by Faith Hunter
This whole thing sucked.
• • •
We had a breakfast big enough to last all day, with a slab of thick-cut bacon that had to have come from Lucky Landry’s butcher shop, Boudreaux’s Meats. Best meat I had ever eaten—well, cooked, and me in human form. Beast had other thoughts about her preference of freshly brought down meat, raw and still kicking. Not my preference. There were also sausage links with the intense spicy flavor of Lucky’s special spice and herb rub recipe, free-range scrambled eggs from a neighbor’s hens, fresh-baked bread, three kinds of muffins, and a bowl of fruit big enough to take a bath in had the fruit not been in the way. The Kid ate huge servings of everything, even the fruit. He was suddenly putting on weight, the muscle kind, and I was sure he had grown another inch. He would be topping his older brother if this kept up, and I saw Eli glancing at his baby brother from time to time as Alex ate. Eli was no slouch in the eat-his-fill department, and neither was I. We managed to put a hurting on the food before Eli decided it was time to talk.
“Who the hell put a sleep spell on us?” he growled.
“Language,” Alex said.
Eli’s eyes narrowed, but he patted his lips with his napkin and placed it beside his plate before taking a tiny sip of coffee. The motions were tight and tense, and I knew he was holding himself in check with effort. Eli had control issues. Spells pushed his buttons. Oversleeping pushed his buttons. Edmund waking him up pushed his buttons. Especially if Edmund was tossing cold water on him or, worse as far as Eli was concerned, whispering sweet nothings in his ear. I managed not to smile at the thought, but it was a near thing.
“Who the heck put a sleep spell on us?” Eli’s voice was ubercontrolled.
“The whole town was spelled,” I said, “not just us. And I’m betting that Leo didn’t know this part.”
“Why?”
“Because he would have shared this with us. Being put to sleep could mean the difference between success and failure, so Clermont didn’t tell him. They’re back to playing vamp games.” I told the boys about my visitor and the intel I had been given. At some point in the narrative, Eli calmed down. The fact that the spell had been a general one, and not particular to us, seemed to ease his anger. For me, that made it worse, as it spoke of a huge usage of magical power, but I kept that to myself. When I finished with my tale of love lost and male stupidity and female scorned and revenge, Eli sighed and poured himself another cup of coffee. The small porcelain cups were dainty and pretty, with little pink and yellow flowers on them, and they held about a third of what our mugs did at home, but Eli hadn’t let that stop him getting caffeined up. He was steadily making his way through a second pot of Miz Onie’s dark French roast brew. “Well, at least we got a good night’s sleep.” He gave me his patented grin—a slight twitch of his lips, which, on anyone else, could have passed for indigestion. “Except you.”
“Yeah. Thanks for the sympathy. I also have a vamp sleeping in my closet. No sympathy for that either?”
“Not a hint.”
“Fine. We have a good nine hours of daylight left before the vamps rise. Alex, I want you to find out the historical and/or current relationship between the Doucettes, the Moutons, the Landrys, and the Bordelons, four powerful families that I remember from my last trip here.” Alex pulled out his electronic tablet and took down the names, but he looked at me curiously.
“I talked with Lucky Landry about the town, back on my first visit, and he told me when the first Cajuns got to Louisiana.” Trying out a Cajun accent, I said, “Dey Moutons say dey get here in 1760, but my family, de Landrys, land in New Orleans in April 1764, but dey don’ get here in dis town till 1769.”
Alex pulled a face. “That was terrible.”
Eli added, “It sounded like you were talking while chewing gum and eating hot mashed potatoes.”
I decided further attempts weren’t worth the trouble. I really needed to find time for French lessons. “His grandmother was one of two Bordelon witch sisters, Cally Bordelon. The Bordelons were the strongest witches in these parts when the vamp-witch-human wars started in Bayou Oiseau. Lucky Landry is related to all the witches in the area, and we might need to know the historical context of this situation. Or we might not. I’d rather have intel and not need it than need it and not have it. Anyway, the family tree between the Bordelons and the Landrys might be important, especially if we find a Doucette or a Mouton in there somewhere.”
