by G A Chase
Kendell didn’t realize until that moment how hungry she’d gotten. “I could go for a diet Coke and some chicken nuggets.”
Sanguine turned to the guard. “Make that two orders of nuggets.”
The man looked annoyed as he turned toward his boss.
Colin merely nodded. “I would kill for a burger so long as you’re out.”
“Right, boss.” The guard fumbled for his keys.
* * *
“Busting ass across Highway 12 isn’t the easiest way to read this equipment.” Professor Yates had been complaining since they had left New Orleans.
Myles suffered both Joe’s desire to move as quickly as possible to find the women and the professor’s need to make sure they weren’t missing something important. What he really wanted was to take Charlie up on his offer to play bartender, but alcohol didn’t seem likely to help. “Joe, is there anyone you could talk to about what properties Colin Malveaux might have available for his use up here?”
“Only if you want to get caught. With the cops at your apartment, I don’t dare contact my people in the department. We are still in a stolen vehicle.”
Myles thought the reminder that they were on the lam, after the previous dozen, was unnecessary. “Yeah, and with our run-in with Luther’s guys, I doubt they’d be any more helpful. This is their van.”
“If you want to take over the driving, I can work some back channels. We probably won’t discover much as I’d think Colin would want to use a place that wouldn’t be easily discovered, but riches combined with arrogance have a tendency to make people careless.”
After only a moment at a turnout off the freeway, they’d switched seats. Driving the stolen van was more nerve-wracking than Myles had imagined. He was certain every cop that sped by was ready to cut him off and make a dramatic arrest. The well-marked exits for the college town of Hammond faded in the rearview mirror. Ahead, random, poorly marked turns off the freeway came upon Myles before he had a chance to read the signs. Dense forests of pine and hardwoods blocked any view of what might be going on in the small hamlets set back from the thoroughfare. Myles wouldn’t see Kendell waving for his help, but seeing nothing but trees made the trip frustratingly slow. Each time he hit the gas, however, Professor Yates complained he wasn’t able to get stable readings.
Joe crept forward and put his hand on the back of the driver’s seat. “Margery Laroque has a boathouse outside Madisonville. That’s Colin’s mother. She’s head of New Orleans Bank and Trust. The location is remote and right on the water. Since the women were abducted from the launch site, they might have been taken by boat. Charlie’s friend said he found only the fresh ATV tracks there—no other vehicles.”
Myles had been so worried about Kendell, he hadn’t bothered to figure out how she’d been abducted, only by whom. “It’s worth a shot. I can’t just keep driving this freeway, hoping for some ping on the professor’s equipment.”
Once off the busy, well-traveled route and on a rural two-lane road, Professor Yates started to perk up. “Now we’re talking. There’s some energy source straight ahead. If we take a couple of side streets, I should be able to triangulate a position.”
“Sorry, Professor, I’m not wasting more time wandering around when we have a lead on our destination. Keep checking your equipment to make sure I’m headed in the right direction, but other than that, I’m just going to rely on you for confirmation.”
Keeping to the speed limit took all Myles’s restraint. The last thing they needed so close to their target was to get pulled over by some small-town cop looking to fill his ticket quota.
The small town of Madisonville, with its historic, well-maintained homes and old-fashioned store fronts, exuded rural Louisiana charm. Unfortunately, the slow pace of life extended to the speed limits. Having to stop every block at stop signs only further infuriated Myles. Apparently, the city hadn’t bothered to invest in street signals. As he turned onto LA-1077, he yelled back at the professor. “Are you sure I’m going the right way? This looks like a residential neighborhood, not a way out to the lake.”
“The twists and turns through town have helped me zero in on a location. According to the GPS map, we’re right where we want to be. A couple more blocks, and we should be free and clear of the town.”
Once they’d passed the houses, with their neatly manicured yards, the native grasses on the sides of the road shot up higher than the roof of the van. Myles tried peering through the vegetation while he drove, but it effectively blocked out any homes that might have been sitting close to the water.
