Dance By Midnight

by Phaedra Weldon

  "I know a little about them because of my mother."

  "She liked Faeries?"

  I snorted and handed Mike a plate. "She was more like terrified of them. She always had me spell the word differently. F. A. E. R. I. E. Said the other way, the F. A. I. R. Y. was just the laymen's understanding of them. I remember gardeners coming to the house every day to make sure there weren't any Cairns that popped up overnight. I think at first they all humored her, but then after a while I noticed a few of them stopped coming and the others were a bit less jovial."

  "What does that mean?" Mike set a plate in the cabinet.

  "Oh, like I said, at first they used to kid with me about my mom. Crazy woman. Scared of little Faeries. That kind of thing. But they stopped doing that and started whispering to themselves before they stopped coming period."

  Sam turned back to the sink. "What kind of garden did your mom have?"

  "An English garden—a lot like the one Mike's got out back." I stared at the window. I tried to call up those old images of mine, the ones of me playing ball around the fountain. I always liked the fountain because it had Koi in it. I said as much to Sam and Mike. "I never saw mom buy the fish, and I never saw the gardeners bring them either. They just multiplied."

  "They call that sex, Dags."

  I gave Mike a foul look. "That's not what I mean. Something my mom said stuck with me when I asked about them having babies. She said all the fish were male. We could tell that because the males were the prettiest."

  Sam looked at the murky water in the sink. "You ever noticed a correlation between the increase in fish and decrease in gardeners?"

  "No." And then I jumped on her train of thought. I snapped my head around and stared at her. "You think the gardeners turned into fish?"

  "Depends on what Faerie claimed that garden."

  "I thought you said they couldn't come into the Material World or it's ash?"

  She pushed her hand into the water and retrieved the wash towel. "They can't. But they can send out little minions. Creatures loyal to them. Sort of like…"

  "Fetches?" I asked.

  Sam gave me a smirk as she looked at me. "Yeah. Only in my opinion, they're more insidious. The usual fetches, the ones made by Ethereals or Abysmals, seem a little brain dead. You know, they got one mission and that's all they got? Well, try coming up on a slug, or a purblind, and not to mention…." She made a face. "A redcap."

  I looked over at Mike. He shook his head. "Don't look at me. I have no idea what she's talking about."

  "You both need to read that book Dags brought. It's one hell of a book of knowledge. In fact, I need to look up crossroads. But," she said and pointed to the clock over the stove before she dried her now wet hand again. "We've got very little time if we're going to make work of the full moon."

  Again, Mike and I glanced at each other before we followed Sam out of the kitchen. She stopped at the dining room table where the BBOE lay open. "I found a book a lot like this one, but not as well kept or indexed, in New Orleans, which is where I live, by the way." She moved a few of the pages. "It had a spell in it that rose above the rest. A spell to trap and hold a Fae."

  Again, Mike and I shared glances. "Sam," I said. "Fae? Fairy? Same thing?"

  "No. A Faerie is what Maab is. They're the indigenous whatsis of their race. But their creations, the ones I was just telling you about, the ones that can manifest and move about in the Material World, are what we call Fae. They're like aberrations of their creators." She paused. "Like the changeling."

  "Ah," Mike nodded. "I get it."

  I didn't but…meh.

  "Dags, all those names I just said? Those are fae. Compare them to the Revenants or Powers. They possess the same cognitive power of thought as a living creature."

  How did she know I wasn't following? Was it written on my face? "And you know the difference because they're here in this world."

  "Hon." She put a hand on my shoulder. The touch was electrical. I felt it all over my body. If it affected her the same way, she didn't show. "Fae creature aren't like anything you've ever seen in this world. Changelings are the closest to something…normal looking."

  Mike sat down near the book. "Why are you wanting to trap one?"

  "Just as a defensive maneuver. So far they've been relatively dormant or invisible. It's only been in the past year my coven and I started noticing them. And given their nature as being something created by planar beings, and given our nature of what we are and our purpose, keeping them out of this world still applies."

  She has a coven?

