by G A Chase
Minerva started up the grumpy VW. “All aboard for the swamp tour. Hopefully, Sanguine will have made her way back to the jetty by the time we get there.”
With Colin secured in the past, the light of day surrounding her, and everyone she cared about except Sanguine safely in the bus, Kendell felt more relaxed than she had in a long time.
“Is anyone else really tired?” Lynn asked.
“And hungry?” Scraper added.
Kendell hadn’t bothered analyzing her body’s demands. “We moved forward in time—based on how I’m feeling, I’d guess by a couple of days. Don’t give in to your body’s needs. Falling asleep probably wouldn’t do any good, assuming sleep is possible. We’ll be headed home soon enough.”
The bus swerved slightly from the edge of the road to the middle under Minerva’s fatigued control. “I’ll be okay so long as the old swamp witch doesn’t move time along any further. Another hour or two, and I’d be a goner.”
Polly straightened up in her seat. “Right. The one sure way I know of to keep us all from dying in hell is to sing.”
The rest of the trip out to the bayou felt like a high school bus ride to a singing competition.
When Minerva turned onto the gravel parking lot on the jetty that bordered the swamp, everyone was exhausted. Even the VW sounded like it wanted to go to sleep. “At least Sanguine made it out okay, but from the way she’s slumped over in the canoe, I’m guessing she succumbed to the need for sleep.”
Kendell’s body ached as she pulled at the open door to get out of the bus. “Wait here. I’ll go get her.”
She almost hated waking Sanguine. Sleep had eluded everyone for so long that the image of the girl with her eyes closed almost made Kendell weep. Fuck this. The only time I’m this emotional is when I’m exhausted.
She used self-incriminating anger to help her shake Sanguine, but the woman didn’t wake. “Myles, come help. She’s not coming out of it.”
He hurried to her side. “What’s wrong with her?”
She didn’t want the rest of the group to hear. “Remember how we couldn’t sleep while we were chasing Colin? That tired-but-awake state wasn’t one we could change. I’m afraid the same might be true if any of us falls asleep now.”
“She’s in a coma?”
Kendell wasn’t sure what to think. The person with the most information about this reality was currently not in a position to talk. “I don’t know. We need to get her into the bus and back to Baron Samedi. Maybe he can help.”
“And if he can’t?”
Thinking while dazed from lack of sleep made Kendell’s head hurt. “Then we carry her back to our reality and hope she snaps out of it.”
Myles lifted the comatose woman into his arms and followed Kendell back to the van.
“She’s okay, just knocked out. We can’t afford for any of us to join her in dreamland, though, so let’s keep singing. Do whatever you can to stay awake.”
Kendell didn’t have trouble staying awake for the ride back to the city. Sanguine, nestled between her and Myles, was enough of a warning of what would happen should she give in to her desire for sleep.
Even with the road noise, the engine screaming under their bench seat, and the rocking of the van, Kendell continually tried to wake Sleeping Beauty. “Come on, Sanguine. Don’t do this to me. I need you.”
But no amount of shaking or enticing could wake the woman on the half hour drive back to the bank.
* * *
Myles wasn’t comfortable leaving Sanguine in the bus all on her own in such a vulnerable state. Logic argued that Colin was not around, but he’d proven too wily to discount. Baron Samedi, however, would need everyone’s help to escape back to Guinee. Before following Kendell out of the bus, Myles shoved Doughnut Hole next to the sleeping woman. “Keep an eye on her for me, okay?”
The hellhound slumped against the woman as if he too would like to catch a nap.
“No falling asleep. You’ve got a job to do. I won’t be long.”
Up in the office, Baron Samedi was as pale as the white bones that were painted on every exposed section of his skin. Time seemed to be doing a double whammy on the voodoo loa, who occupied too many dimensions at the same time. “The gates are secure.”
“And now it’s time we got you back to Guinee. What do you need us to do?”
The man’s long coat hung loosely on his emaciated shoulders. “The gates to Guinee must be opened. I couldn’t risk it while the gates to life were being constructed, but there’s a catch.”
