Persuasion

by Martina Boone

  At the top of the rise, she stopped. The archaeological dig had descended into chaos.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  Berg, Andrew Bey, and the archaeology students, all of them haggard, bruise-eyed, and raw as if they hadn’t slept in days, stood clustered at the excavation area above the hidden room. Cassie’s mother and both Cassie and Sydney were with them. Everyone was speaking at once, raising their voices to be heard over each other by two sheriff’s deputies, who scribbled notes and shouted back for everyone to talk one at a time.

  But it was the excavation itself that made Barrie’s footsteps falter. The stakes that had formed the gridlines lay splintered, scattered across the ground like some macabre game of pick-up sticks. Beside the overseer’s cabin, the mesh of the two enormous screens through which the archaeologists sifted soil had been slashed into ribbons, and the crate of trowels and digging supplies that had stood there the day before was missing. On the opposite side of the excavation, the iron rebar and heavy block of concrete that had been set as the default point of measurement had been dug up and tossed aside. The effect was surreal, as if a giant had come through and pitched a fit.

  In the center of it all sat Obadiah. His face was serene, and his hands lay on his knees, and as before, his eyes were locked on Barrie. Ignoring him, she waded into the midst of the argument and tugged at the hem of Cassie’s shirt.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  Cassie didn’t answer. No one did. No one even turned. Barrie pulled harder, but Cassie only moved her arm as if she was swatting away a pest, and continued shouting to the deputies.

  “How can it possibly be my fault?” Cassie demanded. “Try to think that through. How would I do this? That’s the first question. Second, why would I do it?”

  “I don’t know why,” the taller of the officers said. Reed-thin and stoop-shouldered, as if he spent too much time bending to speak to people or hunched over his notepad, he glanced up to catch Cassie’s eye. “Why don’t you tell me? You’ve done a lot of things I don’t begin to understand.”

  Cassie flushed and looked away. “I promise you, I didn’t pull up a hunk of concrete bigger than your ass with my bare hands, in case you haven’t figured that out already.”

  “Cassandra!” Cassie’s mother gave the deputy an apologetic glance, although she might have had more authority if she hadn’t been dressed in a pink beautician’s uniform short enough to leave ten inches of thigh exposed.

  “We could all be more polite.” Berg pushed closer to Cassie, and there was enough quiet command in his voice that even the two officers turned toward him. “There’s no point blaming anyone before we have all the facts. That block of concrete weighs a good seventy pounds. It wouldn’t be easy to tear it out of the ground like this. Also, the grid stakes were yanked out and thrown aside when we got up yesterday morning. We found some footprints and a beer bottle and assumed it was kids playing around, but maybe it was something more serious. I’ve still got the bottle. There might be fingerprints on it. That could be a place to start.”

  The shorter officer seemed to breathe a sigh of relief, looking everywhere but at Cassie. “You might not be wrong about kids. Could be a prank, I reckon. Someone wanting to give the ghost hunters something to get excited about. There’s not much in the way of real damage done. Go ahead and give us that bottle, and then why don’t you call us back if you notice anything suspicious.”

  “What kind of suspicious?” Barrie asked, but again, no one took any notice.

  Andrew had pushed to the front, his face red and sweating. “To you,” he said, “this may seem like ‘not much in the way of damage,’ but they took all the trowels, shovels, and picks, not to mention slicing the mesh in both the sifting screens.” He gestured to where two and a half widths of brick had been cleared in the excavation, enough to suggest that the ceiling of the room had been domed instead of flat. “That’s going to set us back most of the day.”

  Barrie edged over to Obadiah. “Did you do this?” she asked. “Why? What are you up to?”

  “Me, chère?” Obadiah’s expression was smug and calm. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “How did the equipment get stolen under your nose? Don’t tell me you’re not the one responsible.”

  “I have enough trouble tending to the spirits at night. Trust me when I say I have no energy left to pay attention to human thieves and vandals. You want someone to do that, get a German shepherd.”

  “Funny,” Barrie snapped.

