by King, Leo
Reggie approached the desk. “Is there anything else I can gets you, Master Russell?”
Jonathon waved him off. “No, Reggie. Thank you. That will be all. Please leave me with the detectives.”
Reggie bowed politely before heading out, leaving the three of them alone.
“You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t shake hands. The cancer that is eating me alive makes simple movements very painful. If not for Reggie, I don’t know what I’d do,” said Jonathon, taking a few moments to breathe from his mask, which made him look even more dead.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” said Rodger, shifting some in his seat. “Reggie seems to enjoy working for you.”
Dixie recognized the tactic of getting personable with someone they were about to interview, as it was a tactic she had used successfully many times before.
”Reggie is a good man. I felt bad when Gladys Castille fired him. He’s not a very useful servant, but he’s loyal and he looks after me. And at my age, I really appreciate loyalty, Detectives.”
She looked him over, noting an ornate ring with a crest on it—a red cross with a golden crown. Sorting that design away for later, she said, “If you don’t mind me asking, Mr. Russell, where is the rest of your staff? I only saw Reggie here, and there’s no way just one elderly man can care for this entire estate.”
He chortled. “My dear Detective, I don’t have anyone else on staff. I contract out a maid service and a gardening service to care for my home. I have my meals catered to me every day.” He took a deep breath from his mask and then he coughed a few times. “I don’t generally like people. Not anymore.”
“And I’m sure it’s more cost effective,” Dixie said politely, trying to keep the conversation going. “Much more so than having a full-time staff.”
Giving a short, loud snort, Jonathan said, “I don’t have any heirs or any family left, Detective. When I die, whatever I have left goes to Reggie. Why should I care how much of the Russell estate I squander?”
Dixie shook her head. Wow. What a jaded old grouch. But she figured she probably would be, too, if she were dying a slow, painful death.
“But enough talk of my short remaining lifespan,” he said, leaning forward in his chair. “Your commander told me that you have something very important to talk to me about. And Louis wouldn’t bother me if it wasn’t important. So then, what is it, Detectives?”
Dixie blinked, surprised that he was on a first-name basis with her commander.
Rodger pulled a folded-up piece of paper out of his overcoat. “I made this at the library last night. It’s a copy of a newspaper clipping of you, Vincent and Gladys Castille, and someone named Gerald Robichaux. It mentions a ‘Modern Priory.’ Do you remember that?” He passed the paper over to Jonathon.
Jonathon slid his bony fingers over the image. He smiled in a way that looked more bitter than reminiscent. “Ah, yes. Our donation to Southern Baptist Hospital. I remember that. Vincent was so happy the Priory was supporting modernized medicine.” Pushing the paper back toward Rodger, he said, “But this isn’t about a trip down memory lane, is it, Detective?”
Rodger shook his head. “No. I’ll be honest with you, Mr. Russell, we’re at a dead end with an important lead in our investigation of the new Bourbon Street Ripper.”
“Oh? What lead is that, Detective?”
Rodger leaned forward on one elbow. “We keep coming across something called the Nite Priory. What is it?”
To their surprise, Jonathon laughed, so hard in fact that he started wheezing and hacking, his eyes bulging in considerable pain and his face turning red.
Quickly, Dixie got up and helped Jonathon get his oxygen mask back on.
As he breathed deeply and calmed down, she noticed dozens upon dozens of buttons behind the desk. What the—? What are those for? She wondered if they controlled parts of the house, like the door that had just opened. She anxiously eyed the large red button, remembering Reggie’s statement about feeling bad for a burglar. She had a feeling it was not a nice button.
Once she was sure he was breathing normally again, she went back to her chair. He and this house were starting to creep her out. She just wanted the interview to be over.
“Are you all right, Mr. Russell?” asked Rodger, concerned.
“Yes, yes. I apologize for that,” said Jonathon. “But this is my own penance for my own sins. The good Lord saw fit to strike me down with an aggressive form of cancer that will, to be blunt, end my life in excruciating pain.”
Dixie was about to offer more condolences when he said, “But you want to know about the Priory. Instead of telling you about it, I’ll show you.” With a trembling hand, he pressed a button under his desk.
There was a click, then a motorized sound, and then the wall panel beside Rodger slid open. Both detectives watched as a small bookcase, framed in black velvet, rolled forward. In it were what looked like old, leather-bound tomes and dozens of rolled-up parchments. It looked like something from a monastery.
“The dark red book on the top, Detective,” said Jonathon, pointing with a skeletal finger. “Can you read Creole?”
“A little,” said Rodger, taking the book. It was as dark as blood. The cover had an embossing of the same design as Jonathon’s ring—a cross with a crown.
Dixie took note of this. Perhaps that was their emblem, a family crest.
Jonathon gestured toward the book with a shaky hand. “The page you want is where the black ribbon rests, Detective.”
Dixie traded glances with Rodger, the anxiousness on his face matching her own. The interview had officially become creepy.
When Rodger opened the book to where the black ribbon was marked, Dixie saw an intricate drawing of what looked like a group of men in black hooded robes. They were all holding chalices up toward a heart pierced by a sword and wrapped in thorns.
