by Jan Eldredge
“But Gran.” Evangeline grabbed her by her warm hand. “You did save her baby. I’m right here.”
Gran shook her head. “That baby was born dead. She’s buried in the same coffin with your mama in St. Petite’s churchyard.”
The world slipped out from under Evangeline. Black dots danced before her eyes. “Gran,” she whispered again, “I’m right here. I’m not dead and buried. I’m not a ghost.” It must be the pain medicine. She glanced at the half-empty IV bag. It must be fogging Gran’s mind, making her talk nonsense. But Gran’s eyes, though filled with sorrow, were as clear as ever.
Gran fiddled with the bed covers. “We chanted. We applied poultices. Your mama took my hand, and she said to me, ‘Tell little Percy and his daddy they will always have my love. No time or space can sever it.’” The tears now rolled freely down Gran’s wrinkled cheeks. “She used what little life force she had left to speak her final words, ‘I know you’ll raise her up right and train her to be the best haunt huntress Louisiana has ever known. Her name is to be Matilde Evangeline Clement.’ Then she slipped away, her spirit vanishing like a butterfly made of light, extinguished in the world’s wide darkness.” Gran squeezed her eyes shut, suffering a pain more unbearable than a hundred splintered femurs.
Evangeline tried to swallow but couldn’t, nor could she breathe. Either Gran had lost her mind, or she was not who she’d thought herself to be all these years.
Gran wasn’t finished, though. She sighed heavily. “Her lifeless daughter was born shortly after. I held her in my hands, and I proclaimed her name Matilde, but that’s as far as I got.” Gran wiped her tears and smiled. A flicker of joy sparked in her brown eyes.
If Evangeline had been questioning the stability of Gran’s sanity a moment ago, she was now convinced it’d completely taken flight and left the building.
“But like green shoots fighting their way through a fire-swept forest floor, there amid the deepest sorrow of my life was born one of my greatest joys. Matilde was taken from my hands, so I could receive her sister into them. Oh, she was smaller, downright puny, but she had a mighty powerful set of lungs, and oh, was she sassy. I loved her more than my own life at the first sight of her.” Gran squeezed Evangeline’s hand, then rested the back of it against her weathered cheek.
“Gran?” Evangeline whispered. “What are you saying?”
Fresh tears brimmed in Gran’s eyes, and she nodded. “It hasn’t happened often over the past two hundred years, but it’s not unheard of for a haunt huntress to give birth to twin daughters.”
“But . . .” Evangeline’s tongue was as tied as her tangled thoughts.
“Because a haunt huntress must choose the name for her daughter, and since your sister had been bestowed with the first one, that left the second one for you. So I proclaimed you Evangeline Clement.”
For a moment, the world ceased to exist. Only a blinding white wall of shock and confusion surrounded Evangeline. A sister? She’d had . . . a twin sister? “Gran . . . why didn’t you tell me?” She swallowed hard. “Why’d you keep it secret all this time?”
“I’m sorry, Evangeline. Honestly. I am.” Gran sighed. “I watched your struggles and your self-doubts over the years. I knew you felt adrift without your mama. I didn’t want any of it to affect your development as a haunt huntress. It’s when we start to believe our doubts that we fail at the things at which we should succeed.”
Evangeline had so many questions, her mind twisted and flipped like a catfish in a net. What would her name have been had her sister lived? Would they look exactly alike? Would they think the same way, like the same things? Would they have the same interests? But most important, would they both have inherited the haunt huntress talent and powers?
She fixed her eyes on Gran’s. She didn’t want to ask, she didn’t want to hear the answer. Yet it was the only answer that mattered in all the world. “Gran . . . am I a haunt huntress? Or am I a middling?”
The smile slipped from Gran’s face, and Evangeline’s innards iced over.
Gran shook her head. “I don’t know.”
Evangeline’s knees buckled. She pulled a chair over and collapsed onto it. “Tell it to me straight, Gran. No sugarcoating. I can handle it.” She wasn’t really sure she could handle it, but she was determined to maintain her dignity and composure as Gran had taught her a good haunt huntress always should.
