Bella Flores Urban Fantasy Collection

by R D Martin

  Feeling the pressure surrounding her increase even as she watched the old woman, she did the only thing she could think of and reached for her magic. Opening up, she felt the electric rush of power racing through her, energizing every nerve and filling every cell.

  “Well, you can do that much. Anything else?” The woman’s amused voice cut through the energizing feel of the magic like a hot knife through butter.

  Ignoring the boom of blood pounding in her ears and lungs demanding to breathe, Bella shifted her attention from the woman to the doll. That was the key. Take the doll out of the picture and she’d knock the old hag down a rung or two.

  She might not have use of her voice, but she could still use runes. Lifting her hand, she began tracing a rune in the air, following the pattern she knew so well. Each movement left a glowing trail of light in its wake. Three lines left, then two, and finally the last one to join them.

  “Sorry. Can’t have that, dear.”

  Just as the last connection was being made, her stomach flipped and twisted as the magic filling her disappeared, leaving her cold and hollow.

  Stars popped into existence in her vision as her mind railed against losing the power. Cut off. The old woman cut her off.

  “Come on, child. Show me I’m not wasting my time. Please.” There was almost a plaintive undertone to the words, as though she was scared Bella wouldn’t be able to fight back.

  With her lungs screaming for oxygen that wasn’t coming and her pulse pounding so loud in her ears it drove out every other sound, Bella’s mind raced. Who? Why? None of it seemed to matter. She would die in this tacky voodoo shop and there was nothing she could do about it.

  As that thought crossed her mind, a clarity overcame her. Though everything about her screamed in suffering, the clouds in her mind cleared as though burnt away by the midday sun.

  Closing her eyes, she looked at the swirling mists of magic flowing around and through everything in the shop. Gar said it was a matter of willpower and that was all she had left. Visualizing the flow of magic converging on the doll, she willed the power to follow her thoughts. Converge, heat and ignite, her mind screamed where her lungs couldn’t.

  In all her practice, she’d never been able to put out a candle flame, but now she wasn’t trying to stop a fire. She wanted nothing more than to start one.

  The flow of magic was as stubborn as always, refusing to bend to her will. Something was different though. She could sense a small change. Somehow she was connecting. Somehow she was changing the flow. But where? Opening her inner sight, she let her mind flow with the energy. Back and forth, buffeted and tossed about like a paper boat in a gutter after a rainstorm, her mind traveled with the power until she felt it.

  One small snag, a spot not as fluid or smooth as the rest, like a single thread unwoven from a silk sheet. The thread of energy waved and snapped, pointing at the doll clutched in the woman’s hands, and it was a simple matter of thought to connect the two.

  Her mental roar of triumph died almost as fast as it rose when nothing happened. Concentrating, she pushed harder, forcing more of the thread into the doll.

  Her knees buckled under the mental and physical strain, dropping her on the threadbare carpet and scraping her palms.

  A cry across the room pulled at her attention, and as her head snapped up to see the doll falling from the woman’s hands, the pressure around her chest vanished. Cool sweet air invaded her lungs and rushed through her system, causing her mind to whirl for a moment under the onslaught of pleasure.

  Panting and sweating, legs shaking like twigs in a windstorm, she rose to her feet. There was no way she would die on her hands and knees. She watched the worried look on the old woman’s face soften and morph into a grin.

  “Good. You know something then. Worried me there for a second, though. You know you shouldn’t do that. It ain’t good for an old woman’s heart. Want some tea? Got a fresh pitcher in the back. Ain’t sweet though. Tessa’s a sweetheart, bless her soul, but she near nags me to death about too much sugar. Don’t worry though. Got me a secret stash,” she said, tapping the side of her nose.

  “Wait, what? What’s going on? Why did you attack me?”

  “Attack you? Oh, no, dear. I wasn’t attacking you. Just testing you.” In a move faster than should have been possible for a woman her age, she darted down, picked up the voodoo doll and tossed it.

  On reflex and without missing a beat, Bella snatched it out of the air. As though someone had left it too close to a stove, the plush doll felt warm in her hand and trailed a thin, almost invisible line of smoke in its wake.