Joe pointed out a mailbox covered in vines. “I think that’s it.”
Myles slowed the van to a crawl in order to not miss the turn. Once on the gravel road, he continued to keep the vehicle down at the lowest speed possible until he found a turnout wide enough to park without being seen from the house. “Okay, Professor, time to impress me. I don’t want to bust in on some sweet little old couple who happen to have a nice collection of antiques with powers they don’t suspect.”
Having taken the professor’s class, Myles knew the man often bullshitted his way out of situations, but as Professor Yates stood up in the back of the van, he exuded a confidence that Myles had never seen in class. “This is it. Whatever is in that house isn’t displaying any kind of energy I’ve ever seen before.”
Charlie had been uncharacteristically quiet in the passenger seat. He pulled out his hip flask. “A quick sip of courage before entering battle?”
Myles had never in his life felt so happy to have a personal bartender along. “Is that rum?”
“I could hardly carry the whole bar inventory. I thought rum was the most apropos.”
Myles snatched the narrow metal canteen from his friend. “Time to find out if we’re going to get any help from the beyond.” He jumped out of the van and ceremoniously poured a small libation on the ground for the ancestors. Then he used the flask’s lid to offer a drink to the loa of the dead.
Baron Samedi rose up out of the ground where the rum moistened the gravel. “You found it?”
“It’s not that simple. Colin Malveaux has Kendell and the new swamp witch.”
The all-black irises in the center of his white eyes rotated to take in the compound, appearing to see more than just the obvious. “Madam de Galpion is also here with the spell book. If my enemy is able to remove the silver skull before I get my hands on the cane, it will be an all-out war between the living and the dead.”
* * *
The bite to eat helped Kendell focus, but Sanguine’s herb concoction smoldering on the coffee table didn’t mix well with the deep-fried chicken nuggets in Kendell’s stomach. Singing while breathing in smoke wasn’t a skill she’d ever had to master. In the early days of the Scratchy Dog, singers had to endure secondhand smoke filling the room, but no longer.
Delphine sat on the couch with the diary on her lap. “The secret is not to fight it. You have to fill your lungs with the smoke and let it work on your vocal cords. To break the spell requires Wicca and voodoo to act as one.”
Instead of fighting the fumes, Kendell allowed them to fill her body and soul. Her awareness of her existence extended beyond her body until she encompassed the whole room.
Colin was sitting on the opposite end of the long leather couch from Delphine. He held the walking cane like some sort of demented potentate expecting to be endowed with all the powers of the afterlife. Kendell knew what she had to do. She and Sanguine had a plan. She wasn’t going to completely give in to what Colin wanted, but if things didn’t work out, that would be the end result.
The TV continued to show the growing storm. The predictions were that the citizens of the gulf coast had two days to get out of town. Plenty of time, Kendell told herself.
Summoning her memory and self-condemnation from her time with Robert Johnson, she turned to the house computer. “Play ‘Sympathy for the Devil’ by the Rolling Stones.” As she sang along, she envisioned the words being not only about
herself but also Colin and even the cane as well. The words came out of her mouth as puffs of smoke, darker and more concentrated than the light haze filling the room. Like ocean waves lapping the shore, dark ridges of vapor washed over the silver skull. The energy she expelled was soft and methodical. The knob wouldn’t be forced off but enticed into submission.
Like a scientist observing an experiment, Delphine kept track of the energy holding the silver skull to the cane by rubbing her fingers over the diary pages and smelling the effect. “The counterspell is working.”
Kendell felt a shift in power. The smoke from Sanguine’s smudge pot heightened her connection to everyone in the room but dulled any stimulation from outside the walls.
A breath of cold, fresh air brought her back from the beyond. People were rushing in the open front door. Myles.
“Now, Kendell, do it now!” Sanguine’s words refocused Kendell on the plan.