Myles well understood what was involved in moving from one realm to the next. “They have to be opened in order, but without time existing in this dimension, it wouldn’t be possible for those in Guinee to see the difference.”
“Exactly.” He turned toward the elegant bookcase behind the desk. “Though I am the seventh voodoo loa, I can’t open my gate from this side. It will be up to me to make the final offering. Papa Ghede stands watch in my absence. For me to pass through to Guinee, the other gates will have to be opened simultaneously. Maybe if Papa Ghede sees all the offerings at once, he’ll understand my dilemma and let me pass.”
Kendell had been the one to make the offerings at the gates while Myles had been a prisoner of Baron Malveaux in the afterlife. “There are six of us left conscious. If we each take a gate, can you set off a beacon to let us know when to make the offerings?”
He twirled his cane like a baton. “I can manage that.”
Kendell wasn’t finished. “Is there anything you can do for Sanguine? She fell asleep.”
Samedi looked around the room, but Myles suspected he was really seeing the mirrors into other realities. “Sleeping without time is dangerous. For me to try to wake her would be worse. She could wake up at any point in her future. The young woman you know might turn into an old woman before your eyes.”
“And if we leave her asleep but take her home?”
He continued to turn his cane as he thought. “She might lose some time on the rest of you. As it would likely be less than a day that she’d be asleep in this dimension, it wouldn’t be physically noticeable, but it could give her a glimpse into the future. She’d experience a continuous feeling of déjà vu. The state is called déjà vecu, and it can be very disorienting.”
Kendell turned to Myles. “I guess we’ll have to start listening to her more closely.”
“That is, if she wakes up at all,” Baron Samedi continued. “Falling asleep requires a time reference for the body to know when to wake. Have you ever gotten up minutes before the alarm goes off?”
Myles didn’t like where Baron Samedi was heading. “Of course.”
“That’s the result of your internal clock.”
Kendell took Myles’s hand. “But we can still wake her, right?”
Baron Samedi talked as if he were giving a lecture instead of referring to someone who’d helped free him from hell. “People wake themselves up. A person might hear something external to their dreams that reminds them about the time, but it’s still the dreamer who decides to come back to consciousness.”
Myles knew when a conversation was no longer progressing. “Let’s get you out of here, then we can make our way back to life and deal with Sanguine. One problem at a time.”
Back out in the VW, Myles felt like a bartender on a party bus as he handed out small bottles of rum, absconded from the speakeasy, to the women. “No drinking. This is strictly for the offering to the other loas of the dead. Without time, who knows how they would interpret others partaking of their libations.”
He’d seen each of the cemeteries used as the gates of Guinee but only from the inside. Kendell sat up front, doing her best to navigate with Cheesecake taking up most of the windshield. “Saint Louis No. 1 first. As there won’t be a specific order, it doesn’t matter who takes which station. Just be ready to pour the rum when you see the signal.”
Polly was the first one out of the bus. Muffin Top jumped out after her. “We’ll take this one.
I’ve always wanted to see Marie Laveau’s tomb. You don’t suppose she might stop by?”
“I doubt it,” Kendell said. “But if you run into trouble, send Muffin Top to Saint Louis No. 2.”
Lynn rubbed Cupcake’s black-and-white mane. “I’ll take that cemetery. The sister dogs should be able to find each other easily enough.”
Once Scraper was dropped off, it was down to Kendell and Myles riding with Minerva. Myles put his hand on the back of the driver’s seat. “This is your stop. Kendell and I can walk to our locations. No matter what you see or hear, don’t do anything until you see the signal and pour your libation. After that, if one of us does end up in trouble, round up who you can and head over.”
“What about her?” Minerva motioned toward Sanguine, who was fast asleep on the back bench.
“If Prince Charming comes along and tries to kiss her, hit your bus horn,” Myles said. “Otherwise, I think she’ll be okay.”
