by J. D. Horn
“You didn’t have to do this,” he said, disdain obvious in his glance, if not his tone. “Move into . . . ,” he gestured with a rolling wave of his hand around them, “into private quarters. My house will always be yours.”
“Your house was never mine,” Alice said, pleased that even though her mind was raging, her voice remained cool. There would be no tears. Not now. And certainly not for him to witness.
Nicholas didn’t respond beyond a steely glint in his eyes. He turned his attention to the rosemary tree. “Cute,” he said with an intonation that could either show sincerity or cloak sarcasm. “She gave it to you?”
“Yes,” Alice said, sharpening her tone as she spoke, “she did.” It seemed purposeless to ask him how he’d learned of Nathalie. Perhaps he’d had the decency to alert his other sister of his homecoming before inflicting himself on Alice. Perhaps someone else had told him. There was no shortage of loose tongues, not with so many failing witches seeking to ingratiate themselves with those who still had power. Perhaps he’d been spying on her since her return to the common world. It didn’t matter. Not really. All that mattered was that she move him off the topic of Nathalie before he sullied her name by speaking it.
Her curtness chafed him. “She,” he parroted her, “isn’t right for you.”
Alice barked out an indignant laugh. “Now you want to play father?”
“To start with,” he said, brushing off her derision, “you’re twenty-two. She’s thirty-three. The age difference is . . . inappropriate. Distasteful.” He gave each syllable of the word its full measure.
“You’re old enough to be Evangeline Caissy’s father,” she said, noticing he winced at her name. “That didn’t stop you from seeing her.”
“No,” he said, his usual ramrod-straight posture curving into a question mark. “But it did, in the end, factor into the failure of the relationship.” He paused, his softening gaze suggesting he was reliving the romance’s denouement. “Although the final nail in the coffin was her implying I’d murdered my own son.” He shook his head. “There is no coming back from that.” A lopsided grin joined his narrowing eyes to show he’d regained the arrogance of which regret, or perhaps simple wounded pride, had, for an instant, deprived him.
Alice rushed to speak before he could return to his unwelcome offering of counsel. “I lived seven years on the Dreaming Road in the time since you took off on your pilgrimage. In my mind I feel much closer to her age—”
“Regardless, your birth certificate still says you’re twenty-two.”
“My birth certificate still says you’re my father.” This blow landed.
He fell silent, scanning her face as if she were a puzzle to solve.
He crossed to the round, possibly vintage, chrome and red Formica dining table straddling the bare floorboards of the kitchen area and the dingy beige of the worn shag rug that demarcated the living area. He pulled out one of the plastic stacking chairs—also red, but not vintage, just cheap—and sat. “You know nothing about her. About her family. There are matters surrounding the Boudreau family to which you should be made privy—”
“Wait.” Alice held up a hand to stop him. Now she got it. “This isn’t about Nathalie. It’s about Lincoln. Lincoln and Evangeline. You’re hoping to manipulate me into trying to drive them apart. And if doing so hurts my relationship with Nathalie, well, you’d consider me justifiable collateral damage. Again.” Nicholas kicked out his legs and huffed as if from exasperation. “Admit it. It’s killing you to see her with someone else. With someone who makes her happy.”
Nicholas flushed red and opened his mouth to speak, but then appeared to think better of it. His shoulders slumped as his expression shifted from irritation to sadness. “This isn’t about Evangeline. But you’re right that it’s about Lincoln. And his brother”—he paused, waving his hand, pretending to search for the name—“Washington.”
“Wiley,” Alice said. “He goes by Wiley. And he’s a good guy. He’s good for Hugo.”
“He’s unworthy of Hugo . . .” Nicholas let his words trail off, letting what was left unsaid be heard loud and clear. He waited for her reaction, but Alice refused to take the bait. “They’re killers,” he said in a low, matter-of-fact voice that left no room to think he might be joking. “Executioners, to be precise.”
“Executioners?”
He shrugged. “Magic is about to flatline, but the Boudreaus have always been good soldiers. To the last man.” He paused, then fixed her with his gaze. “To the last witch.”