She was still connected to the cufflinks Colin wore—the small gold accoutrements that had belonged to the baron Malveaux and been cursed by Marie Laveau, one of them modified by Madam de Galpion to obey Kendell’s demands. She lifted her arms wide like a person being crucified. Across the room, Colin Malveaux dropped the cane as he rose from the couch with his arms mirroring hers. The tiepin at his chest called out to her. All she had to do was turn it toward his heart and push it in like an entomologist displaying an insect.
She sensed more than saw the man standing in front of her.
“No, my dear,” he said. “You are not a killer. Leave him to me.”
All she could make out clearly through the haze was Baron Samedi’s eyes. His dark features, even highlighted by the white skeleton markings, mixed in with the smoke, making him appear even more ghostly than normal. “Sanguine can stop the storm, but she needs the cane. You owe it to Myles to let her try.”
Kendell maintained her stance as she watched the swirls of smoke that followed Sanguine as they rushed toward Colin. With her heightened awareness, she knew her friend had picked up the staff. The new swamp witch swung it once over her head like a cheerleader handling a baton and struck the book with the end containing the silver skull. It popped off into Delphine’s lap.
An emerald-green light illuminated the haze over the end of the cane in Sanguine’s hand. Where the hollow skull had been, a chunk of glowing rock remained. Fortunately, the girl didn’t spend long admiring the new handle. She rushed toward the daylight of the open front door.
The men, including Myles, still stood around like zombies who weren’t sure whom to attack.
Uttering the words, “Let her pass,” took all Kendell’s strength.
The last of her energy gave out, and she fell to the floor. When Colin was freed from Kendell’s control, Baron Samedi rushed toward the man. The flurry of activity stopped at the sound of an engine firing to life and gravel being strewn from the tires.
“No!” Colin’s voice filled Kendell’s ears and soul.
The last thing she saw before passing out was the man and spirit running for the door.
* * *
Myles was still trying to blink the sting of the smoke out of his eyes as he cradled Kendell in his arms. She’d only been knocked out for a few minutes, but that time felt like an eternity. He too easily recalled being under the baron Malveaux’s possession and feared she’d suffered a similar fate.
“Well, that did not go as planned,” he said.
She sat up but remained in his arms. “What happened?”
“Sanguine stole Delphine’s Cadillac. Colin jumped in his SUV, with Baron Samedi in pursuit, to chase her. The guards hit the floor when you passed out. Joe and Charlie tied them up and have them locked in a bedroom. But those aren’t our current problems.” He nodded toward the TV. “That storm that was supposed to be days away is barreling down on New Orleans like an attack dog that sensed an intruder.”
Delphine came over and sat next to them with the book in her hands. The woman looked frazzled. “Like attracts like. The energies of the cane, Baron Samedi, and whatever Colin has going on in his joint soul are working on the storm like electromagnets.”
Kendell sat bolt upright. “We have to get Cheesecake! The band! We have to go right now.”
Myles shook his head. “Don’t worry. I called Polly while you were unconscious. Minerva is already picking up everyone in her bus and will be headed this way as soon as she can. Getting Cheesecake was her first stop. What were you two thinking?”
“Sanguine knew a storm was coming, though she didn’t say anything about it being the mother of all hurricanes. Her powers are based on nature. She figured that, with the cane, she could harness the energy of the storm and use it against Colin. We expected him to chase her.”
At least Kendell hadn’t joined in the pursuit, but Myles knew Sanguine being in danger would eventually suck Kendell back into the maelstrom. “So she’s just going to head straight into the eye of a hurricane and hope that magic wand can knock some sense into Colin?”
“Our options seemed pretty limited. We couldn’t separate the baron from Colin since they’re now one spirit. Sending him to Guinee might start a war between the loas of the dead. And leaving him among the living only prolongs our struggle against him. Sanguine believes with enough energy she can create a Wiccan purgatory to isolate Colin.”
