Ghost Train to New Orleans

by Mur Lafferty

  The city was silent, and she looked down at her shoes, which were sensible brown loafers. I understand.

  Good. So. How exactly do I get back?

  The sun dipped below the horizon, the farmhouse getting dark. Zoë looked to her left, and the old woman wasn’t there anymore. Panic bloomed in her chest.

  Hello? How do I get home? Will you help me?

  With the cruelty of a child who has yet to learn empathy, the city’s voice drifted over her as the sun disappeared.

  If you don’t know, I’m not gonna tell you.

  CHAPTER 3

  City Infrastructure

  POST-KATRINA NEW ORLEANS

  It’s no lie, and it’s no secret: in 2005, Hurricane Katrina nearly shattered the city of New Orleans. Humans drowned, rogue saltwater sprites wreaked havoc in the floods, and the thin lines between class, race, and human and coterie were all smudged or erased.

  It has been a long time coming out of that, with some of the people never recovering, others being too stubborn to let “a little storm” beat them, and a rebuilding effort of monumental proportions. Still, the city’s various balances are fragile, the mood of the citizens is less trusting, and the borders, both real and magical, are frayed. It feels like a smaller city now, and perhaps it is. But the heart of the city, the one built on music and food and commerce, that one still beats, and never stopped.

  Walk her streets and tell her it’s OK. Tell her you’re happy to be there. Tell her you love her. Time heals all, and the further it moves us away from the events of 2005, the happier we all are.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  When Zoë was agitated, she would pace. Right now, as she had no body, she felt like whizzing around the city like an untied balloon that had been released. But she took a mental deep breath and first tried to picture the heart garden and float over and force herself back into her body, which still knelt by the flower bed.

  She found it, and Anna still sat in the grass, enjoying tactile sensations of smelling and touching. She tried to get the ghost girl’s attention, but Anna was oblivious.

  So that was how ghosts felt. Great.

  She approached her body and tentatively reached an arm out and tried to get inside as if it were a new suit. She passed right through herself.

  All right, you need to fucking tell me how to get back into my body right now or I swear to God, or—no, I will swear to Gwen —that you will regret it.

  The city was stern now, an angry aunt who wasn’t your mom, but also wasn’t afraid to discipline you. There’s nothing you can do to me that’ll be worse than the war, or the floods, or Betsy, or Katrina. Your threats is empty. Besides, I don’t know how to get you back into your body. I’ve never had one.

  Oh, that’s BS, you’ve merged with citytalkers before!

  And they had all been trained, and knew what to do.

  Dammit, Anna, she thought. Why did you leave this bit of info out?

  Zoë zoomed away from the garden and fled southeast, the direction Arthur had gone in his cab. She began to weaken and feel her connection to the city ebb, and she fought to keep going, but realized she probably didn’t want to sever herself from the city just yet. What would happen if she did that? Would she die? Exist as a ghost?

  With one fleeting look at the highways and swamps past the city limits, Zoë sped back north toward the river. The same weakening happened there, too, which she had expected. Swearing eloquently in her head, she returned to the courtyard.

  How did that go? the city asked her. Zoë ignored her. She went up to Anna and waved her hands at her, trying to get her attention.

  Hey! HEY! Anna! HEEEEYYYY ANNA! I thought you knew all the details about merging with the city, and all that shit? HELP ME. She jumped up and down, ran around Anna in a circle, and tried to grab her head, but passed right through her.

  She appealed to the city, who had appeared again and looked very amused. Can’t you ask her to help me? If you can make her corporeal, then surely you can find a way for us to communicate!

  The city smiled sadly, and then disappeared.

  Oh, you did not just do that. Come back here so I can glare at you.

  She chewed her bottom lip, or what passed for it, anyway. I can’t stay here and babysit you forever! I will find a way to get back, and if you don’t help me, I won’t talk to you or visit again!

  No one ever turns down help from a city, came the disembodied voice. Besides, we connected now. You can’t escape me.