He walked Kendell to the next cemetery. With so many hidden away in dark sections of the city, it was as if the dead really were still a part of the living. She held him close at the iron gate. “You don’t need to take the sixth gate. We could switch.”
Baron Kriminel wasn’t exactly Myles’s enemy, but his chicanery in Guinee had landed Baron Samedi’s cane in Archibald Malveaux’s hands during the city’s first official Mardi Gras parade.
“I can handle Kriminel. He has an obligation to watch over the sixth gate. Unlike Baron Malveaux, the loa has honor. As long as the libation is offered correctly, he won’t have a reason to deny Baron Samedi passage back to Guinee.”
“Maybe not, but his association with Baron Malveaux bothers me. I know Colin is back in time, so opening the gates won’t do him any good, but being a little cautious wouldn’t be a bad idea.”
Myles reached down and scratched Doughnut Hole’s ear. “I’ll have my guardian. He’s got a sixth sense for knowing where Colin is and what he’s up to.”
Kendell pulled on the latch of the heavy wrought-iron gate. “Cheesecake will keep her ears peeled for Doughnut Hole’s bark.”
Myles waited until Kendell and her dog had turned a corner and were lost from sight among the crypts before heading down the street with his pup. Being alone in a city usually teaming with life still didn’t feel natural. At least at dusk people were often eating or resting up for the night’s adventures, but during the day, the lack of people was downright eerie.
“Come on, boy. Let’s get a little jog in. Baron Samedi must be getting a little antsy to set off that cane.”
The exercise managed to distract him from the lurking fear of who might be waiting at his destination. He could put on a brave front for Kendell, but facing Baron Kriminel did make Myles queasy. He slowed down to a stroll when he entered the city of the dead. The mausoleum he sought looked much like all the others that lined the walking path, but having seen it from the inside, Myles would never forget its marble front.
He pulled out the bottle of rum and shot glass. If everything went according to plan, he might not even have to face Baron Kriminel. He hoped none of the women would have to face their loas. Only Kendell had any experience with the guardians to Guinee.
Okay, Baron Samedi. Let’s get this over with.
A green flare shot high into the sky above the French Quarter. Myles set the shot glass on the small ledge meant to hold a bouquet of flowers and poured the rum just as the ball of light exploded into seven spiraling spokes of sparks.
Baron Kriminel strolled out of the tomb as if he’d been expecting to be summoned. “You come asking another favor?”
“You know why I’m here. I suspect you’re the reason I’m here.”
The loa of the dead leaned against the granite side of the crypt. “Are you accusing me of trapping Baron Samedi in this witch’s hell?”
“At one time, you used Baron Archibald Malveaux to displace Baron Samedi as the seventh guardian, and now I suspect you’re helping Colin Malveaux.”
The dark spirit looked around the deserted grounds. “If that were true, why would I wish Baron Samedi to remain as guardian over my servant?”
“Perhaps so you can control Guinee? With him out of the way and Papa Ghede watching over his gate, you might think the time was right for a change.”
“If I let him back, there might be a war.”
Myles wished the rulers of Guinee would learn how to look after themselves without pulling in the living. “Better an isolated war than one spread across dimensions. Baron Samedi won’t survive long in this hell.”
“His passing would create an unstable boundary between the living, the dead, and the deep waters. If war does happen in Guinee, though, you might get sucked into the conflict.”
Myles hadn’t expected anything different.
* * *
Baron Samedi’s return to Guinee didn’t come with fireworks or darkening skies or any commemoration at all. He was simply gone. Colin was gone, or at least was not in the same time as the gang. Agnes Delarosa might have been around somewhere, but with her granddaughter in a coma, she wasn’t reachable.
Their task mostly complete, and with no one watching, Myles and Doughnut Hole danced down the neutral ground of Canal Street like a one-man, one-dog second line. “One last task, boy, and we’ll be home.”
Kendell and Cheesecake were the first to join in on the miniature parade. “I’ve always wanted to dance down the middle of Canal. Now all we need is a little music.”
