The Final Days of Magic

by J. D. Horn

  “The necklace.” Evangeline found herself drawing closer to the desk, her finger tracing the surface on which the chain lay. “Why fourteen stones?”

  “The diamonds are the seven stars of le Grand Chariot, better known in this land under the prosaic name ‘Big Dipper.’ The seven emeralds of Inanna’s necklace combine to form the emerald tablet of Hermes Trismegistus’s Kybalion. The fourteen stones together express the Principle of Correspondence—‘as above, so below.’”

  The Kybalion, Hermes Trismegistus—names to conjure with, literally. Some considered the Kybalion to be the arch grimoire, the greatest modern treatise on magic, and most held Hermes Trismegistus, “Hermes the Thrice Great,” to be an incarnation of the entity known in ancient Greece as Hermes, ancient Rome as Mercury, and ancient Egypt as the great god Thoth—the god of writing and father of all sciences, the architect of physical reality. Hermes Trismegistus was said to have recorded the secret of spinning the energy of the eternal chaos into matter, the supreme act of magic, on what Evangeline had always thought to be a fabled emerald tablet. But if there was even a glimmer of truth in what her aunt was telling her, the tablet was real, and connected to Evangeline.

  “Is my mother’s connection to the necklace the reason why I’m different?”

  “I perceive you as being ‘different’ in many ways; I’m unsure any of them coincide with the uniqueness to which you’re referring.” A genuine smile. A warm smile. Evangeline sensed neither guile nor sarcasm. “Perhaps if you could pose a more succinct question.”

  “Magic is dying,” Evangeline began.

  “Magic is fading,” Marceline joined her in a singsong.

  “The others. Most of them have no magic of their own. They’re clinging to depleted relics. But I . . .”

  “You are sizzling with magic, like une cierge magique.” She pursed her lips as she searched for the English term. “A sparkler. Yes. You are shooting sparks. Bright. Blinding.”

  Lincoln had advised her not to let her gains become common knowledge. She agreed that for now discretion was wise, but soon it seemed she might not have to worry. Only Alice came anywhere near her in power—Alice herself had made a point of showing her hand with the fireworks she’d displayed at Précieux Sang—and a great chasm was growing between them and the rest. Even though Nicholas’s grand scheme had emboldened him, he was looking for a new battery while Evangeline could sense lightning bolts of power playing beneath her skin. Ironic the “swamp witch” might end up the last witch standing.

  “What can I say, ma chère fille? Magic has always played favorites.” Marceline studied her face. “As I descended through the heart of madness, I learned the most salient facts in regard to magic’s demise.” She hesitated, as if waiting for Evangeline’s permission to share. Evangeline nodded. “There is something I need to show you, but it will require the eyes of another for you to see it. You must arrange a meeting with the Marin girl. Alice.”

  The sister witches had conspired with Celestin. Celestin, who had locked Alice away on the Dreaming Road. “I’m not sure Alice will be willing—”

  “Make her be willing. Luc needs you. He needs both of you.”

  NINETEEN

  A text from Nicholas: I know you and Hugo are still out. I’ve sent the Rolls to bring you to the house. Headlights flashed at them as she read the line. Hugo, in the middle of commenting on a leftover bill announcing LaLaurie Mansheon’s farewell “tour,” shielded his eyes with his hand. Alice tapped his shoulder and handed him her phone. The fresh air of the wee hours had somewhat revived her, but Rolls or no Rolls, only one destination held any interest for her—bed.

  He read the message and grimaced. “Do you see now why I don’t carry one of these things?” He dropped the phone back into her hand and started walking toward the car. “Well, come on then.”

  “Wait, you’re going?”

  Hugo turned to face her, walking backward toward the black sedan. “No,” he said, waving her forward, “we are.” Alice hesitated, but Hugo bounded ahead. A man, dressed in charcoal-gray slacks and a white button-down, popped out from behind the wheel and opened the rear door.

  “’Sup?” Hugo nodded at the driver and climbed in. He stuck his head out and focused on Alice. “Come on. ‘The Leader’ awaits.”

