Not long after that, the two groups of friends and the other passengers began unloading their luggage. They wished some of the passengers safe travels, each gave Angus a great big hug and one last pull of the finger, and then began walking together in the general direction of the cab stand which would finish transporting them to their final destinations. Rush and Nicco hugged Lou and tried to see if they could secure a rendezvous with Cyndi. That gave Lou and Milo a moment to say one more goodbye.
“You know how you were saying that you were trying to protect my innocence?” Lou said as she slid up toward Milo, slowly lowering her baggage in the process.
“Yes, ma’am?” he replied. He gently took her hands into his, this time not shying away, his lips widening into a smile.
“As ridiculously sweet and amazingly corny as that is, there’s something you should know.”
“What’s that?” replied Milo.
Lou drew her hands away, slipped one quickly into and out of her blouse and produced a card. It wasn’t just any card either, but the tarot card from the truck stop. With her free hand, she cupped his face, showed Milo the card with something written on the back of it, all the while pulling him closer, then kissing him deeply. Milo lost himself in the kiss, and only realized that she had slipped something into his pocket when her hand was sliding out. She drew away and smiled, picked up her belongings and announced to Cyndi that it was time to go. Cyndi gave Nicco and Rush nothing more than a hug, to the dismay of both young men, and joined her friend in getting a cab.
“Hey, man”, Nicco said after they ladies had left, “Rush and I struck out big time; how about you?”
“I think I’m just stepping up to the plate,” Milo replied. He reached into his pocket to reassure himself that the card was still there. He would keep that private for now. He and his companions called over a cab, Nicco announced their destination, and the three were on their way.
*
Milo hadn’t realized that the alarm in his watch was ringing. He had been lost in memories so deep that he had lost track of the time. Smiling, he reached into his pocket and pulled out the card. Indeed it was, looking mostly like it did the day he loosened it from that magazine with one notable exception. He turned it around to read the words Lucky for you, I’m not all that innocent!
Milo smiled sadly, remembering his wife. He was certainly lucky while he had her. She made him promise to seek happiness again, and he had. She said it was not in the cards for him to stay unhappy or alone. But he wasn’t either of those things. At 5:30 he walked down to the casino’s daycare and picked up his four-year-old daughter. She had hair the color of October, with a rich tangerine hue he knew was more beautiful than anything else in the world. When she smiled, her freckles lit up her face like a million stars, and her voice was a melody.
Like LouAnne, her mother.
25
ace of pentacles
aidan russell
Upright: Perfect contentment,Felicity, Ecstasy,Speedy Intelligence
Reversed: The evil side of wealth, Bad intelligence, great riches
Trelawny Parish, Jamaica, 1793
“Here we are at last.” Beverly stood up in the open carriage and waved a hand at the sign that read Poor Hope Plantation. Beyond the sign, the rolling Jamaican hillside, lush, green, and in full bloom, dominated the landscape until it clashed with the cerulean horizon. Splotches of lush forestry gave way to bright gardens and fields of sugarcane. And in those fields toiled the slaves.
Harriet stood with her sister to better take in the sights of her new home. For the weeks it took to sail from Liverpool to the port at Falmouth, her only view had been endless ocean and her cabin’s undecorated walls. “Oh, I can’t wait to see your home at last.”
“I’m sure you can’t wait to just be able to sit down in a home, finally,” Beverly replied. “Two years of missionary work with those savages in Africa, then a boat ride home, and another boat to bring you here. I don’t know how you ever managed, dear. I have a fit if I miss tea.”
Harriet snickered at her sister. Beverly had always been the prim older sister while Harriet had caused ceaseless trouble for their servants. Only after an exceptionally invigorating sermon did she find an outlet for her adventuresome spirit: to bring healing and God’s word to the Empire’s African colonies. By the time she returned to London, their parents had passed on and Beverly’s husband had inherited the family’s Jamaican plantation.
“With the Lord guiding our work, we learn to do without some of life’somforts,” she answered with a smile.