“Very well.” Gran gave her a somber, understanding nod. “There are three possibilities.” She held up her index finger. “One. You and your sister each inherited full haunt huntress powers. But such a situation has occurred only once.”
Whatever foundation of hope Evangeline had managed to retain now crumbled beneath her.
Gran held up a second finger. “Two. You and your sister inherited the powers, but split the amount between you, fifty percent going to each of you.”
Gran paused, pressing her lips together for a moment. “Or”—she slowly lifted a third finger—“it’s possible one girl received all the powers, and the other received none. In which case, the girl who received none would be considered a middling.”
“I see.” Evangeline glanced down, disappointed, ashamed, and having no idea who she was. Did she have full powers? Half? Or, was she empty, the end of Gran’s long, unbroken line of haunt huntress ancestors. Considering she was almost thirteen and a familiar had not yet made itself known to her . . . Well, there was her answer, the answer she’d been fearing but had known in her heart all along. There was no denying it any longer. She was a middling. She swallowed, forcing away the lump burning in back of her throat.
“Evangeline, I don’t know what amount of powers you have, but I do know you’re something very special. I see it in you, even if you don’t.”
Evangeline had never felt more powerless in all her life. She stared down at the floor.
“I know becoming a haunt huntress is what you’ve dreamed of all your life.” Gran scrutinized Evangeline’s face, reading the doubt there as clearly as reading the rain in a swollen gray cloud. “Oh, Evangeline.” Gran took her by the hand and gave it a tender squeeze. “This isn’t the end of your path. I don’t know which direction you’re headed or where you’ll end up, but I can tell you this: your journey’s only just beginning. Evangeline, look at me.”
Evangeline met Gran’s eyes.
“Power comes from belief. If you don’t believe you have it, then you don’t. But if you believe in yourself, amazing things will happen.”
As far as Evangeline was concerned, those were just fluffy words. They had no weight or heft. If Gran really believed in her, she wouldn’t be asking her to flee from this job.
“A young haunt huntress has no business going up against a rougarou on her own,” Gran said as though reading her mind. “A rougarou is inhumanly strong and completely heartless. You must get yourself to safety.”
What other choice did she have? Evangeline nodded.
Gran arched an eyebrow, evidently believing she needed further convincing. “On that night when you were born, I left you in the care of the council members and went after the alpha on my own. Part of me wanted to protect innocent people, but another part, and it shames me to confess it, wanted to exact revenge, which is not the haunt huntress way.
“I hadn’t gotten far into the swamp when the alpha jumped down from the branch of an oak and attacked me. Despite the blistering burns my talisman gave him, he still slashed at my face.”
“Gran.” Evangeline shook her head. “You’ve already relived too many painful memories. You can tell me the rest later.”
Gran shook her head back at Evangeline. “You need to hear this. I still had enough fury and strength to fuel me. I fought with everything I had. And so did he. He nearly tore my leg away.”
“Your leg,” Evangeline whispered, glancing down at Gran’s newly rebroken limb. Then she touched the faded scar running down the side of Gran’s face. “It was the alpha. He did this to you.”
Gran nodded. “When he de
cided I’d had enough, he left. He’d made his point. I was no longer a threat.”
Evangeline’s ears buzzed, and her stomach flipped upside down. She didn’t want to hear any more.
Gran sighed. “It’d have been better if he’d left me for dead. But he left me for worse. The only humans who survive an alpha’s attack are the ones he wants to survive, ensuring that at the next full moon, that person will transform into one of the same foul and hellish creatures.”
Gran was certainly capable of keeping big secrets, but Evangeline was pretty sure being a rougarou wasn’t one of them. If that alpha was still alive, Gran would be morphing into a vicious, snarling, fur-covered beast every month. “You killed him. You killed the alpha.”
“I did.” Gran nodded.
A spark of pride flared inside Evangeline as she pieced the scene together. “You let him believe you’d been defeated, that he’d whipped all the fight out of you. But when he walked away, you got him.”