  The car slowed to a stop before Nicholas’s well-lit house, situated within view of the finger of water known as Bayou St. John. The house had sat mostly silent in the weeks following the loss of Daniel, but now seemed to be bustling with activity, even though the time was going on three a.m. As Alice leaned around Hugo to survey the situation they were walking into, the driver shifted the car into park, though he left the engine running. The man got out of the car and moments later, Alice’s door swung open.

  “Miss?” he said.

  Alice turned first to Hugo to find him staring at the house, his silent stillness signaling his enthusiasm had flagged. “We don’t have to do this,” Alice said, laying her hand on his forearm. He turned to her, a counterfeit version of his earlier enthusiasm kindled on his face.

  “Nah, this is going to be great,” he said, opening his own door. “Just effing great.”

  Alice sighed and exited the vehicle. “Thank you,” she said to the driver, who waited for her, standing at near attention.

  “My honor, miss,” he said. Alice picked up on a strange sincerity, a zeal even, in his tone. For him, she had a strong sense, these words weren’t a mere pleasantry.

  Alice paused and took note of the driver’s appearance. He was clean-shaven, and his hair was short, neat, perfectly parted—a prudent match for his nondescript manner of dress. His eyes held an ardor that made Alice uncomfortable. The pieces slid together in her mind. Like the young women at Daniel’s wake, this man was one of her father’s newfound adherents.

  Hugo slammed the Rolls’s door, causing her to jump. She found herself instinctively backing away from the smiling, outwardly unremarkable zealot. Hugo had already made it halfway down the walk by the time he realized she wasn’t following. He turned back and held out his hand toward her.

  “Come on, Gretel,” Hugo said. “Let’s go grab some gingerbread.”

  The door opened as they approached, one of the former Goth girls waiting in the entrance. “Welcome,” she said, and as she stepped back to allow them entry, “through us, he shall do great things.”

  Hugo froze, his eyes locking with Alice’s. One eyebrow rose as his lips pursed.

  “Through us,” the other young woman said, coming down the hall toward them, “he shall do great things.” She stopped before them, her face beaming. “He’s asked me to bring you to him.”

  “You’re escorting me to my own father . . . in my own house?” Hugo said.

  “I hope you’ll forgive my presumptuousness, but Father requested it.”

  “Father?” Alice said, thrown off.

  “I believe she means pater noster.” He shook his head. “Wait. Make that pater me-ster.”

  It was the former Goth girls’ turn to cast a cautious glance at each other.

  “You are fortunate to have him as your biological father,” the first said. “As we are blessed to have him as our spiritual father.”

  Hugo turned to Alice, his eyes wide in disbelief. He snorted out a laugh. It took all of Alice’s willpower not to join him in laughter. The two women grew visibly perturbed—the first’s shoulders slumped, her eyes dropping to the floor; the second’s face flushed, her jaw tightening. This one, Alice decided, had more of her true self, or at least her former true self, left in her.

  “Hugo,” Alice said, tugging his sleeve. “I’m tired. Let’s see what Nicholas wants and leave.”

  He looked down at her. “Sure,” he said without conviction. He shifted his attention back to Nicholas’s acolytes. “Listen, I feel we should apprise you that having Old Nick as any kind of father isn’t going to be everything you’ve cracked it up to be.” He glanced at Alice. “Am I right?”

  Alice wondered if her
performance at Précieux Sang, when she’d terrorized the pair, believing she was doing them a favor, had backfired and driven them deeper into the web Nicholas was spinning. “You should listen to him,” Alice said softly to the women. “Whatever Nicholas has promised you, when he’s through with you, he will be through with you, and you will leave empty-handed.”

  “And that’s if you’re lucky,” Hugo added.

  “He’s waiting for you,” the second girl said, undeterred. Her look of confidence seemed to say she had met a foretold challenge and passed the test. She turned and moved to lead them down the hall.

  “It’s okay,” Hugo said, pushing past her. “I think we know the way.” He looked back at Alice. “Make sure you drop breadcrumbs just in case.”

  The two women moved quickly, trying to advance around Hugo, but Alice held up a hand, both warning them and willing them to stop. The two froze in their tracks, their eyes flashing on her in unison. They gazed at her with a reverential wonder.

