by C. L. Bevill
One story specified definitively that only a witch could make a loup-garou. The witch caused the cursed one to become a werewolf. Sometimes the witch became loup-garou and infected another. Sometimes the witch cursed the victim with lycanthropy. Some stories had a time limit. The cursed one stayed cursed only for so many days. Sometimes the victim only became wolf-like during the full moon. Other times the victim changed only during the night.
I’m cursed, Jane thought. So is the werewolf? So we’re both cursed, and by the same witch? What would be the odds that two witches cursed us separately? The Roux-Ga-Roux chases after me. Attached to me somehow? We know each other. I mean, we knew each other.
Jane dug in her pocket for the gold medallion with the snarling face on it. She had an idea that this was the face of a Roux-Ga-Roux. This was the monster that stalked the darkness and had an affinity for her. She looped the leather thong over the corner of the monitor and looked at it for a moment. Maybe it would inspire some thoughts.
Searching for ideas about a witch and a witch’s curse was like searching through a towering pile of needles for a specific one. The Internet was overflowing with tall tales and theories about witches. The mundane and harmless types were Wiccans and not witches at all. There were dozens of articles about types of witchcraft from sorts originating in Africa to some that came from Native Americans. Some were combinations of Christians and other religions from half a dozen countries ranging from Haiti to Bulgaria.
Many of them loved to throw a curse on the unwary offender, which brought Jane to the subject of eradicating the spell.
Searching for how-to’s on removing a curse were even more varied. Of course, it depended on the curse and on the cursee’s beliefs. One could be cleansed through numerous methods.
And look at that, Jane thought clicking on one of the many links, some of them are available on the Internet for a low, low, low price of $19.99 plus tax. Curse-B-Gone for only $19.99 plus tax, and for an extra $5.99 you can get a blessing from the Voodoo Queen of New Orleans.
Jane thought about knocking her head against the wooden desk but she decided the librarian might have an issue with the noise. There wasn’t an easy answer. It all came back to who she was and where she came from.
Tapping her fingers on the surface of the desk got Jane a stern look from the person sitting next to her. She stopped the movement. What do I know about that?
I lived in New Orleans. I think.
No one has reported me missing. I think no one’s reported me missing. There are no posts for a woman who looks like me.
People are after me. Namely Raoul. I don’t know why. He doesn’t like me much.
Freaky stuff is happening. Christien, the Roux-Ga-Roux, the psychic running away from me, saying I’m cursed. Repeat. I don’t know why. Still freaky.
Jane stared at the monitor and the ad for Curse-B-Gone. A little trailer on the bottom said the product had been featured in such and such newspaper.
She perked up; a seed of an idea planted itself in her brain. What had the news said about the car accident? What had they said about me? Maybe the reporters had dug something up in the days since she’d escaped the hospital. Why do work someone else might have already done?
The first search terms were “Jane Doe Found in New Orleans.” It didn’t produce any results. She searched more. She looked under car accidents. It took her the better part of an hour, but she finally found a short account of the car accident:
An unidentified woman dashed into heavy traffic at State Highway 39 and Paris Road in Chalmette. She was hit by a 2007 Jeep Wrangler driven by Stephen Laney, 65, of Kenner, Louisiana. Ten-year-old Bobby Therin of Violet, reported that he witnessed the unidentified woman attacking a man in a sedan blocks away from where she ran into traffic and was struck by Laney’s Jeep. The boy’s mother, Devona Therin, stated, “I don’t know what Bobby saw exactly, but the driver of the sedan was screaming bloody murder at her when she ran away.” The unidentified woman is recovering at Tulane Medical Center. Anyone knowing her identity is asked to call Detective Nicholas Hartman at the New Orleans Police Department or the St. Bernard Parish Sheriff’s Office.
The telephone numbers of NOPD and St. Bernard’s Sheriff’s Office were listed, but Jane didn’t bother with those. Speaking with law enforcement wouldn’t help, as it had been proven before.
Instead she searched for Devona Therin’s name and address in Violet, Louisiana.
