Nancy K. Duplechain - Dark Trilogy 02 - Dark Carnival

by Nancy K. Duplechain

  After a few moments, Sarah began to stir. Her breathing began to regulate, and the blood subsided. Her eyes stayed closed, but I could tell her pain was decreasing. I felt my hand cooling off. I slowly removed it. When I did, I felt very weak. I sat back, wanting to rest on the floor. Miles propped me up.

  “She can make it until the ambulance gets here,” he said to the sisters. Sister Wendy left to make the call, while the other two tried to comfort Sarah, who was still barely conscious.

  Suddenly, there was a round of applause from the small line of people. I looked over at Miles who smiled back at me, looking happy for the first time since I met him.

  Since I was still a little weak from helping Sarah, Miles healed the rest of the sick after the ambulance took her away. After the last person left for the night, Miles told me to go back to Cee Cee’s and get a good night’s rest because there was more work to do the next day.

  I put on my coat and headed for the door while Miles chatted with sisters Alice and Melanie, who had changed into clean clothes. Instead of leaving through the back door of the chapel, I had a change of plans. The door to the bell tower stairwell was ajar. I snuck in, shutting the door behind me. I slowly ascended the wooden steps that spiraled upward in the narrow column of the tower. When I finally reached the massive bell, I carefully stepped aside, near the ledge, and looked out onto the city as she lay restless and guarded beneath a blanket of February stars.

  My breath puffed up around me as I thought about what I had just done. Was it safe to call it a miracle? I had seen Clothilde save Lyla with my own eyes. I knew what paladins were capable of, but did I ever really believe that I possessed such a power? Somehow, doing it with my own hands made it real now; this ability was tangible. I could save people now, like a superhero. I chuckled at that thought, and then laughed out loud when I pictured myself in spandex and a cape. Now, high above the city, I could hear Clothilde’s voice in my head, fussing at me, “Come down from there ‘fore I switch you good!” I smiled at that as I stepped back from the ledge with this newfound elation at my ability.

  As I turned toward the spiral stairwell, I was startled to see one of the sisters standing on the other side of the stairwell, her back to me, head bent as if in prayer. I recognized her little wooden cross hanging off to the side of her woolen belt. “Sorry, Sister Adele. I know I shouldn’t be up here. I’ll head out now. Have a good night.”

  I took one step down the stairwell, but stopped short as Sister Adele grasped my arm with an icy, withered hand. “Sister?” I asked, startled.

  “Your kind will not survive. As we rise, you will fall,” said Sister Adele, the woman who had never uttered a word, not even when she was a baby. She removed her hand, bringing both hands to her belt, which she proceeded to unbuckle. Her head remained bowed, her habit preventing me from seeing her face. Letting her belt fall to the platform, she turned her back to me and faced the night sky. She removed her habit and dropped her garment to the platform, revealing her stark, naked body before me.

  But it wasn’t Sister Adele’s body.

  As soon as I realized that, the creature fanned out her white, veined, marbled wings and then turned to me. She looked like a statue; a beautiful, demonic Venus with vibrant red hair—a ball of fire—that framed her ghostly face and matched her ruby eyes. She looked at me as though she had not eaten in weeks. There was a glee in her red eyes, and she smiled. It was clear that I was a prize she had just won.

  I quickly started down the stairwell, but she was too fast for me. She caught me by the arm, that same cold grasp as before, and started to drag me across the small platform and off the ledge. I screamed as loudly as I could as I tried to hold onto the railing. She was too strong. I weakly grabbed at the rope of the bell. It gave one loud Dong! before I had to let go. The last thing I could grab was a beam that supported the roof of the bell tower.

  I held on with one hand as her long nails sliced into my other arm. I managed to wrap one of my legs around the beam and kicked hard with my other leg. I could have sworn I heard her laughing as she pulled me harder.

  I was slipping. I felt I could hold on no longer.