  “Magic’s more different down here than what most Yankees be used to. More about a strong mind than hand waving’ and fancy words. Marcus said you could handle it, but as much as I’d like to have that man’s boots under my bed, I don’t trust a word he says.” Picking her cane off the glass counter, she turned and shuffled toward a back door. “Anyway, come on back for some tea. I got to call Raymond, let him know you here. That boy needs to settle down sommat. Find hisself a nice girl. You can keep the doll. My Lucy, she makes ’em. Love that girl, but can’t sew to save her soul, bless her. Well? What ya waitin’ on?” The woman disappeared as the door swung closed behind her.

  Bella stared at the doll in her hand. The knot in her stomach loosened enough to let her think without panicking, but she still maintained a firm grip. What was that? How had that woman been able to control her body like that? And cutting off her magic like flipping a switch? That shouldn’t be possible, should it? And that power? That old woman had treated her like the rag doll in her hand. How was she able to do that?

  Flipping the doll over, she noticed the edges of a white square of paper sticking out from under the back of the doll’s shirt. Pulling it out, she read the block script printed in small words beside an open hand. Mama Ade’s. Palms read, futures told. Adelaide Boudreaux, Proprietress.

  Pocketing the card, she opened herself to magic, breathing a sigh of relief when it came as called, and with the hottest flame she could summon, she turned the small doll to ash in her hand. Letting the gray and white flakes sift between her fingers, she stared at the back door.

  Just like Gar, this woman could do things she’d never seen. Even if she couldn’t find the artifact, there was still an opportunity to learn something new.

  Stepping forward, she strode through the shop toward the rear door. If she was lucky, she’d be able to get out of here fast, maybe join Karina for that ghost tour. If she was really lucky, she’d convince Mama Ade to make some coffee. She shivered. She hated sweet tea.

  7

  Sitting on the passenger seat of the Ford pickup, Bella watched tree-lined streets crawl by as they made their way through the crowd of revelers. Lost in her own thoughts, she almost tumbled out of her seat when the truck came to an unexpected halt. Hand pressed against the dashboard, she turned to look at her driver, her mouth twisting in a frown.

  “Just a second,” he said, sliding out his door and disappearing into the crowd.

  She shook her head, wondering if everyone in New Orleans was as strange as this family.

  Last night, she’d spent more time than she’d imagined at Adelaide Boudreaux’s table, discussing family, business, and most important, magic. The longer they talked about it, the more she learned southern magic wasn’t so different from her own. Rather, it was the way practitioners learned that was different. As an Elemental Witch, she controlled all the elements, but learned runes as a method of directing and controlling magic. Southern Witches had a different method of control and called it Hoodoo.

  “You mean, Voodoo, right?” she said, correcting the old woman. Everyone knew about Voodoo. It was the cornerstone of an entire genre of horror movies. Some Voodoo priest would use a secret powder, or call on spirits, or somehow raise the dead as mindless zombies to control.

  “I said Hoodoo and meant Hoodoo,” Adelaide said, picking up her glass of iced tea. “Yanks all think it's the same thin
g, but it ain’t. They got some things in common, sure. But so do Jews and Christians. Don’t make them the same thing either.”

  “So what’s the difference then?”

  “Mmm. Well, to start, Voodoo is a religion, a way of life. We have ceremonies, we worship, and call on Loa and Saints to guide and protect us.”

  “Loa?”

  “Loa be spirits.”

  “Not gods?”

  She cackled. “No, not gods, though some like to think they is. No, Loa just be spirits. We call on them, serve and feed them, ask for advice, whatever. They talk to Bondye for us.”

  “Bondye?”

  “Girl, you keep asking questions, we never gonna get through this. Anyway, Bondye be God. He so far away from us, ain’t no talking to him direct, so we talk to the Loa instead.”

  “Okay, so you talk to the spirits, they talk to your God.”

  Adelaide nodded. “Sums it up, though ain’t the half. Voodoo is an old religion. Hoodoo has roots in Voodoo. That make it strong already, but it ain’t the same. Hoodoo is a way of life too, but it’s also the practice of magic. Spells, charms, crystals, healing and cursin’ all be part of Hoodoo.”