Jane remembered the boy. She’d gotten out of the car, and the little boy in the minivan next to the car was staring at her. He’d been watching her like she was a show on television, like he couldn’t quite believe his eyes. She didn’t quite understand why she wanted to speak to this boy. It was a strong impulse that pushed at her. She didn’t know what he’d seen, but he might have seen something that could help her track down Raoul and consequently, herself.
Half expecting the name to be unlisted, Jane blinked when the find-a-person program came up with William and Devona Therin’s name, address, and telephone number. Associated persons with the couple were Robert, Patricia, and Grace. Of course, finding the information might be the easy part. Getting the child’s mother to allow Jane to talk with him might be a thousand times harder.
“That is an interesting medallion,” someone said quietly from behind her.
Jane didn’t jerk, but her heart jumped in her chest. Using the mouse, she exited the window on the monitor. The window underneath it had the Curse-B-Gone advertisement on it. Then she looked over her shoulder at the librarian who had showed her how to access the Internet.
The woman was in her late thirties and dyed blonde from root to tip. Her brown eyes were expressive as she stared at the pendant. She appeared as though she wanted to touch it but restrained herself. “It looks like something one of the local covens might make. May I look at it?”
Jane hesitated but then handed it to the librarian, using the leather cord to hold it. The librarian took it the same way. She used her reading glasses to examine it closely. “It looks like the representation of a familiar beast.”
“I thought it might be something a little more sinister,” Jane said slowly.
The librarian took a moment to smile at Jane. “Well, we do live in New Orleans.” She drawled the words so that it sounded like “N’owleens.” “Ann Rice sure started something here, although many would argue the city has been inundated with the supernatural for many centuries more than Ann Rice’s been about.”
“I suppose every large city has its fair share of the odd and abnormal,” Jane offered. She was trying to ask what the librarian knew about the medallion without being obvious but couldn’t think of the words. “Have you seen something like that—” she pointed at the dangling pendant “— before?”
“I’ve seen similar pendants,” the woman said. “Oh, my name is Iris.”
“Jane,” Jane said. “Jane Doe.”
Iris snorted. “Seriously?”
Jane shrugged. “Until a better name comes along.”
Iris held the medallion up to the light. “There’s a little maker’s mark on the back. I’d need a magnifying glass to identify it. But we don’t need that.”
Jane supposed she had been obvious about trying to identify it. “Why not?”
Iris gestured to one side with the hand holding the medallion. “Dr. Armand Sorrel is here in the library. He spends most of his afternoons here. We can ask him.” She twisted the pendant around by rotating her wrist.
“Armand Sorrel?”
“I know you probably haven’t heard of him.” Iris grimaced. “He writes about local stories. He’s a retired sociologist, although he’s got degrees in psychology and anthropology, too. He’s written about ten books about local color. Ghost stories, about Voodoo, Santeria, about the history of New Orleans. He did a reading for the library a month ago but then he lives in the Bywater.”
Jane turned to look and saw an elderly man sitting in a comfortable corner seat reading a copy of Mad Magazine. �
��He’s a retired sociologist,” she said doubtfully.
Iris lifted her shoulders. “If it’s got a cultural or sociological bent, Armand probably knows about it. He’s forgotten more information than most people will ever learn in their lifetimes. Come on, he doesn’t bite.” She paused to reconsider. “Well, much, and he’s had his rabies shots.”
Before Jane could consider whether it was a good idea or not, Iris was making her way across the room, leaving the other woman to follow or not. Jane followed.
“Dr. Sorrell,” Iris said cheerfully.
The man peeked over the top of Alfred E. Neuman’s gap-toothed grin on the cover of the magazine he held with both hands. His hair was snow white and combed back into a short pony tail. His skin was glossy mahogany. His eyes were the color of pure brown sugar. If he hadn’t been wearing a Hawaiian shirt with a proliferation of palm trees and neon green jams, he might have looked like a retiree out for the afternoon instead of someone’s escaped, beach-bum great-uncle.
“Iris,” the man said carefully. He put Alfred E. Neuman back in front of his face and ignored the librarian.