“Got it. On it,” Alex said, already bent over his tablet.
To Eli I said, “I think I need to talk to Shauna’s daddy and get the witch side of the story, then maybe see the Amazon witch in the street.”
“Weapons?” Eli asked.
“Me, nothing. You got three-eighties and a vamp-killer?”
“No collateral damage. Got it. Fifteen,” he said, meaning he’d be ready in fifteen minutes. He looked at his brother. “While we’re gone, see what you can find about a magic wreath. Get us dossiers on the living and undead principals to fill out Jane’s old ones. See if there’s anything in Reach’s database to update what we know. And get a shower. You stink.”
“Again?”
“Garlic,” I said. “You sweat garlic and testosterone.”
“I’m da man?” he asked hopefully.
“No,” Eli and I said together.
“You just need to shower more often,” I added, trying for kindness.
“A lot more often,” Eli said, going for honesty.
• • •
We started out at Boudreaux’s Meats, which opened at eight a.m. according to the sign on the door, but actually opened closer to nine. Maybe so the proprietor could get a few winks in between dawn and opening. I hadn’t seen Lucky in the circle, but I had no doubt that he was involved somehow, his daughter being the center of the whole situation.
Boudreaux’s had been owned and run by Old Man Boudreaux, until Lucky married the man’s daughter and Boudreaux took his son-in-law under his wing, teaching him everything he knew about carving up pig, cow, wild boar, squirrel, gator, and seafood. And cooking all of the aforementioned protein on a grill. And making various meat-based delights out of it. I’d been in the state of Louisiana for a long time now, and I’d never found another eatery as good as Boudreaux’s Meats. The outside was decorated with signs advertising the meat and the day’s meals, with the specials written in chalk on a blackboard. There were also crosses painted on each window in brilliant blue, which was new. Inside, the place was changed a bit too, with blue plastic tablecloths on the few tables, new backless benches, the floor painted blue and polished to a high shine, and the smell of bacon flavoring the air. The cooler was still in the same place, full of ice and beer. And just like last time, I was met with the bad end of a gun.
“Jane Yellowrock,” Lucky said from behind the counter. “Raise your hands. Keep ’em high. You too, boy.” Eli narrowed his eyes at Lucky, the word boy being pejorative in these parts, but he raised his arms. Lucky had a deep, heavy Cajun accent, hard to understand sometimes, but there was no mistaking the intent of a double-barreled shotgun. The witch was in his early fifties, Caucasian, with black hair and dark eyes—what the locals call Frenchy. A few strands of silver marked his hair, new since I was here last. “Why you here?”
“I was asked to come by the Master of the City of New Orleans.”
“To stop de witches of dis town, here? To steal le breloque what Shauna found?”
I wasn’t sure what a breloque was, so I ignored that part. “To find out what was going on and restore peace if possible.”
Lucky snorted, a deep and resonant sound that belonged on the backstreets of Paris or in the deeps of the swamps.
“And no,” I said, “I have no intention of trying to steal the wreath or whatever it is. I’d like to stop the bloodshed before it starts, though.”
“Le breloque. Tell you what. You cut de head of
f Gabriel Doucette and I let you go way ’live.”
“I’ll tell you what. You put that shotgun down, I’ll let you live. Deal?”
Lucky snorted again and I smelled the tingle of his magic on the air. No way was I letting him hit me with a spell.
Everything happened fast.
I drew on Beast. Leaped hard across the storefront. Pushed off with a foot and lunged left, then right, behind the counter. Fast, fast, fast.
My partner dove behind the cooler, pulling both guns.
He was still midmove when I knocked the shotgun to the side with one forearm and twisted it out of Lucky’s hands. The spell he threw shot over my shoulder and slammed into the wall behind me. Something crashed. I didn’t have time to look. I turned the shotgun on Lucky. And snarled. Fun, my Beast thought. More!
“Move and bleed,” I growled.
Lucky wore a sheen of sweat that hadn’t been there before, slicking his olive skin.