  Shit. I’m a favorite doll the little girl won’t let go of. Her stomach, whether real or metaphorical at this point, felt made of lead, and queasy. She could feel sweat break out on her forehead and her palms.

  The thought came to her mind unbidden then. What about other coterie? Humans likely wouldn’t help her, but gods might. Zoëtists might. And—

  Had she had a body, the realization would have floored her. Everything from the previous night to perhaps even the slaughter of the citytalkers. All she had to do to confirm this was find one person.

  Zoë calmed herself and let her mind expand, feeling the people within the city without her own thoughts and judgments coloring her view. She felt the life in the city—humans, animals, fae, gods, and demons. She extended deeper and then could feel the undead—the zombies (there were a lot of them), the vampires, and—there. The ghosts.

  The city had an awful lot of ghosts.

  Zoë was looking for one person in particular, not a ghost. She thought about what she knew about him: very little, but he was cowardly, inventive, self-preserving, and on some weird mission for his employers.

  His employers. Oh shit. Seriously? Seriously? How could she have been so dense? Reynard had to be an assassin working for the Grey Cabal, or someone else who knew what citytalkers could do. That was why he was testing her.

  He was also being hunted, first by the ghosts, and then probably by that damn demon dog that Zoë had had to deal with for him.

  I’m done cleaning up your mess, dude. She said this to no one in particular, but it felt good to solidify the resolve.

  Zoë hovered above the Life Day festivities taking place in a hotel north of the French Quarter. She caught sight of the girl Beverly, with her zoëtist family. They were in some hotel conference room, listening patiently to a woman in a business suit who was raising a golem from collected Spanish moss, the action contrasting greatly with her attire. A Life Day demonstration, Zoë guessed. She looked around the room, decorated with plastic flowers and moss, with mud and newspaper golems serving punch and cookies to people.

  These zoëtists know how to party.

  An old man slumped in the corner, hands on his cane, his face sad and scraggly as if growing a beard just took too much energy these days. Zoë looked closer and saw that he was transparent. She approached him.

  She waved at him. Hey, uh, can you see me?

  His eyes rose slowly and met hers. Course I can. What’s wrong with you? Just die or sommat?

  No, I’m not a new ghost. Or I don’t think I am, anyway. I’m more of a disembodied spirit, and I need help getting back to my body. Can you help?

  The man frowned, his bushy brows furrowing. What the hell are you talking about? No, I can’t help you get back to your body. What do you think being a ghost is?

  Honestly I don’t know, Zoë said. I have only been one for a few hours. And I haven’t known many ghosts.

  He shrugged. It’s not like we have conventions to hang out like these fool zoëtists. But I’m here because some young vampire wanted a grandpappy, only my heart gave out before she could turn me. I was a failed vampire, you might say. She hid my body under the foundation and then they built this hotel on top of me. So I just prowl the hotel, break a mirror or two, upset a vice president—they’re much more fun to upset than the working-class folk. And people don’t believe them any more than they do the Mexican maids. One year the marketing department tried to pass me off as a hotel ghost to bring in the tourists, and I took a year off just to spite ’em.


  Despite her panic, Zoë was intrigued. When did you die?

  Almost a hunnerd years ago. Nineteen twenty-nine.

  At least you missed the Great Depression! Zoë said, feeling lame immediately after she said it. The old man glared at her, and worked his jaw. Zoë realized he was tapping his few teeth together. She stopped smiling. Please, is there anything you can do to help me?

  Accept death. It ain’t that bad when you get used to it. Come on by here and visit anytime. Jean-Babtiste Martin, he said, and stuck out his hand.

  Zoë shook it, realizing it was the first thing she had touched since becoming a city specter. Zoë Norris. Thank you, Jean-Babtiste, I will be sure to remember you when I’m out of this situation.

  He snorted. Good luck with that. He worked his jaw again, and Zoë felt a weird desire for chewing gum.