“Don’t be rude, Armand,” Iris said. “This young woman is looking for information about a pendant.”
“Not now, Iris. Mad is lampooning Twilight again,” Dr. Sorrell said brusquely.
Iris glanced back at Jane and made a face. “Lord, you’re a grumpy man. What does sharing a little information hurt you?” she said to the doctor.
“I’ve got a theory that Edward Cullen is secretly an alien.” Those brown sugar eyes peeked over the top of the magazine again. “You know, he’d really kill her if all those things were true about their abilities. Superhuman strength and a body like a rock. Hah! They’d have sex and he’d probably—”
“Dr. Sorrell,” Iris protested. “You’re making me look bad.”
“Only three people showed up for my reading last month, Iris,” he said blackly, adjusting the magazine in his hands.
“I’ll advertise much better for the next one,” Iris said. “It was a Friday night, and people don’t want to go to book readings.” She pursed her lips. “Maybe if we serve beer. No, I guess we can’t do that. Definitely canapés, even if I have to pay for them out of my own pocket. I’ll send out press releases. It’ll be a party.”
The man barked laughter behind the magazine. “All right. I’ll remember that. I’m writing a novel now. It doesn’t have vampires or werewolves in it at all. It probably won’t sell anything. But you’ll have the library buy a copy, am I right?”
“Would a Roux-Ga-Roux in it sell copies?” Jane asked.
The magazine dropped to the man’s lap. He stared at Jane. After a long minute, he said, “Iris, go and show some teenager how to surf for Internet porn or such. I’ll be chatting with the young woman for a bit.”
Iris smiled indulgently. She handed the medallion to Jane, who took it by the thong.
When the man saw the pendant, he sat up straight. “May I, young woman?” He lifted a hand out. Jane hesitated and then put the leather cord into his hand. He held it up and adjusted the item so that he could see it in the best light. He didn’t notice that the Mad Magazine slipped to the floor. Jane took a moment to pick up the discarded periodical and put it on the table beside his chair.
Finally the doctor turned to Jane and said grimly, “Where did you get this?”
“Off the neck of a Roux-Ga-Roux,” Jane said sincerely. Oh why the hell not? I’m not fond of lying for lying’s sake. Besides telling the truth might get an interesting reaction.
Dr. Sorrell looked at the medallion again. “The cord’s broken.”
“Yes, I broke it,” she said. “I don’t think it would have come off otherwise.”
He gestured at the seat beside his. “Sit down. You’re like one of those super tall models towering over me. Makes me think you want to stomp on my head.” His voice was cranky and bordering on full frontal rude.
“You must have been the most popular sociology professor on the block,” Jane said dryly as she sat next to him.
Dr. Sorrell shot her an irate look. “You took on a Roux-Ga-Roux,” he said making it sound like a question but it wasn’t.
“He’s more like a very large puppy dog,” Jane said, immediately regretting the words. A large puppy dog with large canines. Sorry.
“All the large dog stories going around the Quarter lately,” he mused, “they say it’s a devil dog or a hell hound or the ghost of a dog who died protecting his master. If jaws didn’t flap I wouldn’t have a job, don’t you know.” Suddenly he shook the medallion at her. “This was on its neck.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s a him,” Jane said and added, “yes.”
The older man set his shoulders and sighed. He shook the medallion hanging from his hand. “This is a cursed object.”
“I notice you don’t touch it directly,” she said.
“Because I don’t want the curse to rub off on me,” Dr. Sorrell said. “I didn’t used to believe in them, but when you dig around for old stories and talk to hundreds of people who know things you’ve never dreamed of, you discover that you don’t know everything. Not even a man with three doctoral degrees.”
“A woman calling herself a psychic touched me yesterday and said I was cursed, too.”
Dr. Sorrell looked at her, still holding the medallion in the air. He stared for so long that it made Jane uncomfortable. “There are those who are sensitives. Folks call themselves psychics are usually people with a finer sense of what’s happening with others. I call them super psychologists. They see things that others wouldn’t notice. Say, they might notice that nasty scar on your right forearm and think, ‘That’s something that would happen to someone who works with glass or such.’ They might see you’ve got fresh blisters on your hands and think, ‘She’s been doing some hard menial work lately.’ They might notice those fading marks around your wrists and think, ‘She’s been in trouble lately.’”