“What was that spell?” I demanded.
“A get away from me spell,” he said, his mouth turning down. Sadness in his tone, he said, “Broke my wall, it did.”
I glanced once, fast. The back wall of the meat shop looked like a cannonball had gone through it. There was a hole open to the shop next door and the sounds of screams came from it weakly, as if the ladies inside were running away. Smart women.
“You not so easy to stop dis time. Why dat is?” he asked.
“I was expecting the shotgun. You were expecting a human. I’m no longer aping human.” Which still sounded weird when I said it, but secrets could no longer help me.
“What you is?”
I grinned and let more of Beast shine through me, seeing the golden reflection in Lucky’s black eyes. “Not saying. Tell me what happened. Everything. Or my partner will put a hole through your forearm that will take some healing spells and physical therapy to get over.”
From the side I heard a vamp-killer being drawn.
Lucky didn’t spare my partner a glance. “Le bâtard, Gabriel Doucette, done cheat on my girl.”
So far the stories were close, which was better than I feared. “And?”
“And she took my gran’bébé, my petit-fils, and le breloque, what called by de suckheads la corona, and she brung it to me, she did.”
“And?”
Lucky’s eyes narrowed.
“I’m looking for a timeline here, Lucky—everything you know or suspect. If you want to live by your nickname, talk. And if you want to live at all, you better call off the magic, because I have no problem knocking you out and carrying you to the Doucettes’.”
“You not do dat.”
“Try me.”
Lucky snorted again, but this time with less force, as if he was rethinking my intentions. Odd what things you can pick up from a snort as melodious as Lucky’s.
“I take la corona to de priest. Him call de bishop, who send us a scholar. De scholar decide la corona belong to dem. Pack to send it to Rome, they did. Shauna, her climb de fence and steal dat package back. Le breloque, it go to de strongest witch and coven leader.”
I frowned, letting the events settle in my mind. Asking the same questions of different people was a standard investigative technique. One always learned something new, a different slant, a different sliver of intel. It was boring, but it was useful. This time I had learned that Shauna was not just reactionary, hormonal, ticked off, and a wronged spouse, she was also a thief. Of course, the priest and the bishop’s henchman might be thieves too, if I included their taking the wreath and planning to send it away, as thievery. Which I did. Unless . . .
I thought about the laurel wreath and the Roman Catholic Church and, for a fraction of a second, wondered if it could be something other than a witch artifact. Maybe the reason that everyone was so interested was because the laurel wreath was something else entirely. Something glamoured to look like a witch icon. Maybe another circlet, maybe one made of thorns. Now, that would be a powerful talisman. Vamps were always looking for things related to Golgotha, to the place of the skull, from which they took their beginnings. So was the Church for similar and yet wildly opposing reasons. Both wanting the same things . . .
The wreath part of the crown of thorns was supposedly in Rome, while the thorn parts had supposedly been removed from the twisted vine and sent as gifts, bargaining chips, and items of priceless monetary and unimaginable spiritual value to various kings, cities, churches, and armies over the course of history. I had never heard of the crown of thorns being taken from Rome, never heard of it being stolen by vamps or used by witches. And besides, a vine of thorns wouldn’t have been a laurel. If it had gone missing, I surely would have heard about it—the whole world would have heard about it. So the wreath wasn’t that crown. I shook off the thought and said, “I thought you were coven leader.”
“No man can be leader of de coven. Man magic too strong, unpredictable, to lead full coven. Too what dey call volatile to do all de maths for a group.”
Witch magics were dependent on mathematics, geometry, and physics. Lucky was indeed too volatile to run a coven, which took control, finesse, and good people skills as well as strength, but I knew another male witch who could have handled the positon well. “Okay. You did know that Margaud didn’t have sex with Gabriel, right?”
Lucky frowned, a ferocious expression that went all the way to his toes as he tensed. “My girl walk in on dem, she did!”
“She walked in on Gabe feeding on Margaud, after Margaud got him drunk, called Shauna, and then offered him dinner.”
“You lie.”
