She must have noticed me staring at the drawing because she stopped talking and cleared her throat.
“That is the Baron—one of my most powerful ancestors. He watches over me and is with me at all times.”
“Have you ever been possessed by him?”
“Is there anything else you wish to ask me before I have my lunch?” she said, ignoring my question.
I shrugged, not wanting to be a pain, but I was still afraid she was going to make a break for it the second I left her alone.
“You still haven’t convinced me that you’re not trapped here like the rest of us—that you can leave whenever you want.”
She stood up and went to the kitchen where she pulled out a small piece of white paper from one of the cabinet drawers.
It was a receipt for a drum she’d purchased in Sterling only a few days ago.
“You could have faked this,” I said. “Or ordered the drum off the Internet.”
She stood in front of me, her closeness making my legs weak. I didn’t know if she was trying to use her magic on me again, but I had to concentrate and focus on every word that came out of her mouth to understand what she was saying.
“I can get in my car and leave Ashburn right now. If you’d like to come along for the ride, you’re more than welcome.”
She offered me her hand, but I didn’t take it. Nothing would have made me happier than to get in a car with her and go. But whether she could do it or not, Ahriman’s spells wouldn’t let me leave. I was sure of that.
“Let’s assume you can do what you say,” I said. “Then what’s up with your zombie army out front? I don’t think Oizys likes it when she can’t check up on her homeowners in person.”
I wasn’t sure if I’d asked too many questions or if she was finally ready to eat her lunch, but she gestured for me to stand.
“As you are aware, Ashburn can be a dangerous place—more so than it appears on the surface. Many of the worst creatures in this town, including Oizys, don’t like the fact that a human knows what is really going on here. Think of my gardeners as my home security system.”
“Do they ever get a day off?”
“They don’t need one. It’s more of a permanent career than a job, and they’re happy to serve me.”
I studied her face, looking for any sign of deceit, but I found none. Either her magic was incredibly strong, or she was telling the truth.
As I walked toward the door, I wondered why Oizys would send me after Marie if there wasn’t anything there to discover or something to stop. Maybe Marie was telling the truth and Oizys was the one planning to escape. She could have tipped me off about Marie to distract and keep me occupied. A part of me didn’t know who to believe, but Marie was a human and Oizys was a demon, and demons weren’t exactly known for their honesty.
Before I left, I turned around and motioned at the jars on the mantel.
“Those are interesting,” I said.
She touched my elbow with her hand, and the sensation made my head swim, but I stayed my ground.
“They are my Kanari,” she said after she saw that I still wasn’t leaving. “Some call them soul jars.”
“As in, they contain people’s souls?”
“Only the ti bon ange,” she said. “The part of a person that determines who they are—their personality.”
“And those belong to the men working outside?”
She looked at me but didn’t answer.
I didn’t need my heightened demonic senses to see that she was hiding something. But like she said, we all had our secrets. And as long as hers didn’t hurt me or break one of Ahriman’s commandments, I didn’t need to know her personal business.
“You’re not going to make one of those jars for me, are you?” I said with a laugh, trying to ease the tension between us. “I like my personality the way it is.”
“Not unless I need to,” she said as she opened the front door and let the sunlight spill into the foyer.
When I stepped outside and stood on her Welcome mat, I thought of one more thing I wanted to know.
“I don’t mean to be nosy, but you seem like a nice enough person—”
“Such a heartfelt compliment,” she said with a sarcastic tilt of her head.
“How did you end up becoming a Voodoo priestess? Did you apply for the job or hear about it from a friend?”
She paused before letting out a short burst of laughter.
“I wasn’t expecting you to be this funny. But no, I didn’t have an interview or send in my resume. I was born into the church. The day I came into this world, my destiny was set.”
“Never had a choice?”
She grinned.
“Everything’s a choice. It’s just a matter of degrees. But I’m doing what I was meant to do, and I find happiness in that.”
I shrugged and nodded my head. In some ways, she and I were completely different, but we were both stuck doing what we had to, and that made me like and trust her a little more than I was prepared for. I mentally placed her into the probably harmless category and moved Oizys into my danger, danger, beware file.
“Any chance you’d be up for a meal sometime so we can talk more?” I said.
My abrupt statement surprised her as much as it embarrassed me, but she recovered quickly and answered.
“I don’t know how safe that would be for me,” she said. “But feel free to ask the next time you’re hungry—for food. You know where I live.”
Chapter 11
I SAT IN THE CAR outside Marie’s house with the motor running, even though I wanted to go back to John and Sybil’s house, play my new guitar, and find their stash of liquor.
But Ahriman’s magic was working double time, making my left hand twitch—urging me to find Oizys and see why she’d sent me to Marie.
I eased the car forward and drove down one street after another, thinking about what Oizys had said about John knowing how to leave Ashburn. I was far from being a psychologist, but if the way out of town used to be in John’s brain, maybe it was still there as a ghost memory in mine, waiting for me to find it.