Beverly huffed. “Well, I hope your preaching skills have become top-notch. If you think those barbarian tribesmen were a challenge to convert, the boys will surely give you a handful.”
“I’m sure Hugh and Alfred aren’t so terrible. They’re probably just being boys.”
Beverly huffed again. “Oh, you wait.”
The crack of leather on skin broke the tranquility of their carriage ride. Harriet gasped, but Beverly knew to expect such sounds when passing close to the slave quarters. Another crack rang out, accompanied by a wail. Another wail joined in and then softened to weeping.
The carriage rounded a bend and Harriet stood once more to take in the sight before her. A woman hung from her wrists tied to a beam overhead. Streaks of bright blood contrasted sharply with her dark skin and sweat matted down the corkscrewed locks of her hair. Nearby, another slave-woman hid her face away in a man’s chest. The whip leapt out like a serpent and bit another slash across the penitent woman’s back and both women shrieked.
The second woman looked up from her brother’s shirt, spied the carriage, and came running.
“Mistress Beverly! Mistress Beverly!” she called, waving her arms frantically. The sweat and tears soaking her face reflected the suffocating noon sun.
Beverly touched the carriage driver’s shoulder and he pulled the horses to a halt. “Yes? What is it, Anika?”
Anika fell to her knees beneath her mistress. “Please, madame. It’s Leteia. You must help her, please.” The tears fell with more vigor as she offered her plea.
“What happened, my dear? What did Leteia do?” Beverly asked.
“She was caught taking milk from the kitchen. But she had to, madame, she had to. You know she just gave birth, but she couldn’t make her own milk. She had to take the milk to feed her son, so he could grow strong and be able to work the fields. Mistress, she did it for you.”
Beverly cocked her head, almost moved with a moment of pity. “Oh, Anika, if you would have told me beforehand, maybe we could have avoided this unfortunate event. Truly, we wouldn’t want Leteia’s child to grow sickly and weak, but you know we can’t allow thievery. And thieves must be punished.”
Anika squeezed her eyes tight as more tears welled beneath her lids. When Harriet spoke, a flash of hope pulled them open again.
“Please, Beverly, surely you can find some pity for the woman. Even our Lord and Savior hung as a brother beside a thief on the cross. She only did it to care for her son. You would have done the same for your boys.”
“That may be, my sweet sister, but you will have much yet to learn about how to run a plantation. No matter the reason, we can’t simply let discipline run amok. Besides, isn’t it also written that slaves are to obey their earthly masters?”
Harriet’s face screwed up as her sister threw scripture into her face.
“I’m sorry, Anika, but there is simply nothing I can do this time. Leteia will just have to take her lashes. I hope you will all learn to ask Master Monroe or myself about such issues in the future, instead of stealing from us.” Beverly touched the driver on the shoulder, the carriage moved on, and Anika’s weeping began anew.
Harriet turned in her seat and saw another brutal lash fall across Leteia’s back. The whole situation baffled her. In Africa, these people would be craftsmen, politicians, doctors, and leaders of the community. Here, an ocean away, they were property, forced to toil their lives away in service to
her own family. Harriet realized their toil had bought the new dress she wore and her passage to the New World, and the thought sickened her stomach. Her two years of missionary work had taught her that. Despite their difference in skin color, Africans and Europeans were all children of God. Here in Jamaica, however, they were not God’s children. They were things.Property.
*
What the two men lowered into the ground looked nothing to Anika and Garfield like their sister. Leteia had been lively and joyous, always smiling, laughing, and dancing. She had led the choir in the slave’s ramshackle church. Neither could believe the still, lifeless body wrapped in white cloth was their sister.
When they finished lowering Leteia into her grave, Anika, Garfield, and the dead woman’s husband approached the grave and tossed a handful of earth onto their loved one. The pastor began the customary reading of ashes and dust and returning to God’s embrace. Anika heard none of it. Her mind drifted to the memories of Leteia’s screams as the whip slashed open her back, her fevered cries when infection spread through the wounds, and her dying whispers that pled to hold her son.
