dad’s going to let you anywhere near it after you told him to burn it.” Her expression brightened. “But Piers could get it, maybe. My dad’s already asked him to deliver it to a professor’s lab up in Nashville.”