  She turned away from them and continued in the direction of Nicholas’s study, arriving at the moment Hugo flung open its door.

  He advanced into the room already speaking. “Don’t get me wrong, ‘Father,’” he punched the word out to underscore the irony, “this is by far the best community-theater production of Sweet Charity ever, but why in the seven hells are you dragging us into it?”

  Alice stopped in the doorway and watched Hugo spin around one of the chairs that sat before Nicholas’s desk and drop into it, splaying his arms over the top of its backrest.

  Nicholas looked past Hugo to her. “Come in, please, and close the door behind you, if you will,” he said with a deference he customarily reserved for an influential stranger, someone he didn’t know, but who had something he wanted. It struck Alice this was an apt description of her relationship with him. Alice closed the door softly behind her, then crossed to the empty chair and sat down. She smiled at Nicholas and waited. Alice was comfortable with silence, having spent much of her life alone.

  Hugo, on the other hand . . .

  “Why did you bring us here?” he asked.

  Nicholas folded his hands, resting them on his desk. “I’m sure the Twins have provided you with a cursory explanation of my recent undertaking.”

  “You mean your cult?” Hugo said.

  “‘Cult’ is such a charged word,” Nicholas responded, a sly smirk rising to his lips. “I prefer ‘society.’”

  “What have you done to them?” Alice said, keeping her voice low and calm.

  “Done?” he said, giving a shrug. “To whom?”

  “I believe she’s referring to your two vampire brides.”

  “They’ve been changed.” Alice held a hand up to silence Hugo. “Don’t pretend you had nothing to do with their transformation.”

  “On the contrary,” Nicholas said, his lips pulling down, a sign of mild umbrage. “I had everything to do with it. They were lost souls on a downward spiral. I have given them purpose.”

  “You have given them your purpose,” Hugo said.

  “I have given them faith in something greater than themselves, a sense of wonder, a sense of security.”

  Alice held her tongue, giving him a chance to feel the full weight of her distaste. His mask of confidence slowly began to crack. The sharp gleam in his eyes faded. The corner of his mouth twitched. He looked down, focusing on his hands. “I took two broken girls, two broken girls who had no future before them”—his eyes rose to meet hers—“and I broke them down further, so I could begin to rebuild them.” The look of self-satisfied superiority returned. “And they love me for it. Adore me. They trust me . . . completely, and they have opened themselves up to me . . . absolutely.”

  “And you’re feeding from them,” Alice said. “You’re engaged in psychic vampirism.” Nicholas was becoming his father, and he couldn’t even see it.

  A sudden revelation ripped the scales from her eyes. He did see it. Cults weren’t built in a day. Nicholas must have put this plan of his into play long before he’d disappeared from New Orleans on the day of the massacre at Celestin’s memorial ball—a slaughter he himself had narrowly missed due to the disloyalty of his coven. A slaughter for which he could in no way be held responsible. Oh, yes, he’d been both spared and acquitted, almost as if he’d anticipated the bloodshed and shielded himself from the outcome rather than attempted to prevent it. The thought sickened her.

  “I’m taking the potentiality of their life force, potential that would have otherwise been wasted, and I am spinning magic from it.” He paused and leaned forward. “They’re not the only ones.” He laughed, almost as if he couldn’t believe what he was relating. “Around the country, I have hundreds of others. And with your help—”

  “Ah, here it comes,” Hugo said, scowling as he draped himself against his chair’s backrest.

  Alice held her gaze on Nicholas, who looked back and forth between the two of them, his patient, though put-upon expression seeming to ask if they’d satisfied their sanctimonious need to express contempt.

  “I am sheltering the homeless, bolstering the weak, giving meaning to those most in need—”

  “Wow,” Hugo said, “a visit from Saint Nicholas, and it isn’t even Christmas Eve.”

  Nicholas held up his hands in surrender, closing his eyes and shaking his head. He drew and released a deep breath, then opened his eyes. “You both need to grow up,” he said, any attempt to ingratiate himself to them tossed to the wind. “Power is a pyramid. You were both born on the apex—”

  “I thought I felt something sharp poking me in the ass,” Hugo sniped.