Rodger read slowly. “The Knight Priory of Saint Madonna.” He looked over at her. “Knight spelled like, um, a knight. You know, armor and swords. Not the way we’ve seen it spelled.”
She looked at the picture more closely. Something wasn’t right, but she couldn’t put her finger on it.
“The Knight Priory of Saint Madonna,” said Jonathon, leaning back in his chair. “Formation dates back to the founding of New Orleans.
“Originally, the Knight Priory was a group of French nobles who believed in the purity of blood as a right to rule. They believed that as some of the first founders of the Port of New Orleans, that rule was their right. Over the course of this city’s history, the Knight Priory gained complete control over the trade routes, businesses, and even its construction.”
She suddenly realized what was off-putting about the image of the hooded men. “Mr. Russell,” she said, pointing at the image, “the eyes of each of these men are hollow, lifeless. Like they’re all dead.”
Jonathon nodded. “Yes. Indeed, Detective. Very observant. You see, the Knight Priory, for all its roots in Christianity and pledges to the Virgin Mary, put considerable stock in Haitian voodoo. While homage was always given to the mother of Christ, the real deities worshipped were Papa Ghede, Madame Brigitte, and Baron Samedi, the three chief loa.”
“Loa?” asked Dixie.
“Spirits,” said Rodger, his lips tightening. “Sam called it correctly. There is a voodoo cult involved here.”
Jonathan snorted sarcastically. “Well, if this ‘Sam’ you are referring to is Samantha Castille, I’m not surprised that she would think that. You see…” He leaned forward and stared at them. “Samantha is the reason the Knight Priory of Saint Madonna isn’t the same organization it used to be.”
Dixie blinked, feeling quite lost.
“Please, tell me what happened with Sam,” Rodger said, finally sitting down again.
Jonathon again leaned back and took a long series of inhales from his mask. Then he started speaking.
“The Knight Priory was always run by the Castille family. Vincent, his father, his father’s father, and so
on. While their public face changed over the centuries to include groups such as the Mardi Gras Krewe of Comus, behind closed doors, the Knight Priory basically remained a secret order that ran New Orleans. And they—we, I should say—routinely practiced voodoo rituals.”
“Voodoo rituals? Like what?” asked Dixie. In the back of her mind, she was trying to understand how this Knight Priory related to the Nite Priory referenced by the copycat killer. She wasn’t completely sure it was the same thing.
“Oh, the usual,” he said casually, as if he were teaching a class. “Blood sacrifices of barnyard animals, maddened dancing as if possessed, and sexual rituals. What you’d expect from a Haitian religion.”
She felt yet another degree more disturbed.
Rodger seemed unfazed by that. Instead, he asked, “So what happened with Sam? You said ‘we’ practiced voodoo, so, obviously, you were a member.” The concern and urgency in his voice was apparent.
Dixie flashed Rodger a look and shook her head. Don’t get too worked up about Sam, Rodger. Sam was a suspect and Rodger was already on the edge with Ouellette. One more screw-up like he’d had with Dr. Klein and he would get suspended.
Jonathon pursed his lips in obvious pain and continued. “Indeed, I was. What happed with Sam was truly a mistake. Vincent was concerned over her health when she was younger. I don’t remember the details, but she had medical problems. Vincent had been searching for a way to help her when he learned about an African compound called the tkeeus.” The foreign word had an African-style click at the beginning. Taking another breath from his oxygen mask, he added, “Vincent was convinced that doing a ritual with the tkeeus would help Samantha’s condition.”
Dixie furrowed her brow. He was talking about a voodoo ritual with Sam when she was only a child, in a group that practiced blood and sex rituals. What in God’s name did they do to her?
She found her mind going dark places, postulating the horrible things that could have happened. Quickly pulling herself back before she could succumb to those thoughts, she said, “Well, it sounds like Vincent was doing some crazy stuff with his granddaughter. What happened?”
“Well, if you had asked Vincent, he would have told you that the ritual worked. If you had asked anyone else, they would have told you it was a disastrous failure.” He chortled morbidly.
“The ritual started just fine. But halfway through, Samantha went into a convulsion. According to Vincent, she suffered a massive seizure. Now, I’m no doctor, but I’ve never seen a seizure that would make a five-year-old girl strong enough to knock back grown men. Samantha, for a few moments, had strength no human being could possess.”
Dixie stared, completely transfixed by Jonathon’s story.
“After that night, the Knight Priory only met two more times. They met once to try the ritual with a different girl, and then they met so that the older members, such as myself, could announce retirement. After that, the younger generation took over, turning the Knight Priory into more of an underground political group and less of an occult secret brotherhood.” He coughed a few loud, hacking coughs.
“Everything I know about voodoo says that rituals are only as malevolent as the will of the people performing them, but something evil happened that night with young Samantha. Ever since then, most of the old guard like myself have been dying off from some disease or another. It’s like we’re cursed.” He took a few deep breaths from the mask. “Or maybe that’s exactly what happened. Maybe we all cursed ourselves that night.”
