by JB Duvane
Something I had read about when I studied taxidermy as a young boy kept swirling around in my brain. It was a procedure that kept human bodies from decomposing. They could be exposed to the air and would never decay. That made me feel so much better than shutting Mama up in a box. Plus, I was desperate to do something to keep my life from crumbling down around me. It seemed like a good idea so I told Gerald.
“Listen, I understand that you loved your mother and that you want to remember her, but do you really think this is a good idea?”
“I’ve already made my mind up. It’s what I want.”
“Okay, then. She’s your mother. I’ll get it set up.”
Gerald found someone to do the procedure within the hour. They would be flying in from China where the process was performed for certain museum exhibitions, and they would arrive in the morning. I stayed up all night with Mama, telling her everything I’d ever wanted to say but couldn't because I was too afraid. She didn't judge me. She just listened to me while her emotionless eyes stared up at the ceiling.
18
Charlotte
The two men pushed me along the underground tunnels until we came to a rickety wooden bridge that stretched across a small underground creek. On the other side were more caverns in one direction, and a square room that had been built out of patchwork pieces of wood and plaster. This must be where the servants lived. It looked like they had been scavenging portions of the original house to build their underground sanctuary.
A young girl—no more than sixteen or seventeen—with smooth, olive colored skin and bright green eyes, stepped in front of the men. She grabbed the gun out of the young man’s hand and pressed firmly to Renard's temple. When she cocked it, Renard jumped up with his hands held above his head. “What the hell are you doing, girl?”
“Taking her in to see Manbo, now.”
“What the hell do you think we’re doing? Jeeze, what is it with you women. You’re all the same.”
“Only when it comes to you, old man. You two stay here. I take her to Manbo.”
“She's dangerous. Don’t let her fool you!” I heard Renard shout as I moved through another series of narrow tunnels. I had no idea who or what I was supposed to be fooling.
“Who is Manbo? Where are you taking me?” She grabbed the rope binding my hand and pulled me close to her, yanking me fiercely. “Are you going to kill me?”
No answer.
“Are your people going to kill me!? I did nothing wrong. I left like you asked!”
Nothing.
This girl wasn't Renard. He actually seemed to have some humor about the situation. To her this was very serious business. She had a job to do and she was going to complete it. She wasn't going to waste her time talking to me or playing games. There would be no hesitation. I was starting to wish I was back with the silly old man.
Just the way she moved—on the balls of her feet without making a sound—I knew she was different. “Are you Cora's ancestor?”
She looked back and her wild eyes met mine. “I’ll say to you one thing and nothing more. If you speak that name again, your death will be slow.” She turned back around.
Clearly there were two factions—or more—within the Beauchamp family, and they seemed to be at odds with one another. Otherwise they wouldn't be pointing guns at each other’s heads. I gasped as I thought about Raymond and I wondered if something had happened. “Raymond.” It came out as a whisper but she heard it.
The girl turned back. “Shut your mouth. That name is not welcome here.”
We reached a dark opening and the girl lowered herself onto her hands and knees.
“Enter.” An ancient voice came from the darkness.
“Yes, Manbo.”
“Ah, God!” Something hard slammed into the side of my head.
“Your God is not here.” The old voice was filled with hatred. “You will not speak.”
“You will respond by saying, 'Yes, Manbo,' and only when spoken to,” the girl added. “You will shut your eyes. You are not worthy to look at her.”
“Y-yes, Manbo.” I shut my eyes tight. I couldn’t believe what was happening. These people were completely insane. All I could think of was Raymond and that they had gotten to him. But why had they brought me back here. They wanted me gone, now they want me back, but also I’m not allowed to speak or even look at them. Awesome. They were clearly insane.
“No, I want her to look at me. I want her to see what will happen to her. Stand her up.”
“Yes, Manbo.” The girl walked over and grabbed my the hair, wrenching me to my feet and holding my head in place.
“Gentle, Maria. We don't want to scare the poor child. Look at everything she’s already been through.”
I looked at the old woman incredulously. None of them could seem to get their stories straight.
“Yes, Manbo.” She released my hair and held me by the shoulder. The old woman—this Manbo—was sitting on a high-backed chair that seemed to serve as some kind of throne. She had to be their leader, but there was no way she was the Cora woman Raymond told me about. She would have been two hundred years old by now.
The woman leaned forward and her unimaginably long, white hair flowed with her, illuminated by the dim torch light that came from just behind her chair. Her face was mostly in shadow, but her eyes sparkled in the glow of the open flame. She had the same chilling green eyes as the rest of the Beauchamps. “Where is Raymond?”
“Yes, Manbo,” I smirked, and was pushed to my knees by the girl.
“I said leave her alone! Leave me!”
The girl ran out of the room, not making a sound. The old woman stood up and addressed me in a more familiar tone. “We would like to know where he is. Can you tell me, child?”
“Yes, Manbo.”