  “I’m not laughing, either. A couple of trowels and shovels? Those are the last things the spirits care anything about. You see that mess over there?” Obadiah pointed at the piece of iron rebar embedded in concrete that had been torn from the ground. “That’s what happens when the spirits aren’t happy. Things get thrown and people get hurt. And they would have done much worse without me here, I promise.”

  He stumbled as he got up, and Barrie automatically offered him her hand. He seemed brittle and creaky. Thinner, and at least a dozen years older than he had the day before. Their skin touched, and a surge of energy rushed through her, quickening her blood and bringing it to the surface of her skin. It ebbed almost instantly, and it left her weak and cold, deeply cold. She shivered.

  “Stop that!” Wrenching herself away, she stepped back and glared at Obadiah, her blood pounding too quickly and too loudly in her ears. “What did you just do?”

  “Nothing permanent.” He drew himself up and looked at her with a defiant arrogance that reminded Barrie, unexpectedly, of her cousin. “I borrowed a small amount of strength and magic,” he said. “Eat and sleep, and you’ll be fine. I promised you already, I have no desire to harm you or anyone you love.”

  Obadiah stumbled again, and without his even touching her, Barrie felt the air around her drain of warmth. She backed away.

  “Is that what you’re doing to keep yourself going without sleep? You’re stealing energy?”

  “Only from people who have enough to spare. I’m not taking much.”

  “That’s why the archaeologists all look so tired? That’s horrible!”

  “They’re better tired than dead,” Obadiah snapped. “What do you think I’m spending that energy on? If I took what I needed only from the archaeologists, my strength would have failed a long time ago, and the spirits would be doing more than throwing concrete.”

  “So that’s why you wanted me and Eight to come over here, because we have magic? It didn’t have anything to do with sandwiches and coffee, did it?”

  “A little energy from you provides more power than I can get from all the others combined. It won’t do you any lasting harm.”

  “How am I supposed to believe that, when you haven’t told me the truth about anything so far?”

  “When have I lied to you?” Obadiah’s eyes gleamed dangerously.

  “Not lying isn’t the same as telling the truth. You never told me you were related to Mary, for instance. But the names aren’t a coincidence, are they? Mary, Daphne, and Jackson. And you said your family was cursed. Mary’s had more than her share of hardships.” Barrie watched Obadiah carefully as she voiced what she’d suspected after reading the diary.

  He only shrugged. “You never asked who my relatives were.”

  “You’re not after the lodestone to break the curse. Or, at least, that’s not all you want, is it? You want the gold.”

  “I told you there was a debt to pay.”

  “Blood and years and lives, you said.”

  “Stolen lives and years of servitude. Yes, and blood.” Obadiah’s face lost any veneer of charm. “John Colesworth thought nothing of ordering his slave to trap the Fire Carrier and demanding a gift that would always make him prosper while the Watsons and the Beauforts failed. Elijah refused. He knew that kind of magic would have consequences, and John Colesworth bludgeoned him to death for refusing. Elijah’s wife, Ayita, cast the curse and buried the lodestone in the treasure room that John was having built.”

&nb
sp; “So you have known about the hidden room all along,” Barrie said.

  “I knew it existed. I didn’t know where it was, and I couldn’t be sure the gold was in it.”

  “You still don’t know that.”

  “No, I don’t,” Obadiah said, regarding her steadily and somehow managing to turn the statement into a question.

  Barrie had no intention of telling him. Not until she’d sorted through her options.

  “Charlotte Colesworth is buried in that room. Did you know that, too?” she asked. “Whether or not the gold is there, whatever happens, we have to get her out and make sure she’s laid to rest. That’s who Alcee and his wife were both trying to reach the night they died.”

  “How do you know that?” Obadiah’s exhaustion showed in the sag of his shoulders as he studied her.

  “I read between the lines in Caroline Colesworth’s diary. Caroline never knew about the treasure room, and she never knew about the gold until the night the Union soldiers came for it. Alcee took the slaves and men out through the tunnel, but because Charlotte was beautiful, he locked her in the hidden room where she’d be safe—or so he thought. He must have figured his wife, Caroline, and Daphne would be all right because he thought the girls were too young to be of interest to the soldiers, and he believed that if the house was occupied, the Federals wouldn’t burn it. They must have been desperate to reach her when the fire started.”