  I heard steps quickly approaching from the stairwell. It took everything I had in me to hold on. Then I saw Miles come up from the stairwell and onto the platform. He wasted no time in reaching out for me. He pulled me back toward the platform as best he could, but the she pulled back harder. It felt like my limbs were being torn apart.

  A loud Bang! shot through the night. I felt a small force rush past my head. A split second later, the angel released me, and Miles pulled me back onto the platform. I heard a great scream of pain. I turned back to see the angel, who now held her arm, trying to cover a large gash with her hand. There should have been blood gushing from that wound, but there was not one drop.

  I looked behind me to see Sister Alice with a shotgun aimed at the angel, ready to fire once more. The angel snarled, tears forming in her cold, angry eyes, and flew up into the night sky, disappearing into the city.

  I gazed, wide-eyed and panting, out at the sky. “Sister Adele was one of them?” I said in disbelief.

  “Adele is dead,” said Sister Alice gravely. “Sister Arlene found her body just a few moments ago. She came to tell us, and we told her that we had just seen her going into the bell tower. We knew something was wrong.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. “It looks like the Watchers are out to get everyone.”

  “That wasn’t a Watcher angel,” said Miles, placing his hand over my arm to heal my wound. “That was a Nephyl.”

  “A what?”

  “I’ll tell you later, but I think you should stay at my house tonight. I don’t want you alone at Cee Cee’s.”

  “Where is she?”

  “She phoned me a little while ago saying there was an emergency with one of her clients. She’s not sure when she’ll be back home.”

  I didn’t argue with him. He followed me to Cee Cee’s so that I could pick up a few things, and then we went back to his house.

  “The bedroom at the end of the upstairs hall on the right is mine. You can use any of the other rooms. Please make yourself comfortable,” he said.

  He started to retire for the evening. “What are Nephyls?” I asked.

  He stopped, turned to me and sighed. “The children of the Grigori. When the Watcher Angels—the Grigori—were sent to Earth to protect the humans, they wound up mating with the women, despite being forbidden to do so. The children they produced were called Nephilim. They were supposed to be these giant angel-human hybrids, standing over seven feet tall, but that was quite an exaggeration.” He smiled at that. “We think maybe it’s because humans were so much shorter back then, but who really knows?”

  “And Sam? The man from Cee Cee’s shop. Was he a Nephyl?”

  He shook his head. “Sam is actually Samyaza, a Watcher Angel who has been around since the beginning when they were sent down to protect the humans.” He reflected for a moment. “The Watcher Angels are, perhaps, God’s biggest mistake. He made them powerful, yet with human emotions and freedoms. Their emotions have turned bitter over the centuries as they felt abandoned by Heaven.

  “Samyaza became their leader when they decided to take the human women and create more Nephilim. Soon, a legion of Nephilim roamed the Earth, wreaking havoc and destruction. They were Dark Ones from the very beginning; inheriting the insatiable hunger for power that their fathers had.

  “Eventually, God sent the great flood to rid the world of the Nephilim and the humans who stood with them. It killed off many Nephilim because they are considerably weaker than their fathers, thanks to their human DNA, but many still remained. They went into hiding, scattered all over the world.”

  “What about the good angels? Do they step in to help?”

  He shook his head. “That’s why we’re here. They protect Heaven. We protect Earth.”

  “Do they all look like the one who killed Sister Adele and attacked me?”

&
nbsp; “Some do have a strange appearance; others look human, except for their wings. That’s a dominate trait from their fathers. They all have them.”

  “She didn’t even bleed.”

  “They have different abilities. I would try to get some sleep. We’ll have another long day tomorrow.” That ended the conversation.

  I took my things upstairs. There were five bedrooms. I chose the one on the opposite end of the hall from Miles. I unpacked my overnight bag and got ready for bed. I turned off the ceiling light, but left on the small lamp on the night stand. I was much too frazzled to sleep in the dark.

  I climbed into bed and turned away from the lamp so the light wouldn’t be in my eyes. I faced the window which overlooked the back yard. The hunter-green curtains were drawn, but there was a crack in them. This made me a little uncomfortable. I didn’t like the idea of anything being able to peek in on me.