“Cut the bullshit,” she snapped and leaned in. “You didn’t trust him from the beginning. You thought he was a sociopath and you were right. He kidnapped you and threatened to lock you up for his own pleasure for the rest of your life,” she hissed. She paced around the room for a moment, then stopped in front of me again. “And he had your own father killed.” Her eyes narrowed at me. “You didn’t know that, did you?”
I stared at her in horror as a smile curled up in the corners of her mouth. “That’s not true.”
“Oh yes? Is that what you think? It’s not the first time, either. He killed his own mother and turned her into that monstrosity you saw on your way in here. He is the one that you should be afraid of, not us. He is the one that deserves to be put to death. Each generation of his family has become more and more insane. Do you really think all that madness could just end with him? Like that?” She snapped and stared at her fingers like she had just performed a magic trick. “He is a madman and any child he has will be just as crazy, mark my words.”
I was in shock. It couldn’t be true. I didn’t want to hear another thing this insane woman said.
“You’re the crazy one. You believe you have all these powers and all you have is a bunch of people who you’ve tricked into thinking your some sort of queen!”
The old woman scoffed. “What is this man to you that you could disregard everything you care about? Your father, your own life. You would give it all up for him?”
“You don’t understand. I hated my dad. I hated my life in the trailer. I hated everything about my world, and he … Raymond saved me.” I was starting to cry. I didn’t want to let this woman see my tears but I couldn’t control them. They came gushing out along with all of the sadness I had been holding in. “It doesn’t matter to me that he locked me up in the beginning. He did it because he appreciated me.”
“So now you defend him even after you found what he did? You’re pathetic.”
“I know you’re a fraud. I can see it.”
“You haven’t seen anything yet.” She reached out and plucked a strand of hair off of my head.
“Ow,” I reached up. “What are you doing?”
“This,” she held the ti
ny strand up to the light, “is all I need to control everything that happens to you.”
“Raymond told me about how uneducated you people were, but magic? Seriously? It didn't seem to work out very well for Cora. Why would it work for you?”
She took her place back on the throne. “Child,” she laughed and shook her head. “I am Cora. Her blood and her power are flowing through my veins. I am her blood granddaughter, Coraline.”
“You're all just a bunch of psychos,” I spat.
“Maybe so, but it is the lowest depths lunacy where the Loa reside. Here,” she got up and untied my hands and wrists. I stood quickly to run away. “That kind of behavior is going to get you killed. Sit down.”
I stood there for a moment and stared at her.
“Don’t worry. I am not going to kill you.”
“Then why am I here? Why are you holding me and asking for Raymond?”
“Come here.” She walked up and took my hand gently so she could lead me out toward the mouth of a hidden cave entrance.
I was astounded by the intricacy of the cave and tunnel system that the people moved around in. I had no idea I was anywhere near an opening.
“Many of my people have died as a result of this feud.”
“You could have had peace. You chose to keep fighting.”
“Why should I settle for peace when I can have what's mine? What is ours? The Valices took everything from my great-grandmother, Angeline Beauchamp, and from my people. In my dreams I can smell her flesh burning on that stake. Do you have any idea what those people did?”
“They killed someone who had disregarded a basic respect for human rights and was running around the family farm trying to sew people together.”
“They killed a high priestess! They burnt her at the stake! They deserve to burn themselves!”
“All that’s left is Raymond! And he didn’t have anything to do with what happened almost two centuries years ago.” I finally saw her for what she really was. A con artist. “You are not some reincarnated Voodoo queen. You're a psychotic, sociopathic liar.”
The old woman’s eyes grew wide and she slammed me into the rock wall at the opening of the cave. “I don't care about what you think is right or wrong! Raymond Valice is not going to take away my one chance of getting my home back. I will get what is mine!” she screamed. Then regaining her composure, she stepped away from me. “I can see that it has been a mistake to try to reason with you. You are no better than that thief and murderer. You are both to blame for your own fates.”
The old woman grabbed me by the hair and pulled me back into the cave, then through the tunnel until we were standing in the room that held that horrible open casket and the hideously preserved body of Raymond’s mother.
“Hold her arms.” The woman threw me across the cave at a group of men. Renard was there, but he didn’t touch me. Two of the younger men held my arms against the stone wall.
“Kill her.”
19
Raymond
“Gerald, I need your help.”
“Sure thing.”
“Can you pull up the surveillance system on the island? I’ve been trying to call Charlotte for hours and she’s not answering.”
“Shit. Do you think—“
“I have no idea what to think. I just want to see for myself.”
Gerald navigated his way through a website and the living room of the house on the island popped onto the screen. “Looks empty.”
“Check all the rooms. I’m going to call the security over there.”
I got on the phone with my security man and he told me he hadn’t seen anyone come or go from the house all day. But after checking with the airport tower he found out that another plane landed and had taken off from the airport on the island in the middle of the night.