“I don’t. Margaud and her brothers hate vamps. She set the whole thing up, using Shauna’s postpartum depression and anemia, and Gabe’s starvation, as a way to start trouble.”
Lucky’s frown lessened. “What?”
“You didn’t know Shauna was anemic? Depressed? Women do awful things at times like that, or so I hear.”
Lucky scowled, an expression that suggested he was thinking back. “Her taking iron pills,” he said reluctantly.
“Uh-huh. And Gabe was starving to death because he wasn’t feeding. I’m not saying that drinking whiskey on an empty stomach was smart, and I’m not saying that Margaud wouldn’t have slept with Gabe, or that she didn’t spike his liquor with something even stronger. I’m not saying that Gabe isn’t an idiot, because he is. What I am saying is that you didn’t get the full story. Your daughter is”—I pulled a Cajun saying out of the air—“the pole around which this johnboat twirls.”
“You say my Shauna causing trouble?”
“Yep. First off, it sounds like she also has postpartum depression. And that’s on top of you raising her to think she could get anything she wanted out of life just on her looks.” Lucky started to object. “Don’t. I met her. I knew girls like her, growing up. I recognized the signs the first time I met her, and that was before the depression set in. You let Shauna wrap you around her little finger her whole life. You need to see all your people for who they really are. Shauna, Gabe, and Margaud too. And then you need to stop being flighty, emotional, and volatile, and be a leader. Don’t tell me you can’t just because you’re a male witch. That excuse might have worked when you were fourteen and full of testosterone, but it stops working today. Right this minute.”
I set the shotgun on the counter and let Lucky go. He didn’t lunge for the gun, which kept him alive; Eli had a vamp-killer in one hand and his .380 in the other, aimed through the glass butcher counter. At this range, he could have hit Lucky—and a gorgeous ham—with his eyes closed.
He said, “You done come to dis town and you try teach me lesson?”
“Somebody needs to. Lucky, this town is this close”—I held my thumb and index finger a quarter inch apart—“to going up in flames or turning into a bloodbath. Or both.”
“Okay. I hear dat.” He squinted at me. “You too
young to be my gran’-mère, but you sound just like her.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” The rest of the convocation went much more smoothly.
• • •
The shop door closed behind us. Eli said mildly, “Grandmaw?”
“Boy?”
“Yeah, ’bout that.” He scowled. “Coonass,” he said, evaluating and passing judgment.
“Agreed.”
“But . . . Grandmaw?”
“Cherokee chick,” I corrected.
“Badass, motorcycle-mama, deadly Cherokee chick,” he amended.
I nodded contemplatively, taking in everything about the small town as we walked, including the still-unused heavy equipment parked in the streets around the main intersection. “Badass, gun-toting, loyal, former military, take-no-prisoners-and-leave-no-one-behind”—I paused, thinking about Eli’s milk-and-coffee skin tone and his possible ethnic background—“caramel candy man.”
“Sylvia says my skin is sweet as sugar,” he agreed, looking relaxed as a tourist, but his eyes taking in everything, glancing at me, making sure I saw what he did. The unused equipment didn’t have state or county license tags. Some private company had gotten a contract to repave the city streets, and then, for reasons unknown but probably having to do with bloodsuckers, the workers had disappeared. “She likes to lick me aaaall over.” His twitch of a smile was half-teasing, half–evil swagger.
“Ick. TMI. Boy talk. Not what I needed to hear. If I weren’t so badass I’d stick my fingers in my ears.”
He laughed. Finished with the questions, insults, clarifications, and bragging rights, Eli slipped his sunglasses on against the glare. The day was heating up in what South Louisianans called fall weather: mid-nineties, dead air, with a blistering sun. Even with my healing abilities I had taken to wearing sunscreen. Sunburn was unpleasant, and it might be a while before I could shift into Beast and heal the minor hurts. “The only good thing we got out of our chat with Lucky was lunch plans.” He shook his head as we sauntered toward the Catholic church on the far corner. Eli went on, “I ate until I was stuffed at breakfast, and I’m already hungry just from smelling Boudreaux’s.”