The rhythmic honking of the battered horn on Minerva’s VW announced that accompaniment was on the way. As the van reached the back of the growing parade, Polly—with tambourine in hand—jumped out of the slow-moving vehicle to join in the dance. With Cupcake and Muffin Top following the bandleader, there were more dogs in the procession than human companions.
Scraper on electric bass and Lynn on mobile keyboard made their music heard through the open windows of the van. Minerva continued to keep time with the bus’s horn.
Polly spun between Myles and Kendell. “We figured out how to power the instruments from the old VW. That thing is amazingly versatile. With the modifications from Delphine and Professor Yates, we could amp up this whole town.”
Minerva took up the opening rhythm to “Iko Iko,” adding in flashing headlights for emphasis. The traditional New Orleans parade song quickly had everyone singing along, even Myles, though he had more confidence in his dance moves than his off-key singing.
Cheesecake took lead of the second line, howling out her interpretation of the song. With dog, human, dog, human, the interspersed multispecies line of revelers weaved across the streetcar tracks, the bus following along behind.
For a moment, Myles forgot he was dancing in hell, and in that moment, he sensed someone not of the troop dancing next to him. “Charlie, what are you doing here?”
His fellow bartender’s presence made about as much sense as a dead person showing up in a dream. “I heard there was a second line. You know I’ve never been able to resist a good party.”
Even Myles didn’t know when or where the trip out of hell was going to take place. “How did you hear about it?”
“How does anyone hear about any great gig in New Orleans? Word of mouth!”
Myles still wasn’t sure he believed what he was seeing. His exhaustion had a way of making reality a little hazy. If it was really Charlie, then Myles couldn’t think of a more welcome addition.
His friend pointed beyond Kendell, who was dancing in front of Doughnut Hole. A multicolored piece of fabric was floating on a breeze, but as Myles focused on it, Delphine de Galpion filled out the garment. Her dance moves put everyone else’s to shame.
It’s working. He wanted to shout to Kendell to sing louder. As she spun around, he noticed she had her eyes closed. He feared distracting her might break the spell. Good girl. Keep going. Maybe she’d hear his thought, or maybe not, but either way, he knew he was witnessing her powers in action.
The long-limbed, gangly body of Profess
or Yates joined in next to Polly. He kept far enough from the lead singer to avoid hitting her with his exuberant dance moves.
Myles turned back to face the front of the procession. Tears filled his eyes at the thought of his friends joining in on the second line out of hell. Up ahead, like a military escort, Police Lieutenant Joe Cazenave and his paramilitary troop marched in formation. Myles sighed with relief at seeing his friend wearing his police uniform. Joe had returned to the force. Whatever danger had sent the cops to Myles’s old apartment must have been cleared up. Life must have continued on without us. He wondered how much time had passed while they’d been caught in the no-time of hell.
A streetcar bell joined in with the VW bus’s horn. The number of people around the procession grew exponentially. People Myles recognized were joined by others—friends of friends—until the main street that cut through New Orleans was as full as a Mardi Gras celebration.
Through it all, Kendell kept her eyes closed as she sang and danced as if she were alone.
When the fifty-pound hellhound in front of Myles reverted to a two-pound puppy of uncoordinated black fur, he knew they were home.
18
Myles found it oddly calming to be back at the bar, serving drinks beside Charlie. The musicians onstage played cheesy ’80s covers without calling forth magic. Drunk tourists danced badly and hit on each other to avoid spending the night alone. No one in the club, with the exception of Charlie, knew about the parallel realities or the hell Myles had helped secure.
Though returning to a normal life reduced the burden of standing watch over the devil, after a week of the usual routine, Myles lost interest in the predictable banter that buzzed in his ears every night like a swarm of mosquitos. “Charlie, I’m going to knock off early tonight.”
“Headed back to the Scratchy Dog?” Charlie always could see right through Myles.
“I thought I’d walk Kendell to her gig. The girls are playing a late-night set.” Myles felt a comfort with his fellow travelers to hell that was hard to put into words.