  The business-suit woman was finishing with her lecture, and she was taking questions. Beverly had pulled a cell phone out of her pocket and was thumbing through Twitter. Zoë wasn’t sure what to do, so waved at the girl a few times, but nothing happened. She tried to touch her but her hand went right through her. It was kind of revolting, honestly. The girl did flinch a little as if she had felt something cold touch her neck, but didn’t look up from her phone.

  Zoë leaned in close and tried to whisper in her ear, but she didn’t respond.

  She was well and truly alone.

  CHAPTER 16

  Festivals

  LIFE DAY

  A celebration of the zoëtist way, and the power the zoëtists can command, Life Day is a festival that used to move around the country but now has a permanent home in New Orleans as of 1957. The zoëtists behind it found that New Orleans was the most coterie-friendly city, and something about it made it unique. The power that flows through this city is different, and many master zoëtists chose to make their home here to train their students. Famous zoëtists such as Beracha Zimmermann, Kreindel Sitz, Naira, Richard Silverman, and the mysterious ancient woman the Doyenne all resided in New Orleans at some point, and all trained students here. In 1973 Zimmermann and Sitz set up a school for zoëtists in the French Quarter, but the Doyenne sent a golem to burn it down. They rebuilt with constant gargoyle guards, but their second building was destroyed in Katrina. Both zoëtists are long dead, but their students mourn the loss of their school.

  The School of Life used to host Life Day, but now it’s in the Andrew Jackson Hotel every January. The festival consists of lectures by masters, contests of creation, and parties staffed completely by golems.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Nothing. Nowhere. Zoë didn’t so much leave the hotel as sink down into the floor, leaving the convention and forming a puddle of misery.

  She sank deeper into the grass. She could sense the wet ground, the soil around her. She became intensely aware that very few coterie could come down here. Well, aside from any earth elemental or sprite or other ghost. But the others, the zombies and vampires who claimed to be intimate with the earth by virtue of the fact that many of them were buried, them she knew more than about this.

  Not that there was a lot to know. It was dark, which should have been blindingly obvious. But it was also full of life, the network of root systems, the worms and beetles that burrowed, and close were the Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi with their teeming life. I could stay here forever. I have nowhere else to go.

  What did you do to me? Why am I suddenly so emo? she asked. The city made no reply. Zoë ached with loneliness. I could just sleep here.

  She thought about her friends, Morgen and Gwen and Eir. Morgen, who had sacrificed herself to save Zoë and her friends from a fire demon. Morgen who would never let Zoë quit even when it looked as if everyone was against her. She wondered what the water sprite would say to her right now. “What the hell, Zoë? That’s not how you become an earth sprite! And you wouldn’t want to be one of them anyway. They have no sense of humor, and they usually watch really bad television.”

  Eir simply would have no patience with her. Go big or go home, that would be the Norse goddess’s motto if she were American and from a steel town. Zoë didn’t know what the Norse said to pump themselves up. Something like, “Devour the whole pig or eat greens forever after!”

  Gwen. Would Gwen see her as an errant soul and devour Zoë on her day off?

  Once she might have thought Gwen could help her. Gwen was a psychopomp, and she knew exactly what to do with spirits.

  Why hadn’t she gone to Gwen right off? Did she really mistrust her friend that much? Ever since she saw her friend eating souls, yeah, there was mistrust there.

  She floated up, up, and into the sunlight. The cloud cover had finally blown away and left a beautiful blue sky.

  How long had she sulked in the ground?

  Something pulled at her, and she followed it like E.T. following a trail of candy.

  Or like Hansel and Gretel.

  Gwen sat on a park bench several blocks away in Louis Armstrong Park, watching a brass band and waiting patiently.

  Hey, Gwen.

  “I didn’t know how long you were going to wallow. I thought I would watch the band while I waited.” She smiled. “What did you get yourself into?”

  Zoë told her much of the story, from merging with Anna to following the golden thread to become one with the city. My first problem was just that I didn’t know how to get back into my body. Then I tried to go back but couldn’t, and the city just… abandoned me. I feel like I lost my virginity to a boy who did it on a dare. I’ve been intimate with the city but now what?