Gran nodded again. “Climbed up onto my good leg and shot him through the heart with a silver bullet from my pearl-grip derringer, the one I kept strapped to my leg and hidden just beneath my skirt.” She fixed an eye on Evangeline. “I took a chance and won. It cost me a lot, but I was willing to pay higher. If I’d failed, he not only would have slain the council, he’d have gone after you too.” She shrugged as though it had all been in a day’s work. “Killing the alpha broke his blood hold, changing his pack members back into men. They and their human familiars scattered like cockroaches and hightailed it out of town. Since then, there’s been no sight or sound of a rougarou anywhere near. Until now.”
“But Gran, what are we, I mean, what are you and the council going to do about the alpha who’s out there now?”
“You and I,” Gran said, “will go back home, and with the help of the council, we’ll figure something out.”
Three knocks sounded, and Evangeline jumped.
The nurse stepped into the room. As she replaced the nearly empty IV bag with a fresh one, she fixed her firm gaze on Evangeline. “I’m afraid visiting time’s over. Doctor’s orders.” She patted Gran’s arm. “Mrs. Holyfield’s going to take a nap now.”
“I’m not tired.”
“You will be,” the nurse looked at her watch, “in ten seconds.”
Gran glanced at the IV bag, then glared at the nurse. “What did you put in there?”
The nurse smiled sweetly. “Doctor’s orders.”
Gran’s head slumped to the side, and one eye went droopy. “Evangeline. Promise me you’ll . . .”
“Gran!” Evangeline sprang up, her heart slamming inside her chest.
“It’s okay,” the nurse reassured her. “It’s just a harmless sedative. A little something to relax her before surgery.”
Gran’s one eye fell shut. The other stared out straight ahead. Frowning, the nurse reached over to close the eyelid, but Evangeline blocked her hand. “No. That’s the way she sleeps.”
“O-kay.” The nurse moved toward the door. “And now you really must leave.”
Evangeline looped the knotted cordon around Gran’s wrist, then leaned down and kissed her on her scarred cheek. “Don’t worry, Gran. Fader and I will get back home. And you’ll be safe here.” She went to give Gran’s talisman a reassuring pat, but it wasn’t there. She yanked down the thin blanket. There was no silver talisman lying against Gran’s hospital gown. She whirled around on the nurse. “Gran’s talisman! Where is it?”
“Now, don’t worry.” The nurse extended her hands in a just-simmer-down motion. “Per hospital policy, patients aren’t allowed to wear jewelry. We’ll keep her necklace safe until she’s discharged.”
“Oh.” Evangeline drew the blanket back up to Gran’s chin. “Okay . . . I guess.” But she did not like this hospital policy at all.
The nurse pulled the door open and motioned for her to leave.
Evangeline’s heart drooped like a wet rag that’d been squeezed and wrung out. She wanted to cry, but she did not. She straightened her back, held her head high, and left.
She stood in the cold hallway, the heaviness of Gran’s confession pressing down on her as though she were standing at the bottom of the ocean. Visitors and staff flowed past like schools of fish, but she’d never felt so alone in her life. Her mama was gone. Her sister was gone. Her hopes and self-worth, her future as a haunt huntress—vanished. And if the hateful grim had its way, Gran would be leaving her too. She forced her booted feet to move and made her way to the hospital’s tiny chapel.
Holy sanctuaries were her place of comfort, their quiet peacefulness always putting into perspective whatever was troubling her. She knelt before the altar scattered with flickering candles in glass jars. Willing herself to shut out her anguish, at least for the moment, she murmured a prayer for Gran’s safekeeping and for that of Mrs. Midsomer. She prayed for the strength to accept things as they were, then quieted her mind even further. Sometimes her troubled heart and soul cleared right away; other times it took a bit longer for comfort to appear.
The only thing to appear to her this time, though, was the remembrance of her itchy knee yesterday morning, the indicator she’d soon be kneeling inside a strange church. And here she was. She’d seen a lot of other signs and portents over the past two days too, all of them dark and unwelcoming. She gazed up at the chapel’s stained-glass window, and the breath caught in her throat.
There in vivid reds, greens, blues, and yellows, a wolf was taking a small boy and girl by their hands. Sin leading innocents astray. On the other side of the window, the sun was sinking, steadily drawing the day to its end.