  Eyes closed, Obadiah rolled his head on his neck until his spine cracked loudly enough for Barrie to hear it. “They’re both still desperate. That must be why they wanted us to see what happened. They can’t speak, so they used the burst of power Elijah and Ayita threw at me to show us what happened that night, hoping we—someone—would finally reach Charlotte and set her free.”

  “What happened to Daphne?” Barrie asked, biting her lip. “I know Caroline survived, but was Daphne all right?”

  Obadiah’s expression smoothed out and became inscrutable. “Why do you suppose I would know that?”

  “The names can’t be a coincidence. Mary, my friend Mary, is your family, isn’t she?”

  “That’s not the family I need to be concerned with now.” Obadiah sounded even more exhausted. “Elijah and Ayita have never lost their hatred for John Colesworth and his descendants. Their need for revenge makes their spirits strong, and their hate keeps them from caring whom they hurt.”

  “But who’s to say what the Colesworths who came after John would have been like if they hadn’t been affected by the curse? I’m half-Colesworth.”

  “Not like them.”

  Barrie shook her head. “I can’t let you take the gold,” she said, before she’d even realized she was thinking it. “It doesn’t belong to you, and I can’t imagine that Mary would want it if you take it illegally. Stealing won’t solve anything.”

  Obadiah didn’t answer her, and in the silence, the sound of car doors slamming and an engine turning over made her turn to look behind her. The police were leaving, and Andrew and Berg were climbing inside the dusty white Prius. From the row of tents, the other students were emerging with towels and bathing suits and racing one another to ride shotgun in an equally dirty Ford Escape and a tiny, battered Fiat. Closer to the house, Cassie’s mother hustled Sydney into a Toyota and sped down the driveway as if she was late for work, which she likely was. In less than five minutes, the grounds were empty, apart from Cassie standing beside the excavation site alone.

  Barrie turned back to Obadiah in time to see him make a gesture with his fingers. His lips moved, Barrie’s breath died, her muscles spasmed, and everything went black.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  The earth shook. Rumbled. Barrie groaned and tried to roll over, but her entire body felt too stiff to move.

  “Wake up! Barrie, you have to wake up.” The ground rocked even harder.

  Forcing one eye open, Barrie pried her brain loose from a deep swamp of sleep that wanted to pull her back. She found herself lying on her side on a wooden floor. There was no earthquake. Someone was shaking her. She was staring at brick, and the planks beneath her were worn, rough, and splintered.

  Damn, her head hurt even worse than usual.

  And while her mind was cloudy, her body was on high alert. Every heartbeat was too loud and too fast, and her wrists were bound behind her. The pull in her shoulders said they had been fastened behind her for too long already. Her ankles were tied together. What the hell?

  “Barrie, get UP!”

  A shoe connected with her hip in a white flash of pain, and Barrie came fully awake. Awake enough to recognize her cousin’s voice.

  “Stop kicking me, dammit. Where are we?” she asked.

  That was a stupid question, though. Barrie recognized the low ceiling, the two tiny windows, the brick fireplace, and the wooden flooring of the slave cabin where Obadiah had left his offerings.

  The thought poured chills down her spine.

  She wiggled onto her back, and then turned her head so that she was facing Cassie. Her cousin had tears brewing in her eyes. Lying on her side, hands behind her back, Cassie had been pushing Barrie with her knees and feet instead of her hands because she was tied up, too.

  “Stop gawking at me,” Cassie said. “Turn back over and let me see your ropes.”

  Barrie inched her way along the floor and rolled over so that the ropes around her wrists were close to Cassie’s mouth. Cassie tried to tug on the knots with her teeth, but that accomplished nothing. Cassie started to tremble, her teeth chattering.

  “Cassie, stop. Let me try yours instead.” Trying not to panic herself, Barrie took deep breaths and forced herself to think while Cassie got into position.