  “That pyramid is crumbling,” Nicholas said, ignoring his son. “I’m building a new one.”

  “Over which you’ll be the all-seeing eye,” Alice said.

  “It is,” he said, “my pyramid, after all. I don’t feel the need to justify myself. I’m not looking for your approval. Or even your gratitude. I’m giving you the chance—”

  “You’re just like Celestin,” Alice said, not an accusation but a cold, simple acknowledgment of fact.

  “Celestin stole,” Nicholas said, fast and sharp. It seemed he had enough of a conscience left to be riled by the truth—though not enough of one to admit it was true. “I’m only accepting what has been freely offered to me. In case the point was lost on you, I’m the ‘him’ in the ‘Through him we shall do great things.’”

  “Yeah, Nicholas, we get it,” Hugo said, pushing up from his chair and standing. “I always wanted my own catchphrase, too.”

  Alice took her cue from her brother, rising and moving to the side of the chair. Suddenly tired beyond words, she grasped the top of the backrest to steady herself. To brace herself for his answer. “What do you want from us, Nicholas?”

  “From him,” Nicholas said with a nod to Hugo, “I want his pharmaceutical know-how.” He looked over to his son. “You have experience with using psychotropics to take yourself into the astral, where it’s easier to move magical power.”

  “I no longer have magic,” Hugo said. “I no longer want magic.”

  Nicholas’s lips curled up, then opened as he let out a caustic laugh. “You say that now, flesh of my flesh, but you’re going to miss it, and miss it more and sooner than you are, in this moment, ready to believe. But,” his expression softened, “I don’t want you to flounce around the astral. I want you to send others there.”

  “You want me to drug your little acolytes, so you can shift the power of their potentiality more easily.”

  “Yes. Once they have been adequately prepared. I also want you to assist me with smoothing out the jagged remnants of who they were, to help them become who they were born to be.”

  “Your batteries.”

  “Precisely.”

  “The Dreaming Road,” Alice said, an awareness of his scheme dawning on her.

  “A”—Nicholas emphasized the article—“Dreaming Road. A new Dreaming Road.” He fell silent and studied her. “That is where you com
e in.”

  Alice released the chair and, shaking her head, began backing away.

  “You know more about the Dreaming Road than anyone. Together we can build these unfortunates their own private paradises.”

  “Go to hell.” Alice turned, almost lunging for the door. She felt as if she couldn’t breathe, as if she were trapped in a vacuum. She grasped the doorknob and yanked the door open. The wake, the drink, the Twins. The entire long night caught up with her in an instant.

  “That goes double for me, Pops,” Hugo said, catching up to her, slipping his arm around her, supporting her. His eyes met hers, a silent inquiry. Her answer was to lean into him. He placed a peck on her temple, and together they headed down the hall toward the front door.

  “‘Better to reign in hell . . . ,’” Nicholas’s voice followed on their heels.

  Alice glanced back to see him standing outside his study, his stance loose and confident, his arms folded across his chest. “You flatter yourself, . . . ‘Father.’”

  Power surged through her, and she slipped free of Hugo’s grasp. She stepped forward on her own and used her magic to will the door open. It flung wide and slammed into the wall behind it. She reached back for Hugo’s hand and together they stepped out into the glorious night.

  TWENTY

  Night had fallen, and Nathalie sat on the thin, stained mattress in the mildewy air of the room she now considered her cell. The fan still rattled the window blinds’ metal slats, but the faint glow beyond the shifting blinds had faded away.

  Nathalie felt like she could sleep a hundred years—and she also felt ready to jump out of her skin. They’d given her something, something first offered as a hot drink “to warm her up.” Warm her up, hell. When she refused, three of the fatigue-wearing goons from the yard had marched in and held her down, pouring the earthy-smelling, almost tasteless liquid into her mouth, ounce by ounce, then forcing her mouth shut and squeezing her nostrils closed. She’d tried to fight back. Any one of them, she could have fought off with either her fists or, she’d sensed, magic. Maybe even two of them. But the three had proved more than she could take, especially with Emil standing over, watching, cooing at her. “Calme-toi, chérie. Reste-tranquille.”