“I don’t know what you’re trying to convince me of, but—”
“There are laws. Laws of conduct among witches. Many byzantine, most overlooked and by and large unenforced, but there remain a handful that are considered immutable.”
“Such as?”
“Such as ‘Thou shalt not assist thy not-altogether-dead grandfather in the slaughter of witches at his own memorial ball.’” He rapped his knuckles on the table and grimaced. “I do apologize. I should have said ‘father,’ not ‘grandfather’—I understand you relished passing on that sordid tidbit to the masses.” He raised his hand to his heart, an involuntary gesture she felt sure.
For a moment she wondered if this act could be more than a prideful man’s reaction to public humiliation, if it betrayed an ambivalence on his part as well. Perhaps he regretted his lies. His desertion. That he couldn’t find it in his heart to love her.
“Everyone knows Celestin took me to the Dreaming Road by force. That I didn’t play a role in the massacre.”
“Oh, do they?” he said, feigning innocence. “Even after what you got up to at Précieux Sang, ripping the gates off their hinges? You were foolish to indulge in such theatrics before magic-starved witches.”
“It wasn’t theatrics. I wanted to send the message that I wouldn’t let myself be anyone’s victim, ever . . .” She fell silent, acknowledging to herself that the message hadn’t been for the benefit of the toothless witches who’d gathered in the cemetery, hoping to walk away with a magical relic, ready to snatch up fingers, ears, or even a pinkie toe. The message was for Celestin, a farewell to ring through every cell of his consciousness-haunted corpse as the witches carved it up and parceled it out.
“And quite the message you sent, too,” Nicholas said, his words trampling over her thoughts. “You’re strong. You’re powerful. More powerful than most of the witches in the Gulf region combined.” He paused, a glint in his black eyes. “You’re hard.” This he said with a timbre that hinted at pride. Then he smirked and mimed hacking off his left hand and tossing it into the crowd, a parody of her dismembering his . . . their father’s body. “You could be, no, you are dangerous.”
She looked back on the day and for an instant saw herself as another might. She must have been, as Fleur had later told her, horrifying. Glorious. She’d only been brought back from the perfect hell Celestin had built for her on the Dreaming Road hours before. Daniel had given his life to save her, and if it weren’t for Nathalie, they would have lost Hugo, too—a fact she ought to share with the man who stood before her criticizing the woman who’d saved his child, now his only child. Alice had been traumatized, maybe even a bit out of her mind. Would she act in the same manner today if given the chance to reconsider? Once again she felt the heft of the athame in her hand. In her imagination, she could see the gleam of the dying sun on its fine blade. Her hand moved, a nearly involuntary action, and again she felt the blade slice in a single swift stroke through withering flesh and brittle bone.
Nicholas studied her face, then nodded as if in agreement with himself.
“You’ve got a lot of your mother in you. You do,” he said, emphasizing the last two words as if he anticipated an objection.
Ambivalence prevented her from doing so. She felt butterflies in her stomach and placed a hand over the fluttering spot. She hoped she did share her mother’s strength but feared the seeds of Astrid Andersen Marin’s darkness might be germinating within her. Maybe it was only
her time in the hospital on Sinclair, the years when her magic had been tamped down and kept in check, that had kept those seeds from reaching maturity and bearing fruit.
Now it felt as if nothing could constrain her.
“There are laws,” he said, wagging an accusatory finger at her, as if he were certain she’d broken more than a few. “And there are those who enforce them.” He cocked an eyebrow. “Strange, isn’t it? There are only”—he paused, making a show of counting his fingers—“five witches of any true ability left in New Orleans, and three of them are sharing their beds with a Boudreau?”
The butterflies in her stomach caught fire. Alice wasn’t, not yet. Maybe not ever. But her love life was none of his business.
“I must admit,” he said with exaggerated nodding, “I am beginning to feel a bit left out. I wouldn’t mind having a go at the younger Boudreau boy myself.” A sly smile rose to his face as he savored her surprise. “Not all of us are as narrow in our tastes as you and our hapless Hugo seem to be.”