With that small hope dangling in front of me like a supernatural carrot, I turned the nav off, took a deep breath, and let my instincts guide my steering.
The first thing I discovered was that Ashburn proper had grown so large and overpopulated, a single name wasn’t enough to contain it. Instead, it was divided into several large, distinct neighborhoods, including Ashburn, Ashburn Village, Brambleton, Broadlands, and Ashburn Farm. Of course, I never saw a village or a farm, and the land itself was anything but broad. Mainly what I encountered were a lot of busy people, expensive cars, and huge houses.
On the positive side of things, the town had several Moon Dollarz strategically placed in each neighborhood. And from what I could tell, they were always packed. Even the kids ran on designer coffee in Ashburn, most of them hooked on caffeine long before they were old enough to drive.
When I was a kid, coffee was something my dad drank to help him stay awake during long family road trips. I never touched the stuff until I was in my twenties and needed to stay awake for a show.
Maybe it was because of all the caffeine, but Ashburn’s sidewalks and walking paths were filled with endless streams of runners and walkers. They exercised alone, in groups, with dogs, and even while pushing baby strollers. And of course, I ran into plenty of cyclists who wanted to be treated like cars until it wasn’t convenient for them.
After two hours of getting lost, twilight was settling in, and I gave up thinking I’d magically remember the way out of town. Instead, I started looking for familiar streets and tried to figure out how to get back to John and Sybil’s house. Still lost, I turned a corner and saw an old stone building that was distinctly out of place among the rest of the town’s McMansions. But what really got my attention was that, as I approached the building, I could hear the vibrations of live music in the air.
I slowed down when I saw a huge crowd of people ju
st off the side of the road, gathering at the top of a large grassy hill next to the old house. My heart rate revved when I saw the unmistakable glow of stage lights coming from the bottom of a sloped field tucked away just outside the tree line.
Daylight was almost gone, and I was dead tired, but I always had time for music. Plus, Sybil said she was going to meet me at a concert, and I doubted Ashburn had more than one of those going at a time.
So I took a right into the parking lot and pulled into one of the last open spots. Hopping out of the car, I followed the crowds of homeowners dragging their coolers and fold-up chairs as they slogged toward the base of the hill to listen to the band. They were playing a cover of a popular reggae song by Bob Marley, and I laughed, wondering if Mr. Marley ever thought his music would be played in an affluent suburb like Ashburn.
As I walked by the old two-story stone building on my right, a coldness passed through my bones. I stopped moving, stunned by whatever I was feeling, but the crowd swept me up in their flow and carried me away. The chill left me as I glanced back, wondering what was inside the historic structure.
I was close enough to see the concert venue—a fenced-off area that included a grassy slope filled with people listening to live music in the warm spring evening. Hundreds of parents sat on blankets and beach chairs, drinking from plastic cups and handing out snacks to members of their brood who ran around as if possessed by sugar demons.
It wasn’t Woodstock, but it was better than nothing, and as I looked past the two off-duty police officers pulling overtime as gate security, I saw the band. There were five of them on stage, producing a sound that barely required three people. They mimicked the movements of rock stars, and their facial expressions tried hard to say bad ass, but their untucked designer tee-shirts, freshly purchased baseball caps, and ironed cargo shorts left no doubt that they were suburban dads.
At the entrance to the field, a sign warned of the consequences of bringing glassware onto the lawn, while overhead a large banner read, Hump Day in the Styx. I laughed out loud at how appropriate the sign was, given Ashburn’s supernatural reality.
The herd pushed me forward, and when it was my turn to get my hand stamped, the off-duty cops glanced at me with the combination of surprise and fear I was starting to expect.
One of them stamped my hand without a word, and I passed through the gate and entered the chaos, stepping over and weaving around blankets, boxes of white wine, and abandoned sippy cups, as I searched for a place to sit. Just as I found a piece of open grass half-way up the hill, the band finished their song and went straight into a Jimmy Buffett classic.
I wasn’t surprised at all.
I sat on the ground and studied the band and its gear while the crappy but catchy lyrics about attitudes and latitudes washed like sandy water through my ears and threatened to leave a nasty headache in their wake.
As suspected, the band had the nicest consumer-level gear on the market. Shure mics and Marshal amps, probably turned up to at least 5—the highest the neighborhood HOA probably allowed. And their instruments. I had to admit, a couple of them made my mouth water. One was a vintage Telecaster with original Fender pickups and a custom tremolo bar, just like I had back home in my studio. The bass player was trying to maintain a mellow groove on an ‘89 Rickenbacker with signature head stock. And of course, the drummer was surrounded by all manner of percussion, including a mounted cowbell, chimes, and toms of every size, all built around a nice five-piece walnut kit.
Watching them perform reminded me of the gorgeous custom acoustic waiting for me in my trunk, and I smiled as I imagined myself playing it. My happy daydreams were interrupted a few seconds later when I heard a commotion and a familiar voice coming from the lawn directly in front of the stage.