  I got out of bed and went to the window to completely shut the curtains. Through the narrow sliver of glass, I saw a pair of headlights approach the driveway on the other side of the backyard fence. Soon, Noah’s Charger came into view. I watched as he parked his car in his driveway and got out. He went around to the passenger side, opened the door, and pulled out a cardboard box with a St. Geneviève’s label on it. Nadia’s belongings, I assumed.

  With a heavy sign, I started to pull the curtains shut, but something caught my eye down in the garden below my window. I could barely make out anything in the moonlight, but I knew I saw something move. I strained my eyes and watched closely. More movement near the fountain; a figure moving toward the greenhouse.

  I froze, a lump in my throat, my eyes wide. A light went on in the greenhouse, illuminating a tall Creole of color with long, flowing black hair.

  Ruby.

  I eased a bit, but now I wondered what she was doing at this hour. Did Miles just give her the go-ahead to raid his greenhouse anytime, or was she purposely hiding? I don’t know what you’re doing here, but I’m going to find out, was what she had said to me on the way back from St. Roch. Now I felt the same way.

  Without a second thought, I hurried to put on my jeans, shoes and a long-sleeve T-shirt, and hurried downstairs into the kitchen. I opened the back door a crack and peeked out toward the greenhouse. It was hard to see from this far away, but I could make out her blurry outline through the condensation on the glass walls at the back of the building.

  I stepped out into the chilly night and crept up to the greenhouse. Once I arrived at the entrance, I slowly opened the door and peeked in. Warm air immediately rushed at my face, and it felt good. I didn’t see Ruby from where I was, so I cautiously entered, careful to not let the door shut behind me.

  In the center of the building was an above-ground artificial pond that harbored lily pads and lotus blossoms and other aquatic foliage. It looked to be the size of a small swimming pool made of stone. On either side of the pond were five rows of flora that went on for about ten yards in each row. There were also plants hanging from metal beams that latticed the glass ceiling. This made it difficult to see what was happening on the other side of the building, though I did glimpse a blur of movement.

  I crouched low to the ground and made my way toward the back. I was in between the third and fourth rows on the right side of the artificial pond. I could make out the top of Ruby’s head—she was in between the first and second row on the other side of the greenhouse. I half stood to see a little better. I watched as she quickly gathered roots and picked different flowers. She looked troubled.

  Ruby continued further down the row, out of my sight. I crept around my row and was now at the very back of the building. I moved forward in her direction and stumbled over her big blue bag that was left in the aisle. I froze, afraid that she might have heard me.

  When I felt safe, I got back into my crouch position and picked up her bag to put it aside. When I picked it up, I did so from the side of the bag, unaware that it was open. The contents came spilling out onto the cement floor—a small jar of black powder, a vial of salt, a stick of charcoal, a gold compact, and something I had only seen once when I was seven years old in the Oak tree in our front yard. I had screamed that day. Daddy had come out and saw what was there. He had laughed and said, “Red and yellow kills a fellow. Red and black is safe for Jack.” Immediately, I knew that the red-and-black King snake slithering out of Ruby’s bag was not venomous, but it scared the hell out of me nonetheless.

  I stumbled backward on my butt and gave out a startled cry. I turned around to get up and, as soon as I did, I saw Ruby round the corner with some kind of weird, crooked stick in her hand. She came to a complete halt and, before I realized what was happening, she lifted the hand holding the stick above her head. With her free hand, she pushed forward, palm open. Without her even touching me, I was suddenly knocked backward by some tremendous force. I cried out as my body was thrown down onto the floor.

  “What are you doing here?!” she hissed.

  I couldn’t speak to answer her; the wind was temporarily knocked out of me. I heard the door open in the front of the building. It took only a moment for Noah to arrive at our end of the greenhouse.

  He looked down at me and then at Ruby. “What’s going on?”