  “So that’s what you used on me? Hoodoo?”

  “In a way. See, for Hoodoo to work, you gotta believe it will work. Believe with every fiber of your being. Believe hard enough and the magic works.”

  “What about the doll then?”

  “That? Just a doll. Sometimes a body needs help believin’. Crystals, bottles, brick dust, dolls, or even a Bible. They all help.”

  Belief was something she could understand, though she couldn’t quite grasp everything Mama Ade was saying. She’d listened with an open mind though.

  The door of the truck swung open, and her driver slid back in. Raymond Lafontant, Ray to his friends, was a well-built man with piercing blue eyes, straight blond hair and a five o’clock shadow even at ten in the morning. His muscular frame reminded her of the boys in high school, the ones more interested in sports than anything else, but were never good enough to be the baseball or football star. The only thing marring his otherwise perfect features was a thin scar running down the side of his face next to his hairline.

  He gave her a lazy smile and passed a small box across to her.

  “New Orleans tradition,” he said, shoving the box into her hands. “King Cake. Gotta have a piece and they make some of the best.” He pointed to the shop across the way.

  Opening the carton, she stared at its multicolored contents.

  “Thanks,” she said, her tone wavering. There was enough colored sugar on the pastry to give her diabetes just looking at it.

  “No problem,” he said, shifting the truck into gear and pulling back into traffic. “Mama Ade says this is your first visit to New Orleans. If you can ignore all the drunk tourists, it’s the best time of the year to be here. Not too hot, music in the air, great food.”

  “Can I ask a question?”

  “Sure.”

  “Why do you call her Mama Ade? Is that some kind of title? How are you two related?”

  He gave her a puzzled look before shrugging.

  “Everybody calls her Mama Ade. Always have. It’s a Louisiana thing, I guess. We’ve always just called her that. And as for relation, she’s my great-great-great-grandmother on my dad’s side. Adopted his great-great-grandma.”

  “You’re great… Wait, you’re what, twenty-five? Thirty? That’s got to make her well into her hundreds, or close to it. How can she be that old and so…” She waved her hand around, trying to find the right word. “Spry?”

  Ray barked out a short laugh.

  “She’d love to hear you call her that. I don’t know how old she really is, but I’d say you’re close.”

  “And there’s another thing. Why don’t you have an accent like everyone else here?”

  “Oh, that. My dad retired from the Army, but before he did, we moved around a lot. Lived all over the world before settling down here. I never really picked up the accent. Any little I had, I lost when I went to college. Nobody takes a programmer if they sound like a country hick.”

  “Programmer? You?”

  “What’s so surprising about that?”

  “Nothing. I mean, well, shouldn’t you be in Silicon Valley or something? I mean, no offense, but New Orleans isn’t known for being the country’s center of technology.”

  “True,” he said, nodding. “Tell the truth, I went out to try my luck with a couple startups. Trouble was, I missed being home too much. Besides, with a computer and internet connection, I can do my work from anywhere.”

  “So, that’s what you do for a living? Programming?”

  “Among other things. I like to keep busy.”

  She bounced off the passenger door as he jerked the wheel to the left.

  “So where are we going, anyway?”

  “Mama Ade said you were looking for something stolen, right? Well, whoever stole it either has a buyer already or will look for a fence to sell it. Since Mama Ade’s trying to help, it isn’t something that’ll wind up in a pawnshop. That means they’ll need a specialist, and there’s only a handful of them around.”

  “And you just happen to know them because…” She let the sentence hang in the air, shifting a little away from him.

  “The Crescent City is a small town, and everyone knows everyone here.” He chuckled at her discomfort.

  “Where are we going then?”

  “Right. So I asked Cousin Eddie if he could find out anything. He reached out to John Benoit, and John spoke with his wife’s sister, Sheila. Her boyfriend works on one of the paddle boats, but he hears things. He called one of his cousins, who reached out to Shady Mike. Mike manages a couple of dive joints, one in the Ninth Ward, and another near the swamp. One of the girls working there heard someone was looking for some muscle.”