There at the center of everything was Sybil. She was dancing like the seductress she was and dressed to kill, wearing a tight, small black dress that accentuated her long legs and her figure. Five drunk guys jostled around her, each desperate for her attention. Watching her dance was like watching a witch cast a spell with her hips, and I found myself envying the man who’d be going home with her that night.
Then I realized I was probably the lucky guy I was thinking about, and I swallowed hard, my throat suddenly dry.
I sat mesmerized by Sybil’s undulating curves and her hypnotic moves. The guitarist flubbed a few notes of his solo. When I looked up, he was staring at her, too.
Half-way through one of her gyrations, she spotted me. With a snap of her fingers, the men paused in their orbits, and she headed up the hill, marching directly for me.
“There you are,” she said, stopping to pose in front of me, with her stiletto-heeled feet shoulder-width apart and one hand on her hip. “I told you not to make me wait—now I’m ravenous.”
Suddenly, the day caught up with me, and I felt a gnawing in my stomach.
“Anywhere around here we can get some food?” I said as I stood up and stretched my back.
As soon as I asked the question, I knew I’d screwed up.
She cocked her head, leaned forward, and wouldn’t you know it, she sniffed me—a tradition that was really starting to annoy me.
“How about our regular place?” she asked slowly.
And there it was. She was testing me, and I was about to fail because I had no idea where our regular place was or if we even had one.
Backed into a corner, I decided to pivot—something I’d learned during that month in the 80s when I was popular and had to give interviews on a daily basis. If you don’t know the answer to something, change the topic and answer a different question.
“Wherever we go, the first thing I want is a stiff drink,” I said.
It was an obvious dodge, but it brought a smile back to her face.
With her pack of want-to-be lovers drooling a few yards behind her, she leaned in and kissed me.
While we kissed, the band finished their song, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end as I heard the first notes to a pop tune I instantly recognized.
I pulled back from Sybil and looked up at the suburban dads on stage as they performed a horrible cover of the horrible song that had dogged me throughout my life. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, middle-aged homeowners all around me stood up and started clapping and smiling as they screamed the words to Yeah, Yeah, No, No, Maybe as loud as they could.
“Come on, babe,” Sybil said, grabbing hold of my arm and pulling me toward the exit. “I know how much you hate this song and everything else this wanker ever wrote.”
I scrunched up my eyebrows. Yes, it was true I loathed the song that had brought me so much fame, so little money, and so many headaches. But I was the wanker who’d written it, and I was allowed to hate it. The fact that John hadn’t liked it made me defensive and angry, and I fought the urge to defend it to Sybil.
Thankfully, she pulled me away before I could say anything. As the two of us moved through the crowd, her fan club followed us. Without even thinking about it, I turned and snarled at them, which stopped them in mid-step.
They looked at me, confused and afraid, then turned around and shuffled away in the opposite direction.
As we neared the exit, I heard a familiar voice. It was Oizys chiding a young couple with a baby. She was going off on the mom, pointing at the glass bottle the woman was holding and wagging her finger. The mom was in tears, the baby was screaming, and Oizys looked like she was in bliss. Meanwhile, the distraught husband tried unsuccessfully to catch the attention of the police officers, hoping they would come to their rescue.
They didn’t.
As we walked past them, Oizys saw me and broke away from the young couple. Sybil and I walked as fast as we could, blowing past the old building on our left and stepping into the parking lot.
“We need to talk,” she called out as Oizys chased us.
Reluctantly, I stopped. Sybil groaned.
“Tell her it’s not a good time,” Sybil said. “Or you can let me take care of
her. I promise I won’t leave much of a mess—nothing the animals won’t clean up before morning.” Even with my heightened powers of observation, I couldn’t tell if she was kidding.
“Leaving so soon?” Oizys said, finally stepping up next to us. “Did you not like the concert?”
“It was fine,” I said as Yeah, Yeah’s chorus rang out through the night air.
“How did things go regarding that matter we spoke of earlier today?” Oizys asked me. “I hope you weren’t too hard on the poor girl.”
“I’m not working right now,” I said, avoiding her question. “And hungry. Maybe you could stop by the store tomorrow if you want to talk.”
“I knew it,” she said, shaking her head. “You didn’t do anything at all. This is something we need to discuss right away.”
“He’s coming with me,” Sybil said, grabbing my arm. “Go find your own date.”
Oizys ignored Sybil and addressed only me.
“You know this is in your best interest,” she said as I sighed and caught Sybil’s eyes.
“Just give me five minutes,” I said.
Sybil released my wrist and strutted over to a picnic table to wait.
“Make it quick,” I said to Oizys, and she smiled, relishing my frustration like it was a tasty snack.
Chapter 12
I FOLLOWED OIZYS and her tightly wound hair to a paved path that led into the woods. After twenty yards, the path turned to packed dirt, and the trees blocked out the moonlight from above and the lights from the concert.
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