“You foolish children,” Delphine said. “The amount of energy required to create an alternate reality is staggering. By using the cane to gather that power, she’ll be creating a whole new hell made up of both Wicca and voodoo. Did you consider that every afterlife has someone in charge? Even if he is alone, you’ll be creating a god. And what if he’s able to catch up to her and takes the cane while she’s building her new reality?”
Myles felt as though his head was spinning. “What about Baron Samedi? He’s not going to let her keep his cane. That would only replace Colin with Sanguine as its owner.”
Delphine handed the book to Kendell. “So now we have a three-way battle for control of the cane going on in the middle of the worst hurricane New Orleans has ever seen. A storm, by the way, that doesn’t feel completely natural in origin. If Baron Samedi does regain his staff, it’s unlikely he’ll care about stopping the hurricane. The dead don’t spend much time worrying about the trials of the living. If Colin ends up with the cane, we may be facing a whole new type of devil. At the very least, we’ve released its power for his use. We had all better hope Sanguine knows what she’s doing.”
Kendell flipped through the book as though searching for an answer. “We tackle one problem at a time. Though my cynical impression is that Colin would sit back and watch the world burn, New Orleans is his home. If he ends up with it, I’m sure he’ll do what he can to stop the storm. What good is having power if there’s no one left to boss around?”
Her constant attempts to put Colin in a less-than-evil light bugged Myles. “Sanguine’s the only one we can really count on. She’s read enough of the book to know how to use the cane to influence the hurricane’s direction.”
Delphine looked out the living room’s bay window at the wall of black clouds on the horizon. “I hope you’re right about Sanguine. At this point, we’re at the mercy of that storm’s desires. If it decides to march across the lake, there’s nowhere we could run.”
58
Colin’s fury was matched only by the growing hurricane, which battered his Ford Expedition. Off in the distance through the worsening rain, the taillights of the vintage Cadillac were still visible. Being low to the ground, it didn’t suffer the winds that rocked his SUV, but with each flooded section of road it hit, the possibility of water soaking the engine—and rendering the vehicle inoperable—made him push his truck a little harder.
“You’re a damn fool. Any woman who crosses your path that you can’t crush under your toe sends you into a fit of rage.” Baron Samedi didn’t so much sit as hover in the passenger seat.
“I’m only allowing you to tag along because we agree she should not use t
hat cane. Once it’s back in my hands—”
“Something I’ll never allow to happen,” Baron Samedi interjected.
“A battle for another time. The point is, if she uses it, we’ll both be in a world of trouble.”
Cars were filling the northbound lanes of the Causeway. The twenty-four-mile-long bridge across Lake Pontchartrain was the most direct—but also the most precarious—route out of New Orleans. Winds from the outer bands of the storm found free range across the wide-open water of the lake and plowed with full force into the narrow strip of raised cement and asphalt.
Each time the steering wheel pulled hard to the left, Colin swore and yanked it back in line with his quarry. Clouds darker than the black Cadillac filled the sky.
“Can’t you just manifest over there and push her into the guardrail or something?” Colin asked.
“You know better than that. As a loa of the dead, I can only go where I’m invited. And without my cane—”
“Don’t start again. I need all my anger to keep this damn vehicle from going over the side of the bridge.”
When they’d finally put the two-lane causeway behind them, Colin expected Sanguine to make a turn toward the city. Cars jammed the interstate on-ramp headed out of town. With the evacuation order in place, all routes into the city would be severely restricted, both to save the lives of the fools who wanted a closer look and to provide more lanes of traffic for escape. That would be the perfect place to catch her.
Apparently, she had the same realization. Instead of joining the throngs of vehicles, she continued straight toward the eye of the storm.
“Would you look at that thing? The funnel must be larger than the city’s diameter.” He hadn’t meant to engage Baron Samedi in conversation, but the event proved too huge to not make a comment.