  My second thought was, do they all look like her? "And you want to see if any of them know where Brendi is?"

  "They wouldn't tell us even if they knew." She turned the book to face Mike and myself. "In order to get Brendi from Maab, we're going to need something to trade. I'm not sure it'll work, but I thought if we had something Maab really wanted…" She looked at each of us. "I looked into this wonderful book of yours and found some information about a mantle, a simple piece of cloth, given to Maab by Oberon when they were lovers. Legend says it was made of the stars and woven by spiders—which sort of creeps me out."

  Me too.

  "The mantle was stolen not long after Oberon replaced Maab with Titania. Maab vowed a wish to whomever found her mantle."

  "No one's found it?" Mike leaned back in the chair.

  "Nope. It's slipped into legend. I've never heard about it. And I'm sure no one else has either."

  "So…." He raised his arms and tucked his hands behind his head. "How exactly do we find a mantle spun by spiders?"

  I nearly choked when she turned and pointed at me. "Him."

  "Me? I don't know where to find a mantle. I've never heard of it either."

  "Right. But," she said and bent over the book and flipped few pages. I leaned over with her and caught the section header: Finder. Oh boy. "See here? It says there are spells to find things, but no one ever listed any of them in this book."

  "Maybe that's because it's not always wise to go looking for some…things?"

  "Maybe. But I'm pretty sure the Grimoire has one of those basic magic spells the Big Book Of Everything mentions." She smiled at me and I backed up again when she wiggled her eyebrows. "Time to put yourself to good use, other than sapping all my healing power."

  "It's not like I ask to get beaten up."

  "Man-up bro." Her eyes sparkled.

  "Wait just a minute." Mike leaned forward and lowered his arms. "Just…bare with me. You think the changeling took Dags because he's a Sentinel?"

  Sam nodded. "That's my theory. He has the smell and feel of one of the God Mother's children. But he's been tainted with other magic, like the Cruorem brandings as well as the Grimoire. He's low hanging fruit."

  Now that was just mean.

  Mike chuckled. "Well that's where I'm going with this. They sensed he's a Sentinel, and the changeling might have sensed other things about him, thus putting him in that crossroad. But he's also got this all powerful magic book inside of him. Dags used magic from that book to escape. Why didn't it protect itself from the book's power?"

  "I wondered the same thing. My assumption is the changeling and her puppet master, Maab, don't know about the Grimoire, 'cause if she did, I doubt she'd have just used rope to bind him there. I agree with you that now he's used it, it's possible if he's taken again his escape won't be that easy."

  I followed the thread. "Which means next time they'll use something stronger—"

  "Or they'll take you straight to Alfheim." She poked my chest. "Because that book you're carrying is something every damn race in every damn world wants. It's a culmination of magic that originated in the Dark World from the dawn of time."

  That just made this book seem all the more impressive. The fact it was intangible and part of me…or I was part of it…sometimes scared the shit out of me. It was like having a ticking time bomb strapped to my chest.

  "I think you freaked him out."

  Sam
moved closer to me and put a warm hand on my cheek. "Darren McConnell, you were chosen by fate to carry this book. You keep it from the hands of everyone else by holding it to your soul. It's why they call you a Guardian now, because you keep the book's secrets safe."

  "I don't think the Witch that put it there did it for those reasons."

  "Doesn't matter. It's done. So you accept it and you make the best of it." She stepped back. "So now I have to ask you…is there a way for you to look into the book?"

  That was a good question. "Back in the Cairn, I was scared out of my mind so I begged it to get me out of there. I saw a small book at that moment, and when it opened, I could see a spell. The one word for fire."

  "That was all you needed because of your intent. Escape. So…." She pursed her lips. "Maybe if you try it now and think of a spell to find…." She paused as if looking for the right word. "Well I can't say find Fae objects or we'll be scrounging through a bazillion items. Those little fuckers are hoarders by nature. So…how do we narrow it down?"

  I gave it a bit of thought. I could understand saying Dark objects or Light. But since we didn't know where they were from, it sort of limited us. "How about I look for lost objects from a lover?"