Evangeline leaped up. She had much to do before the arrival of the midnight hour.
Evangeline descended the hospital’s front steps, and a gust of wind blew past, whipping around leaves and sending an empty soda can rattling down the street. The weather had picked up since they’d arrived at the hospital that afternoon. The sky now hung gray and swollen.
Her heart as heavy as the clouds overhead, she set off toward the Midsomers’ home. As her boot heels clacked hollowly against the sidewalk, a sudden sensation fluttered against the back of her neck, and she stopped.
Someone was watching her.
She whirled around, certain she would come face-to-face with the spy, but no one was there.
Just nerves, she reassured herself. She’d had a bad day, to say the least. Being a bit jumpy was to be expected. She turned and resumed walking.
She would do what Gran had instructed. She would tend to Mrs. Midsomer, evict everyone else from the house, then go back to the swamp. She’d return in shame, not having discovered her familiar, not having proven she had heart, and with not even a spark of haunt huntress magic igniting inside her. She’d return as a middling. But worse than that, she would have abandoned the Midsomer family, tucking tail and running away in their greatest time of need.
At least Gran would be safe. No rougarou would try to attack her in a hospital. And as soon as the doctors said Gran had recovered enough to go home, she and Percy would drive back and retrieve her.
Barely paying attention to her surroundings, she was passing a three-story brick building, its tall windows covered with tightly shut faded green shutters, when a scruffy brown dog lunged from the doorway. The half schnauzer, half mutt perked its ears, splayed its four legs, and unleashed a barrage of barking, startling Evangeline from her thoughts and bringing her feet to a quick stop.
“Mind your manners, Ju-Ju!” a huddled figure called from the doorway. The owner of the voice wore a dirty blanket wrapped around her bony shoulders; a paper shopping bag filled with what Evangeline guessed were her worldly possessions sat beside her on the gray sidewalk. Ju-Ju wagged his tail at the sound of the woman’s voice.
“Hello.” Evangeline nodded to the woman. She crouched and petted the little dog as it pranced in place, its claws clicking against the pavement. It erupted into another round of barking.
The woman in the doorway leaned out
of her blanket and fixed her eyes on Evangeline’s face, her own face as creased with cracks as the broken and bumpy street next to the sidewalk. “Ju-Ju says you carrying a heavy load in your heart.”
Evangeline sighed miserably. “Yes, ma’am. That’s true.” Her heart did indeed weigh a ton.
A brisk breeze whipped by. The woman tilted her head back and sniffed deeply. “This wind ain’t normal. There’s something in it. Something bad. Ju-Ju smells it too.”
Ju-Ju barked his agreement, his tail wagging a hundred miles an hour. He spun around, and a tiny gray bag swung from his dirty red collar.
Evangeline’s eye’s widened. She didn’t have to ask what it was. Gran had taught her all about them. “A gris-gris bag,” she whispered. She glanced at the woman, who also wore a small sack hanging from a long leather cord around her neck. Evangeline’s heart lightened a few hundred pounds. A gris-gris bag couldn’t remove the rougarou’s curse from Mrs. Midsomer, but it could provide another layer of protection for her, a little something extra to reinforce the weaken-binds. An ember of hope glowed inside Evangeline. She might not have any haunt huntress magic to offer, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t use someone else’s magic to aid Mrs. Midsomer.
“You best be getting off the streets, girl.” The woman in the doorway nodded, then mumbled, “Mmm-hmm,” as though confirming the wisdom of her own advice.
“Yes, ma’am.” Evangeline indicated the tiny sack hanging from the woman’s neck. “I’m in need of a gris-gris bag. . . . It’s an emergency situation. Can you point me to the nearest voodoo temple?” Ju-Ju licked the back of her hand. She scratched his ears, and he closed his eyes in canine bliss.
The woman gave her a silent stare. For a moment, Evangeline feared she wouldn’t answer, but then she pointed across the street with her crooked finger. “You want Papa Urbain’s. Head one block over to Dumaine, then down toward the river.”
Another gust of wind whipped by, bringing plastic straws and pigeon feathers skittering up the road.