  “So we’re going to the Ninth Ward, ask the girl some questions?”

  “Nah. Jenny Cormier is as crooked as they come and would lie to a priest’s face if there was money involved. That’s a dead end.”

  “So where then?” she asked, feeling like she needed a notepad to keep track of the conversation.

  “Down to Algiers. The only man in the city dealing with items Mama Ade would be interested in keeps shop in the Jackalope Bar. He’ll have what you’re looking for or know where to find it.”

  “If you knew that, why’d you go through all the trouble of talking to the cousins and such? Why not just go straight to him?”

  The look he gave her left her wondering if she’d grown a second head.

  “Straight to Remy? He’d bolt like a scared raccoon if he didn’t know we were coming. No. Jenny will tell him we’re looking for him, and he’ll know Mama Ade sent us. That’ll keep him from worrying some Imperium official is tracking him and he’ll stay put.”

  “Wait, Imperium? You know about them?” She couldn’t hide the surprise in her voice. She wouldn’t have thought they’d have any influence down here, not where magic was practiced in the open.

  “We keep to our own, but sometimes a couple of them make their way down here. We smile and nod, but ignore them. About ten years ago, one of them tried to flex some muscle, show how important he was. The Queens didn’t like that too much, so they fed him to the gators. No trouble with them since.”

  “Queens?”

  “Voodoo Queens. It’s what we call the head priestesses of the groups in the different quarters. They’re in charge of the city, no matter what the mayor thinks.”

  “And is Mama Ade…?”

  “A Queen? No. Used to be, but retired from it before I was born. Still, they try to get her back in from time to time, but she could whip any of their butts without breaking a sweat.”

  Settling back, watching the Big Easy pass by, she had a lot to think about. Her companion seemed to know what he was doing, which helped put her at ease, but the culture here was just so different from what she was used to.

  Picking up the pa
stry, she eyed it for a moment before deciding to try it. Biting into it, she cried out as something hard and sharp poked the roof of her mouth. Spitting out the cake, she saw a little plastic figurine, covered with fruit filling and bite marks, staring back at her.

  “Hey. You got the KC baby. That’s good luck for the year.”

  Good luck? This had to be the weirdest thing yet. Why would finding a baby…? Shaking her head, she ignored the question racing through her mind and chalked it up to another culture difference. Maybe this was like a rabbit’s foot? Good luck for whoever finds it.

  She tried to strangle the small voice in the back of her mind reminding her it wasn’t good luck for the rabbit.

  8

  There are certain qualities all dive bars have in common, Bella thought as she and Ray walked into the Jackalope. There’s always a hulking brute at the front door, there is always at least one pool table, and even in places that ban smoking, the air always seemed filled with a gray haze. She wondered if there was a secret catalog people ordered from, one filled with all the kitsch necessary to create this atmosphere.

  Lights in the Jackalope were dim enough to make it hard to see in some deeper recessed areas, but even here the Mardi Gras spirit still made itself known, though it seemed embarrassed to do so. Purple, green and gold beads hung from the edges of picture frames and lined the walls of the bar as though grudgingly accepting the fact it couldn’t keep the celebration out. Sad of an attempt as they were, the beads were still the brightest things in the place.

  Ray tapped her on the shoulder and pointed toward a distant corner where a small group of people huddled around a table. She took a step but halted when she felt a hand grip her shoulder. Looking back at Ray, she watched him shake his head and gesture toward the bar. Taking that as her cue, she followed close behind as he wound his way between empty tables toward the long wooden edifice.

  Behind the bar stood a man who could have been an extra for any slasher movie ever made. Scars covered his face in crisscross patterns and his nose was bent so far to the side, it looked as though he was trying to sniff his ear. On top of that, he sported such a bad comb over, she almost couldn’t look away. He was like a walking car accident. She didn’t want to look, but couldn’t stop herself from slowing down to look, anyway. Behind the long slab of polished oak he continued wiping down taps, checking the bottles in the speed well, and acting as if the two of them hadn’t entered the bar at all.