  Mike snorted. "You really think that'll work?"

  "You got a better idea?" She gave him a withering look and then looked back at me. "Try it. What do we have to lose?"

  I really don't like those words. It's like saying…hey Murphy! Fuck with me!

  I closed my eyes and tried to think with the same intensity I did in the Cairn. But I didn't want to escape this time, I needed to find something. I thought of the feeling I had when I lost my mom's locket. The one she always wore around her neck. I remember it had a picture of her and me in it. They hadn't found it in the fire that killed her and it hadn't been in her jewelry box. So I understood the desire to find something.

  I'd wanted it for over twelve years.

  I heard Sam gasp in the distance but ignored it. The book appeared to me again, closed just like before. But this time it flipped open to a page filled with words. All kinds of words. So I started reading them aloud. And as I read them I committed them to memory. I knew I would never forget this spell, just like I would never forget the one for fire.

  And when the spell was finished, the book closed.

  "Wow," I said as I blinked a few times. But Sam and Mike had their jaws hanging open. "What?"

  "You…." Sam pointed. "It came out of your chest. It was all glowing and ghostly. You had it in your hands and turned the pages. Then…you stopped, and started reading from it."

  "Really?" I remembered reading; I just thought it was in my head. "What'd I say?"

  Mike gave a nervous laugh. "Who knows? You were talking in some weird language. Couldn't understand a word."

  "Sumerian." I looked around. "You got a pen and paper?"

  She brought me her iPad and for the next twenty minutes I translated the spell in my head into English. When I was done we all whistled. Some of it was an ingredients list and the rest was a simple ritual.

  "I've got most of these things…but," she said and pointed to one of the items on the screen. "What the hell is a 'three day dead shroud of a respected woman?'"

  I looked at it again. "Uh…"

  "You got that wrong." She arched her eyebrow at me.

  "No I didn't."

  "Yeah you did. That doesn't make any sense."

  Mike took the tablet and started poking at it.

  "Sam, I didn't get it wrong. The thing is burned into my brain and that's what the translation says."

  "Translations can be wrong. I mean, look at the Bible and the whole prostitute thing—"

  "I'm not having a debate with you." I stood up and faced her. "The list isn't wrong. Just break it down. You have to find the shroud of a woman who's been dead for three days, and that woman has to have lead a respectable life."

  She put her hands on her hips. "And where in the hell in the city of Savannah do you think we're going to find that?"

  "Right here."

  We both turned and looked at Mike as he faced the tablet out to us. "Mrs. Jessica Reinhold, passed away two days ago from complications of a knee replacement. She was fifty-three and an upstanding lady of Savannah. See? Her obit says she was a member of the Mayflower Society."

  I grabbed the tablet and skimmed the obit. "Fuck…it says her funeral was today where she was interned in her family mausoleum in Bonaventure Cemetery."

  "Yay. Great. That place gives me the creeps." Sam crossed her arms over her chest.

  "You don't get it." I turned the tablet to face her. "She died two days ago. This is the third day. Some traditions bury on the third day. She died at eleven twenty two p.m. We've got less than four hours to find her and get her shroud before she's dead four days. Otherwise, we're going to have to wait for another upstanding lady to pass away."

  Mike stood up. "I hate cemeteries…"

  BONAVENTURE

  I'm not sure if I mentioned it before, but I'm not fond of cemeteries either. Especially not the kind where all the gravestones are sculptures and big box mausoleums with doors. Too Hollywood. Too…something's going to come out and eat me feeling.

  Just like the other cemetery I'd been in two weeks ago. I'd looked at a grave and something did come out and try to eat me.

  An Angel.

  It took just over a half hour to get to Bonaventure. But it was closed, which meant the large gates leading into the infamous cemetery were locked. Wasn't it fortuitous that Grey the wolf-dog knew another way in?