  Gwen nodded. “I don’t know much about cities, but I do know about souls. You are not necessarily a ghost, but you’re close enough. I could guide you back to where you are meant to be, but your body isn’t on this plane. It never was.”

  I need to fly another airline, then. Where the hell is it?

  “Oh, it’s here, but not here,” Gwen said. “You need an anchor, not a guide. You can do this yourself.”

  That’s wonderful, Gwen. Remind me to give you your merit badge in obscure and unhelpful.

  Gwen smiled at Zoë’s annoyance. “Just calm down and listen. You said you followed a golden thread toward the city’s heart. You didn’t follow some sort of heart line, but where you needed to go. Now what you have to do is do that again. Think of where you need to go, and follow your thread there.”

  That actually makes some sort of sense, Zoë allowed. It still doesn’t tell me how to find my body, or how to get back into it.

  Gwen opened her mouth. Zoë held up her hand to stop her. And for the love of, well, you, don’t tell me to find the strength inside me. ’Cause it’s not there. I checked. Sang the Whitney Houston song and everything. And I looked behind the milk, and under the couch, and in my pocket. I don’t know what to do, and I don’t know who to trust anymore! I don’t even know if you would eat someone like me, an errant soul just bobbing around!

  Gwen smiled sadly. “Zoë, we were both inebriated last night, a position I don’t often find myself in. The souls pass through us unharmed, they are not processed, or eradicated, or devoured. I understand your objection, but it’s not nearly as bad as you thought it was. And even if it were, I would never do that to you. You’re my friend.

  “Go find your body, we can talk about the rest of this later. You have a connection to the city now, if you concentrate you can find anything here you want. You have to do this yourself, Zoë, but understand you are not alone.”

  Zoë nodded and sighed, realizing that she had no mouth, and didn’t need to breathe, but going through the motions made her feel better. She tried to think about what she needed to do to connect with the city, despite wanting to do the exact opposite. She really didn’t want to talk to the city again, but she needed it now. She spread out, finding the borders of the city’s presence, at the coast, through the bayou, over the Mississippi and the lakes and the sound. She found she couldn’t go into the swamps, or the Gulf. She felt her friends, and more. She felt
the anguish and shame of Opal, and the regret and grief of Eir. The people she didn’t know as well, she couldn’t sense their emotions. She found Christian, who was inspecting a block of ice in his freezer, and seemed to be talking to it. This cemented one of Zoë’s theories about water sprites, but she couldn’t think about that.

  Zoë drifted and thought about what she’d learned. She thought about citytalkers and zoëtists and the mysterious Doyenne. She thought about the voodoo practitioners, and Freddie Who’s Always Ready’s grandfather, the one who fought Muhammad Ali. She thought of the host of the party she had been invited to, and how she could explain that she had been kidnapped by a city and had to miss his party.

  The golden thread reappeared, and Zoë followed it gratefully. It led her east.

  She drifted along into a small shop in the Warehouse District of town. Civil War museums, art galleries, the Superdome, the convention center, these were all upper-crust business and tourist destinations, but one shop stood out horribly. And that’s why the humans ignored it completely.

  Zoë headed inside, taking note of the seven people who lived in the small apartment above the shop. The aisles were dark and the few windows were coated with grime. A handwritten sign on the door read MAREE’S SHOPPE—WELCOM.

  Zoë browsed the shelves, feeling many of the items fairly pulse with energy. This was a voodoo shop, a real one, not one with cheap masks and New Orleans mugs to appeal to the tourists. This was where zoëtists shopped.

  The top shelves held jars of herbs and bottles of viscous liquid, some black, some yellow. One rack that stood apart held swatches of fabric, velvet, it looked like, alongside rolls of ribbon, bottles of glitter, and embroidery kits.

  The herbs had names like crossing powder, calamus root, catnip, and holy thistle.

  Another aisle held small boxes of edible herbs, such as basil, lavender, cloves, and ginger. This aisle also had oils Zoë was more familiar with than the items on the other shelves, like peppermint, cinnamon, and vanilla.