The funeral rites ended and the crowd slowly drifted away, shambling back to the desolate quarters none could bring themselves to call home. Garfield and Anika stood by themselves beneath the moonlight over their sister’s grave, until a gentle hand took hold of Anika’s shoulder.
“Are you ready, my child?” the old man asked. Amos was the eldest of the slaves. Too old for labor, the Monroes trusted the white-beard to handle the affairs of slave life: settling disputes and ensuring the masters were informed of every birth and every death.
“No.” Garfield took his sister by the shoulders. “She’s not ready. I won’t lose both my sisters this night.”
Anika shrugged herself free of her brother’s grip. “I am ready.” She scrunched her face to hold back the hot tears of rage building within her. “I’m ready for these devils to finally get the justice they deserve.”
“This won’t bring justice,” Garfield insisted. “More blood won’t bring Leteia back and it won’t end our suffering.”
“You’re wrong.” Anika stepped away from her brother and stood by Amos’ side. A half dozen men and women emerged from the brush. They held torches and each had white paint smeared across their dark bodies in the shapes of skulls, ribs, and other bones. “These rich devils grow happy and fat while we become broken, starved, and sick to make it so. No, brother, blood is only thing that will change this.”
“Are you prepared to die, to sell your soul, to bring a demon to our land just so you can have your revenge?” Garfield asked, his voice stretching to a thin hope his sister would say “no”.
“This isn’t our land, brother.” Anika’s voice was flat and her face hard. Her lip quivered into a sneer as she thought of the life of injustice into which she and her people had been born. “This is their land. When we no longer must worry about dying beneath the lash, when they can no longer end our lives with a wave of their hand, then will we be able to call it home. And yes, I am prepared to die and barter with the devil himself to make that so.” She turned and followed Amos into the forest’s shadows.
They didn’t walk far. Men with hounds and muskets patrolled the perimeter of the plantation, watchful for slaves with dreams of freedom. For the ceremony to take place, it had been easier for the shamans to infiltrate the plantation than it would have been to sneak Anika out.
Torches stood watch over the clearing. Another group of shamans remained within the shadows. Robed figure with a crown of bones and feathers stood in their center. While the other shamans painted the bones onto their skin, their leader wore a skull and ribcage over his own. He saw Anika enter the clearing and beckoned her closer with a finger.
“Go. It is time. God be with you, child,” Amos whispered.
Anika took in a breath of the crisp, forest air to steel her trembling nerves and approached the sorcerer. She stopped before him and he took her cheeks in his hands, turning her face to study her. Beneath the skull, she saw him smile.
“Why have you come here?” the sorcerer croaked through his brown, broken smile.
Anika gave the question but a brief thought. She was here to make right her sister’s death, even if it meant her own. “I am here to ask the old spirits to avenge the wrongs done against my people.”
“And do you know what Ol’ Hige requires of you to regain her strength that she can remain in the mortal world long enough to exact your revenge?” Talk of witches and vengeance made the sorcerer’s smile broaden from a blade-thin crease to a crescent moon.
Anika nodded. The response did not satisfy the old man.
“Tell the old witch with your own last breaths what it is you have come to offer him. What is it you have to give that he will use to cast the spells and bring pain to those who have pained you?”
Anika nodded once more. “I offer my body and my blood.” Her voice was proud, like a martyr who reveled in the opportunity to be fed to the lions.
“And to whom do you offer your body and blood?”
“To Ol’ Hige,” she said. She took a contemplative breath while the sorcerer waited for her to finish. “To Ol’ Hige, the last witch of the island.”
The sorcerer cackled delightfully and clapped his hands. The smell of smoke and decay rolled off his tongue and twisted Anika’s gut. He stepped close to her, eye to eye, still holding his broad smile. Anika wondered for a moment if the old man had grown so tired of the swamps and trees that he was glad for her pain; glad that he could finally add some spice to his hermitic life with a little fire and a fair amount of death. Then he produced a crude knife and ran the blade across her forehead.