  Obadiah had used magic to knock her out. And Cassie, too. That was fact number one. He had said he wouldn’t hurt her, but he’d lied. Or had he? She wasn’t hurt. Even Cassie wasn’t hurt. At least not yet.

  She and Cassie were in one of the slave cabins. That was fact number two. If it was the same cabin where Barrie had been before, the floorboard was loose. That might be useful. If she couldn’t release Cassie’s wrists, maybe she could pry up the plank and push it aside and get—what? A pile of bones? A rusted straight pin? A pot?

  With a sigh, she tried to find an angle on the rough twine that Obadiah had used to bind Cassie’s wrists together behind her back. The knot was tight.

  “Ow,” Cassie said. “What are you doing?”

  “Trying to break the twine. It’s too tight to untie, but it’s the same stuff they used to create the gridlines.”

  “Well, quit. It hurts.” Cassie pulled away.

  Barrie thought of the clay jars in the recess beneath the floorboards. If she could break one, it might be sharp enough to cut through the twine. But how would she pry the floorboard open? Maybe the jagged brick of the fireplace would do just as well.

  She rolled onto her side and pushed herself into a sitting position. Trying to stand up with her ankles bound was harder than she’d expected. With effort, she maneuvered herself into place in the low fireplace, her knees bent, her back wedged along the top so that she could rub the twine back and forth against the corner of the bricks.

  “Are you about done wasting time yet? What are you doing now?” Cassie asked.

  Barrie sent her a withering glance. “What does it look like I’m doing? Shopping for shoes?”

  “You don’t have to be a bitch.”

  “Gee, and you’ve always been so nice to me—” Barrie broke off as a gunshot rang out. One gunshot, and then another.

  “What was that?” She tugged frantically against the ropes, working her wrists even faster across the brick. “Go look out the window, would you? Hurry.”

  Cassie grunted as she struggled to her feet and hopped to the window, and then her muscles seized. She began to shake, and tears slid down her cheeks, leaving fresh dark mascara smudges.

  Who wore makeup to an archaeological excavation anyway? Well, apart from Cassie. And Mark would have, too. He had always said it wa
sn’t worth going anywhere that you couldn’t go in a good pair of shoes and a great pair of lashes. Which pretty much ruled out where she was right now—Barrie really should have considered that.

  But that was beside the point. Barrie recognized that she was trying to distract herself because she was on the verge of being hysterical. Dammit, she needed to breathe. Her chest ached, and she couldn’t take in air. Now was not the time for a panic attack.

  She made herself take five deep breaths. Exhale, then inhale.

  She made herself keep working the twine back and forth against the bricks. “Cassie, what do you see?” she asked. “I need you to stay with me. Tell me who’s out there.”

  Cassie gave no sign that she’d heard.

  Barrie doubted that it was Obadiah. He wouldn’t have needed a gun. So who had fired the gunshots? The police? Or someone else?

  Speculation was pointless. She worked the twine back and forth on the edge of the fireplace, and the rope grew sticky with blood. But eventually it began to loosen.

  For her own sanity as much as her cousin’s, Barrie talked to Cassie as she worked, trying to bring her back to the present. “Focus,” she said. “Come on, Cassie. Tell me who’s out there. Who fired a gun and who got shot?”

  The possibilities were endless. Barrie didn’t even know how long they’d been knocked out. Maybe the police had shot someone, or had someone shot Obadiah? Or had he shot someone else? What if Berg or Andrew Bey had come back? What if they’d been shot? Any one of them might have forgotten something. Or—and now Barrie’s mouth went dry and her vision darkened until she felt like she was blacking out—what if Eight had come after her? What had happened to him that morning? He was supposed to stop and drop off the food for Obadiah on his way to Columbia. What if he’d forgotten and then come back? Or what if Pru had noticed the keys were missing from beneath the stairs?

  “Cassie!” Barrie couldn’t keep the panic from her voice. “Dammit, Cassie! You have to tell me what’s going on!”

  Cassie stood at the window and didn’t move.