“That isn’t what happened,” Jane said. “She touched me and then freaked out.”
The doctor shrugged. “I’ve never seen evidence of it for myself, and even though sociology is considered a soft science, it’s still science.”
“What about a group of people who live at a lake who have certain abilities?” she asked, thinking of what Marinette said. “They call themselves La Famille.”
The doctor grinned, showing a full set of pristinely white teeth. “Mostly psychics from the rumors, but they won’t talk to outsiders, and there’s no proof of their abilities either. People have been known to disappear who go asking questions about them.” His grin slowly faded as he regarded her, and his gaze settled on her eyes. “One of their most infamous attributes is their gold eyes. Eyes very much like yours, I suspect.”
“I don’t know anything about them,” Jane admitted.
“Well, who are your people, then?” he asked after looking at the medallion once again.
“I wouldn’t know.”
“Oh, orphan then,” Dr. Sorrell said. “Maybe you’re a distant relative. That would explain much.”
“What about the medallion?” she asked instead of answering his implied question.
“As I’ve said, a cursed object. I’ve seen one before. These are handmade, cast by the maker. A curse-layer. A black-hearted individual who wishes harm to another.” The doctor tilted his head as he studied the item dangling from his hand. “Often it will contain something that belongs to the victim. This one, for example, might be the handiwork of a hoodoo practitioner. One of the most exquisite I’ve seen. The beast’s face is remarkably detailed. Possibly this was cast by the lost-wax method, after being hand carved for a lengthy time in order to get all the details correct. The maker puts a stamp on the back just after the casting, so it’s clear that the practitioner is the one everyone fears. But this mark is somewhat obscured so I can’t be certain.”
Jane felt a chill run across her flesh. Tiny icy fingers brushed her skin. “So the victim might be wearin
g that? Why?”
“To be under the hoodoo’s control,” Dr. Sorrell said. “Sometimes they mark the flesh. Sometimes they make an item. There are many stories about it. Methods vary. To the true practitioner, the spells are passed down to family members or their beloved devotees.” He lowered his hand and let the medallion dangle between his knees. “Those are secrets that even I cannot pry out of them.”
“How would one break a curse, then?”
“An eternal question, young woman,” Dr. Sorrell said with no little amount of amusement. “The cursed one kills the one who laid the curse, of course.”
Chapter 14
Raise no more spirits than you can conjure down.
– English proverb
Jane digested that in much the same way as she would have swallowed a golf ball-sized rock. It made sense, and it didn’t allow for much leeway. There was, however, the whole issue of murder being illegal, not to mention that she didn’t know who the curse-layer was.
“Do you know who made that?” Jane asked, referring to the pendant. Might as well follow the clues. The good doctor seemed as innocuous as the next retired would-be novelist-sociologist.
If Jane hadn’t been watching Dr. Sorrell’s face she would have missed his minute reaction. His eyes skated over her face to the medallion hanging between his knees. He swallowed, and it wasn’t the good type of swallow when one has just consumed something tasty. It was quite to the contrary.
Little beads of sweat gathered at his temples, and Jane understood that this medallion made Dr. Sorrell nervous. Finally, he nodded to himself. “There are practitioners and there are practitioners. I suspect this is a product of the Noir.”
“The Noir?” Jane repeated. “The…black?”
“The Noir or Le Noir is French for the Black. The Noir is a magic practitioner of local repute. I’ve heard stories about the Noir as far away from Louisiana as D.C. and New York City. That one doesn’t play around with legends at all. I’ve tried to talk to the Noir before, but I was warned off. I didn’t think much of the warning at the time, so I went along with my merry business until I woke up one morning with a dozen snakes in my bed.” Dr. Sorrell offered the medallion back to Jane, who took it and stuffed it into her pocket once more. “Let’s say I was motivated to leave it be.”