  “I was getting some things I needed, and she was sneaking up on me,” said Ruby.

  “I just …” I had to stop to get my breath. “I just wanted to know what you were doing,” I managed.

  “That’s none of your business, you understand me?” she said.

  “You didn’t have to hit her that hard,” said Noah, reluctantly holding out his hand to help me up. “Go back in the house,” he told me.

  “What are you two doing?” I asked.

  Ruby took a step forward to get in my face. “I told you—”

  Noah put up his hand to stop her from going further. “I’ll meet you at my house, okay?” he told her. She didn’t want to budge, but he gave her a look to let her know that it was time for her to go.

  Ruby gathered her things that I had spilled from her bag. She reached down for the King snake that was still slithering around us. When she picked it up, she looked at it fondly and then kissed it on the head. Then she stuck it out in front of my face to scare me. I jumped back.

  “Ruby, go,” said Noah, rubbing his face with both hands and sounding very tired.

  She left through the back door, slamming it behind her.

  Noah looked at me for what seemed like a long time. I noticed his eyes were red and a little more moist than they should have been. He looked angry, but too exhausted to say or do anything. I was afraid to speak, not because I thought he would harm me like Ruby had. I was afraid to hurt him anymore. Clearly Nadia meant the world to him, much deeper than I had ever felt with someone.

  It was so quiet inside the greenhouse that when he spoke, it jolted me a little. “Ruby is performing a Voodoo ritual to see that Nadia’s soul finds rest. She needed some things in here for the ritual. That’s all you need to know.” When he spoke, he didn’t look at me, and it was barely more than a whisper.

  “Oh,” I said, feeling foolish for following Ruby in there in the first place. “Noah, I’m sorry about Nadia—” Before I could finish, he was out the door in a flash.

  Full of guilt and self-loathing, I went back to my bedroom. Before I went to sleep for the night, I once again went to close the curtains. I could see a small bonfire in Noah’s back yard. I shut the curtains and went to bed, sleeping until Miles woke me up the next morning to start training again.

  12

  Noah’s Labyrinth

  Miles no longer had me looking for the mask. It was a solid two weeks of training, grueling hours at the convent, healing everyone who came in. I pushed myself to get better so that what happened with Nadia would never happen again. I grew stronger and faster with my healing. Cee Cee was gone most of the time, saying she had her client to deal with. Soon, Mardi Gras was two weeks away, and the mask was still not found.

  One night,
after all the healing had been done at the convent, Miles got a phone call from Noah, saying that he had potential new information about the Grigori ball. He said he would meet up with a contact in about an hour and then report back to him. Miles told him that he wanted me to go with him to meet his contact. I was caught off guard and it seemed Noah was, too, as there was silence for a moment. Then I heard a muffled, resounding “No!” on the other end of the line.

  “This is not open for debate. I will drop Leigh off somewhere to meet up with you, and the two of you go together.”

  “Miles, I’m not—” I heard him yell on the other end of the phone.

  “Where should I drop her off?” asked Miles, cutting him off, nary a stir of emotion in his voice. Again, there was silence. Then I heard a murmur that I could not make out. “Okay then. I’ll take her there. Make sure she’s in your sight at all times,” said Miles and then hung up.

  “Are you sure you want me to do this with him?” I asked him.

  “Quite sure,” he said, gathering his bag and heading out the door of the chapel.

  I followed him out to his car and got in. He drove me to an unfamiliar area somewhere in mid city. “Can I ask why you want me doing this tonight?” I said, once he stopped the car in front of a small restaurant in a busy area.

  He put the car in park, but kept the ignition on. “There has been considerable distance between our group since Nadia passed. I know it wasn’t your fault, and so do Noah and Ruby, but it takes a long time for anger and hurt to subside, especially with Ruby. Noah has always been quick to anger, but he is also fair and reasoning. I want the two of you to be on good terms first. That will turn Ruby around eventually. I need to have a tight group at this point. Too many lives depend on it, not just ours.”