A light went off in Dixie’s head. An exotic incense had been mentioned in Michael’s report. He had said that soon after inhaling it, he had started doing things that would be considered superhuman. One look at Rodger, and she knew he was wondering the same thing—could Michael have inhaled the tkeeus?
She didn’t believe in voodoo or demons, either, but a drug that enhanced people’s strength wasn’t completely impossible.
“So where did Vincent find this tah-keese?” she asked, stumbling over the word.
Jonathon rubbed his chin for a long time, a contemplative look on his face. “You know, I actually don’t remember. I know he learned about the tkeeus from someone. But that was so many years ago. I’m going to have to think on that one, Detectives.”
She nodded. “We’ll follow up with you on that, Mr. Russell. I’m sure it’s important.”
“So two more questions, Mr. Russell, and then we’ll get going,” said Rodger. “First off, who was the other person this ritual was performed on? Second, the copycat killer is spelling ‘Knight Priory’ as ‘N-I-T-E’ Priory. Any idea what that means?”
Jonathon took a long breath from his oxygen mask. “The other person was one of the daughters of the housekeeper, Josephine Patterson. Don’t ask me which one, because I don’t remember.”
Dixie looked over at Rodger. She had no idea who the Pattersons were. However, when he nodded thoughtfully, she was sure he had to know.
She could grill him for what he knew about the tkeeus, the Pattersons, and everything else on the ride back.
Leaning forward, she asked, “And the other question, Mr. Russell? About someone spelling ‘Knight Priory’ incorrectly?”
To her surprise, Jonathon laughed again. “My dear Detective Olivier,” he finally said after more than a few hacking coughs, “I do believe the killer is playing the police for fools.”
Afterword
Had fun? I certainly hope so!
If you made it this far, you realize by now that the story is only partially over. The truth is that Sins of the Father was originally meant to be one book, but after several conversations with my editor and my publisher, we decided to break it into three. This is a good thing. I believe that as three books, the story can be told more completely.
Because of that, The Bourbon Street Ripper needed to end with a bit of a cliffhanger. I do believe, though, that we left it with enough conclusiveness to stand on its own merit. That said, you’ll have to wait for Book Two in order to see “whodunit.”
In all seriousness, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading my first novel ever. The moment I decided to become a writer, I also decided I wanted to start with a mystery. And I also decided I wanted that mystery to be set in my hometown of New Orleans, Louisiana. What I didn’t expect was to shelve that idea for many years, or for the idea to grow well beyond a mere mystery during that time. Least of all, I didn’t expect Sins of the Father to grow into what it has become.
So what has Sins of the Father become?
It has become several things. Foremost, it’s a thriller, a story meant to keep you on the edge of your seat, to riddle you with suspense and apprehension.
Second, it’s a mystery, and while I wouldn’t call Sins of the Father a classic mystery, the entire story has several mysteries within it. But as you can tell by now, the mysteries are more than just “who is the killer?” There is also “what happened in the past?”; “who was actually involved in what?”; and “what is really going on?”
Finally, Sins of the Father is a story of how the consequences of the past shape the situations of the present. As you likely see, there is a strong element of karma present in the story. One could say that a major theme is how things left unresolved in the past have come around full circle to haunt the present and the future.
So as you reflect back upon this book and await the conclusion, remember the following: Be skeptical of what the characters told you unless you saw it unfold yourself. Let your intuition guide you and your imagination disturb you. Keep an open mind to solutions that defy convention, but never let go of cold, hard logic.
You might just figure it out all before you get to the end. Wouldn’t that be something?
There are too many people to thank to fit on one page, or fit in one afterword. But most of my thanks goes to my wife for supporting me, my family for believing in me, my critique group for shaping me, my publisher for publishing me, and my editor for putting up with me. To anyone whom I may have forgot
ten—thank you, as well, for sticking it out with me during this amazing journey.
See you in Book Two!
—Leo King
About the Author
Leo King was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, and moved to Houston, Texas, in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina. He works during the day and writes at night, usually juggling several projects at once.
He lives with his wife, his Playstation 3s, and more stuffed lions than an adult should probably own. His education is in game development, and he often uses the structured approach of game design in developing his stories.
Find out more about Leo on his website, www.foreverwhere.com.
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More from Leo King
Sins of the Father: A Life Without Fear (Book 2)
The Bourbon Street Ripper is still at large. Three victims have met with horrific ends. With both of their partners out of commission, detectives Rodger Bergeron and Dixie Olivier must team up to track down the killer.
Meanwhile, Sam Castille and Richie Fastellos try to clear Sam’s name as the evidence mounts against her. With the mystery of the original killings starting to come full circle, the race is on to stop the copycat before another falls prey!
Available now on Kindle
Sins of the Father: Face Behind the Mask (Book 3)
The Bourbon Street Ripper is dead, and the mastermind behind him stands revealed. His end game for both sets of killings is simple: Sam Castille cannot die.
Now Sam lies in a coma as the remnants of the Knight Priory and Dr. Lazarus’ fledgling group battle over her and all of New Orleans.
Spanning five years and the intertwined lives of five characters, the explosive climax to this supernatural thriller trilogy will change the world forever!