She gasped as she felt the sharp pain of her skin splitting and the warm, sticky sensation of her blood dripping down her face. She took another breath and settled herself. The worst of the pain was still to come.
The sorcerer gave her a questioning nod. She returned the nod. He smiled and placed the knife’s blade against her head to cover it in her blood. Then he took a step away and drew a circle in the sand around Anika’s feet. He dipped the blade in her blood once more and drew the five-pointed star within the circle, with its apex facing south. The sigil complete, he stood and howled.
The other shamans began to chant, their voices growing louder as the sorcerer howled and danced. Anika had never learned the native language of her people, so the words had no meaning to her. She was glad. She didn’t want to know what blasphemous invocation they were reciting. As foreboding began to break apart her resolve like a ship upon a stony shoreline, the chanting stopped.
The silence was a relief to Anika, but was much more eerie than the clamorous chants. High in a nearby tree, an owl let out a crying hoot. She turned and beheld a white owl, spotted with gray and black, staring down at her. The old bird leapt from its perch and glided to her shoulder. She was mesmerized by the creature’s large, black eyes and the two shared their gaze for a few breaths. Then the owl lashed out with its beak, ripped off Anika’s ear, and gobbled the flesh down whole.
Anika screamed and the owl continued to tear at her flesh. Soon, she collapsed to the ground and fell silent while the bird continued its feast. In a few short minutes, all that remained was a skeleton, blood-stained feathers, and a promise that justice would be fulfilled.
And Ol’ Hige always kept a promise.
*
“Savages are restless tonight, for sure,” Ruskin muttered to himself. He waved the lantern around to clear away the shadows from within the barn. He walked from stall to stall to make sure all the pigs had been penned for the night, and most of all, to make sure none of the slaves were hiding in the hayloft, thinking they’d sneak away that night. Ruskin smiled at the thought and patted the whip hanging from his belt.
“Six, seven, and eight. They’re all here tonight. Good. I’ll finally be able to sleep.” He turned to the barn’s door but stopped when he heard the fluttering of bird wings. “Damn pigeons; bunch of flying
rats.”
He turned to the sound and the lantern’s light spilled over a white owl, spotted gray and black, perched on a rafter. “Oh, well, look at that. We ain’t had an owl to clean up all the mice in some time, not that this place can be much clean with the pigs ‘n all.” The owl hooted, then glided to the ground, disappearing behind a stack of feed sacks.
“Eh? You catch something already?” Ruskin rushed to the pile of sacks to see what the owl had caught. When the lantern-light revealed a naked old woman lying in the dirt and hay, the overseer froze in his steps. “Hey!” he yelled. “You all right?”
The hag lifted her head and slowly pushed herself up, brittle bones popping and creaking while she stood.
“Hold on a moment, ma’am. Let me get you a blanket.” He rushed off and pulled a dirty horse blanket from a hook. He turned back and saw the old woman was hobbling toward him. With each step, the years washed away from her. Wrinkles turned smooth and her frizzy, white hair turned golden and silky. Ruskin’s eyes went wide and he dropped the blanket, no longer desiring to cover the woman’s perfect form.
She reached a hand to his cheek. Her diamond eyes so entranced the slavedriver he didn’t notice the flames engulfing her arm until they burnt at his flesh and hair.
Ruskin shrieked and the woman embraced him, her entire body an inferno. Then her fangs sank into the arteries and veins in his neck.
*
“Hugh! Alfred! Come inside this instant!” Beverly called from the manor’s front porch.
“Aw, Mother, we don’t want to stop playing yet,” Hugh whined.
“You mustn’t disobey your mother like that,” Harriet scolded.
“I don’t care if you want to stop playing,” Beverly said. “It’s getting dark and there’s a killer still on the loose. You come inside right now or I’ll send you to go pick out a switch for your brother and you.”
Never Fear - The Tarot: Do You Really Want To Know? Page 47