  A cold feeling of dread ran up my spine once we climbed under the fence. My face stung from the scratches inflicted by thick the hedging blocking the hidey-hole. Sam turned on a penlight and moved it along the ground. We decided early on the use of light had to be limited. People lived around the cemetery and any kind of light would be visible. It was a waxing moon, so what light did filter through the thick canopy of oaks protecting the cemetery was bright enough to see by.

  Sort of. If you were a bat. With radar.

  "So…which way do we go?" I looked around.

  "I don't know." Sam moved the tiny beam of light over my boot. "I thought you two knew where the woman's grave was."

  I gave her a pretty hateful look and was happy she couldn't see my face. "They don't have addresses for gravestones in obituaries."

  Mike didn't say anything as he followed Grey. He had a backpack on and pulled out one of his Desert Eagles. Sam pulled at my t-shirt and we followed the big guy around the foot paths.

  We entered near a huge Celtic cross and moved toward the water. The cemetery backed up along the Savannah River. I'd been here once or twice as a kid, long before any movies were made about good and evil. And the place still gave me the same heebee jeebees it did when I was six. I think what really gave the place character—other than the Spanish moss that hung like beards off the trees—was the array of monuments. I'd seen the piano headstone before, and the creepy little crib one. There were several that looked like kids. And a pyramid, which just failed to make any sense to me.

  But the creepiest kinds in my opinion, especially out here in that moon-doused, monochromatic light, were the angels. They were everywhere. Wings folded in, heads bowed, and hands usually out in supplication. I don't know why—but they scared me the most.

  My grandmother thought it was some kind of child psychosis, my dislike of angels. Imagine explaining that to your church going friends—about how your grandkid screamed when he saw an image of an angel.

  Thinking of Gabriel, maybe my younger self knew something I hadn't even realized yet.

  When we reached a main road where a car or tour bus could drive, Sam stopped and thumped the back of Mike's shoulder. "Hey," she hissed. "We're going in circles."

  "I'm following the wolf." Mike gestured to the animal in the middle of the road. "She's sniffing."

  I looked around us, keeping close. It was sort of odd to me, that you could look around the cem
etery from any vantage point and see the tombstones and mausoleums on the opposite end. A waist high level of azaleas dotted the empty spaces. And above us Spanish moss hung like beards from the trees.

  To my right I could just see the river through the trees. The moon sparkled on its surface, giving the whole night a surreal moment to it. But then…I was in a cemetery after eight in the evening…looking for a freshly buried nice old lady. Not sure how much more surreal I could get.

  "What if she's in one of these mausoleums?" Sam whispered. "These things have locks."

  "They do?" I looked at her. "Why? Who's going to steal anything out of—" and then our present circumstance came crashing on top of my head. "Oh."

  "Ass hat."

  I laughed. "I know another woman who says that a lot." But then thoughts of her darkened my mood so I tried thinking of something else.

  That's when I noticed Mike was a few feet down the road with Grey. Sam and I ran to catch up. "Where are you going?"

  He stopped and pointed to the left. "She's heading through there. Just past the Mercer grave. I see a hell of a lot of wreaths."

  Genius.

  We tromped around the footpaths toward the flowers and Sam groaned once we arrived. "Fuck…it is a mausoleum."

  I heard a low growl and looked down. Grey stood between me and Sam and she was giving the Mausoleum a really nasty evil eye. The thing was still a good fifty feet away, but even in the moonlight I could see why she didn't like it.

  The outside of the small marble structure was the centerpiece of a plethora of flowers. Standing wreaths, O's with sashes across the middle and a few solid hearts. The basket and oasis flower arrangements were stacked at least six rows away from the front doors, making it look like a little garden.

  When Sam started forward I grabbed her arm. "Grey's not happy."

  "She thinks the flowers are people. It's okay." She tried to pull away.

  A movement amid all those flowers made me grip her arm tighter. "She might not be wrong. Hey Mike…you guys come back here."

  I led them several feet back the way we came into a plot with a Roman column tombstone. The column gave us a bit of shielding and a great vantage point. Once they knelt down next to me, Sam shot me an irritated look. "What is your damage?"