Her blushing discomfort sated his desire to shock her. “I’m sorry,” he said, though his tone was anything but apologetic. “I’d assumed anyone who’s spent seven years on the Dreaming Road would have a more cosmopolitan perspective on matters of the flesh.” He’d succeeded in driving home his point about her immaturity and the common-world age difference between Nathalie and herself. He leaned toward her. “Or are you, the worldly-wise habitué of the Dreaming Road, uncomfortable discussing sexuality with me because an infinitesimal part of you still sees me as your father . . . despite your very public disavowal?”
He covered his face with his hands, giving her the impression that he had revealed more than he would like about his own hurt. When he lowered his hands, his face had lost all vitality. He looked older. He looked tired. “I didn’t come to fight with you. The fact is I didn’t even come to comment on your life choices. I only came because I wanted to warn you that your actions may have unintended consequences. You’ve brought a lot of attention on yourself. And with a serial killer for a patriarch, we Marins were already under intense scrutiny.”
A vague-enough admonition. Alice reasoned the true goal of this encounter was to frighten her so that she would seek shelter under the canopy of Nicholas’s protection. His visit was a last-ditch effort to regain control over her. The thought should have rekindled the flame of her anger, but it didn’t. Maybe because she no longer felt afraid.
Alice realized she, too, had lost her will to battle. Rather than vengeance, she wanted answers. She might never have such a ripe opportunity to get them.
“I met her, you know,” Alice said. “I met Astrid. On the Dreaming Road.”
His eyes widened ever so slightly. A sign, Alice took it, of true surprise.
“And how is my dear, devoted wife?” His tone was biting, but Alice could sense the news had thrown him. Alice couldn’t tell whether he truly still cared about Astrid or if he was simply buying time to regain his footing.
“She’s gone now,” Alice said, searching his expression for the answer to that question. She saw only amused incredulity. His disbelief felt like a challenge. “The world Astrid inhabited was collapsing around us as we spoke. She had no way out—”
“Oh, she had a way out. Astrid always has a scapegoat for the Devil and a life raft for the deep blue sea. I suspect she’ll still be carrying on long after the human race has died out, and radioactive cockroaches rule the world.”
“She confessed everything to me.”
“You may rest assured anything she said to you was either a lie or a misdirection.” He paused, seeming to reconsider. “Maybe you aren’t so much like her after all. You enjoy a capacity for truth Astrid was born without.”
“Says the man who pretended to be my father.” The only thing Astrid had ever given Alice, perhaps the only thing she ever had to give Alice, was her story. Alice was unwilling to let Nicholas strip away the value of Astrid’s bequeathal by shedding doubt on it.
“Says the man who tried his best to be a father to you.”
Alice startled, stunned by the assertion. “You must be joking.”
“No need to provoke or dissimulate. I see you are seeking an answer to the big why—Sinclair Isle, and its psychiatric care for those deranged with magic, as well as those deranged by magic. Why did I abandon a perfectly sane little girl there? The answer is simple, whether you choose to accept it or not.” He leaned back in the chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “I put you there to keep you safe. Safe from Celestin, certainly, but most of all from Astrid. I knew she’d find her way back. Eventually. Once she got her claws into The Book of the Unwinding.”
He sighed and forced his body into a less defensive pose, uncrossing his arms and folding his hands on the table. “I’m not certain for what purpose, but Celestin and Astrid made you to serve as a tool. Of one thing you may rest assured, your mother had a use for you. Otherwise, you would never have been born. Separating you from them, from your magic by means of the hospital’s safeguards, seemed to be the best way to ensure your safety, and”—he shrugged—“the well-being of the rest of us. Don’t forget, the heir to magic can’t have children. If Astrid still had her sights set on capturing the last breath of magic, she would have mowed both you and Hugo down without a second thought. And if Celestin believed he might be the lucky witch, he would’ve done the same—to all of us.”