“What?! How did you not know about that? I want you to through all of the footage from every camera in every part of that house and the grounds last night. I want you to watch every single second! Call me when you find something!”
I hung up the phone in a rage.
“What’s going on?” Gerald was still looking through the rooms on the monitor.
“A fucking plane landed on the island in the middle of the night, then took off a couple hours later.”
“You gotta be kidding. And they didn’t think to tell you?”
“No one was in the tower at the time. They weren’t expecting anyone so … fuck! What the hell happened to her?”
“Okay, we don’t know that anything has happened yet.”
“Then where is she? Did you see her in any of the rooms in the house today?”
“No.” He stopped clicking through the surveillance footage but didn’t turn around. “I think I have an idea of where someone might have taken her.” Gerald turned his chair around and looked at me. “I’ve had guys going over the grounds around this house periodically. Usually we don’t find much but recently one of them came across an area that had multiple tire tracks.”
“Where?”
“Remember when I pulled you out of the caves that time?”
“Yeah, of course.”
“Right around there.”
“But we’ve looked for them there. Dozens of times. We’ve scoured that whole area and we’ve never found a place where they could be hiding.”
“Well, maybe they just use that spot to come and go. Those caverns are immense, Raymond. They stretch underneath the desert for hundreds of miles, and there could be dozens of places where they go in and out. I’ve been getting a surveillance system set up to put out there, but it’s a huge area to cover. We’ll have to—“
“No. Forget it. We don’t have time for that. This bullshit ends now.”
“Kill her.”
I head those words as I entered the crypt where my mother’s body was kept. I was simultaneously relieved and terrified to see Charlotte standing there. I was so glad to see that she was alive, but I never, ever wanted her to see any of this. It was something I’d come to dread, how to deal with Mama.
In all these years I hadn’t been able to let her go, but I was ashamed of how insane holding onto her dead body made me look. I wanted to run to Charlotte and reassure her. I wanted to explain everything to her. All the things that I had left out when I told her the story about my family’s history. All of the details, every thing she wanted to know. I was ready to tell her now. But that old bitch was in my way.
“Get the fuck away from her!” I yelled, my voice booming through the empty stone tunnels. Gerald and ten of my men were behind me and were all armed with semi-automatic rifles.
“Here he is, the guest of honor. We’ve all been waiting a long time for this meeting.” The old wench smiled a gap-toothed smile at me.
“The party is over, you old witch. Tell your men to get their hands off of her. You’re all going to die if you don’t.”
“Not so fast.” The old woman held a finger up in the air and stared at me like she was commanding me or casting one of her curses.
“What is it that you want from me? Whatever it is, it’s yours. Just let her go!”
“You seem very sure that she is going to want to come with you. I’ve told her about your indiscretions. She knows about what you did to your own mother. She knows that you killed her father. And you’ve killed others as well.”
I didn’t know what kind of game she was playing but I knew what it was she wanted. I moved closer to my mother’s casket but the men holding Charlotte dug the knife into her neck.
“I’d be very careful if I were you,” the old woman said.
I inched my way closer to the casket while I address Charlotte directly. I had to get her to understand. And to believe me. “I didn’t kill my mother. I swear. I didn’t kill your father either, Charlotte. He was dead before Gerald got to the hospital.”
“But he was on his way to kill him,” the old woman crowed in a creepy sing-song voice that sounded exactly like my mother’s. It sent shivers down my spine.
“Shut the hell up! This has nothing to do with you!”
“On the contrary, it has everything to do with me, and my people.”
“Charlotte, I only ever did what I thought was best. To help you. I just wanted to—“
“Control her? Keep her for yourself?”
“Shut up, you old bitch!” I took one last step toward the casket and reached in, slipping my hand down the side between the silk fabric that lined the box and the fabric of my mother’s dress. When I pulled my hand up it held a burlap sack with a draw string. “This is what you want! Not her! Let her go!”
The room fell silent and the old woman took a step toward the casket, but her eyes never left the bag in my hand. “What is that?”
“It’s the goddamned legacy you and your slimy cronies have been searching for. The Valice fortune. The one that was supposed to be buried in the walls of this house. Feels like about five pounds,” I said as I threw the bag up into the air a couple times. “I buried it with my mother. But I’ve never wanted any of the money that came from the decades of degradation that my ancestors perpetrated on your goddamned people. You want it? It’s yours.” I threw the bag across the room at the old hag and she caught it. She immediately opened up the drawstring and poured out a handful of diamonds.
“Papa Legba! You have brought the fortune to my people!”
“No, I brought the fortune. Not some hoodoo goblin. Now if I were you I’d get the hell out of these caves. They’re going to start filling up with smoke any second.”
“What? Why? What have you done?!”
“I had some of my men stay above ground. I instructed them to wait twenty minutes, then to light the whole fucking house on fire.” I looked at my watch. “I’d say that twenty minutes was up five minutes ago.”