“They had a falling out,” Alice said. “Celestin trapped her on the Dreaming Road, just like he—”
“I,” Nicholas said, holding up his hands to stop her. “I trapped Astrid on the Dreaming Road. Luc’s tenth birthday. You—you were a newborn. I came upon her reading to the three of you from The Lesser Key of Darkness, letting Luc turn the pages as if it were a children’s picture book.” A slight shake of the head signaled that he still couldn’t comprehend Astrid’s actions. “‘A present,’ she called it. I snatched the book away and tried to burn it in the fireplace. Luc tried to dodge around me and rescue his gift. Hugo did as Hugo does—he escaped the room. You lay in the bassinet wailing. I had a full blaze in the fireplace, but The Key wouldn’t burn. The flames danced around it, but they wouldn’t touch it.
“Astrid bounded around the room, screaming as if I’d set her alight rather than that damnable grimoire. She didn’t stop shrieking until she managed to recover the book. That’s when I realized the degree to which Astrid was connected to The Key. I began laying the trap. It took a few months, but I succeeded. She fought like the hellcat she was . . . is, but I succeeded. I forced her psyche from the common world onto the Dreaming Road—or at least the hinterlands. Had I known Babau Jean had turned it into his own private whorehouse, I might have pushed even harder, but I only recently learned that tidbit about the Storyville construct from your loquacious cousin.”
Ah, Lucy had been his source of information. Alice felt certain there had been no ill intent on Lucy’s part, only her customary lack of discretion.
Nicholas fell silent, his eyes landing on the easel standing in the corner. “It’s a shame about Daniel,” he said, his voice hushed in a moment of quiet candor.
Alice tried to blink back a tear, but the thought of her former nanny and oldest friend giving himself up to save her tore her apart every time it bubbled up in her mind.
To her surprise, she witnessed a tear trace a path down Nicholas’s cheek. “He was one of a kind, our Daniel,” he said, wiping away the offending tear and rising. “I’m sorry for disturbing you so late. This reunion might have gone better in the light of day.”
“I doubt it,” Alice said without rancor, her response bringing a laugh from Nicholas.
“No, I’m sure you’re right.” He turned toward the door.
“You think they might be coming after me?” she called after him. He looked over his shoulder at her. “The Boudreau brothers?”
He shook his head as he made his way to the door. “Not after you, my dear. You could handle them. I fear they’re ‘coming after’ Fleur.�
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“Fleur? Why would they want to harm her?”
“You know why,” he said, stopping to look back as he grasped the knob. “The spell she worked. For Lucy. To bring one person back to life, she would’ve had to sacrifice another.” He opened the door, turning away. “Our sweet Fleur,” he said as he stepped over the threshold, “is a murderess.”
FOUR
Blood. Sex. Dreaming.
Intoxication. Adoration.
Deprivation.
Madness.
Astrid Andersen Marin rested one pale hand on the moonlit, silver trunk of a bald cypress, reaching out with the other to touch the words flickering before her, their fire cold and blacker than the midnight-blue night air in which they hovered.
They evanesced at her touch, others coalescing to take their place.
These are the gates to magic,
of which Madness is the greatest,
for Madness is the utter surrender to Magic.
The words dissipated as a young man, a teenager, crabwalked toward her at a furious clip, his broad shoulders straining the fabric of his royal blue-and-white letterman’s jacket. A shing resounded as Babau Jean’s razor-blade smile showed itself on her lips. The boy cried out at the sight of her and pushed back in the opposite direction, trying to launch himself toward safety, but instead landed flat on his back before her feet. Astrid gazed down at him, a beautiful boy with a square jaw and thick, curling locks that gleamed golden even in the cooling light of the moon. His body was strong, athletic, pleasing in proportion—a true Adonis. He might have escaped Grunch Road had he not twisted his ankle on a treacherous tree root.
There is neither a left-hand nor a right-hand path.
Threefold, singular, serpentine, the way of Truth.
The young woman who’d come with him to Grunch Road had shown herself to be more fleet of foot than her lover. Astrid smiled, pleased the female offering would provide Rose with a much-needed challenge. Rose dearly loved to exercise her newly limber body, but she’d been let go from Bonnes Nouvelles for getting into a fistfight with another one of the dancers. Astrid hoped tonight’s outing would bring an end to her tiresome pouting.