Beneath the Black Moon (Root Sisters)

by Fine, Clara

  She watched as Brent glanced curiously around the clearing, staring at the makeshift homes, the altars where herbs were burned, Mattie’s collection of bones and the colorful charms that hung from the branches of a dead tree. The scent of herbs and conjure wafted from the largest hut, which stood right on the bank of the creek. Brent coughed and turned to look at Cam. “Did you say that they’re friends of yours?”

  “Yes.” Cam told him. “Wait here.” She followed Louis across the clearing to Mattie’s home.

  “What?” Brent sounded concerned again.

  “Or don’t.” Cam called back to him. “You don’t have to wait for me. But be polite. This is their home.”

  “I’m always polite,” Brent said, and Cam had to bite her lip at his bemused tone. Given that he had been raised in Philadelphia, it was entirely possible that he had never encountered rootworkers before.

  Welcome to my world, Mr. Anderson.

  When Cam entered the cottage, Mattie Deveraux was seated in a chair by her cold hearth with her eyes closed and her hands resting under her chin. If Cam didn’t know better she would have thought that the woman was sleeping.

  The cottage looked much the same as it always did. Mattie Deveraux owned few possessions that weren’t somehow related to her conjure. Her clothes, curtains and bedding were sewn with charmed thread, and the only metal in her house was protective silver. It was nice to see a home where the evidence of conjure wasn’t hidden away, like in Cam’s kitchen.

  “Hello Cam,” Mattie Deveraux said at last, opening her eyes. She was a tall, thin woman with a wiry build, high cheekbones and startlingly white teeth. It had to be the conjure that kept her teeth that way, for Cam had never seen anyone else in their fifties with teeth that perfect. When Cam had first met Mattie she’d expected the woman to be wildly exotic looking. But Mattie’s clothes were quite plain, apart from the colorful scarf that she wore wrapped around her head. Her black skin wasn’t marked with any colorful symbols, and she wore no jewelry.

  “Hello,” Cam said.

  “You’ve brought someone with you,” Mattie said, gesturing for Cam to sit.

  Cam seated herself in the chair across from Mattie. “Brent Anderson.” She explained. “It wasn’t my intention but…”

  “Anderson…” Mattie repeated thoughtfully. “Oh, yes, the newcomer.” She spoke slowly but clearly, and she always seemed somehow distanced from the situation at hand, as though her attention were divided between earthly matters and visions of some other world. She had lived in New Orleans far longer than her son, but for some reason her accent wasn’t as strong.

  “I was coming to see you about supplies,” Cam said in a hushed tone, even though Brent wasn’t nearly close enough to hear anything that was said. “But Louis mentioned that you wanted to see me.”

  “Yes.” Mattie said simply. “I sent him to fetch you yesterday, but there was some social gathering at your home and he couldn’t intrude.”

  So it was Louis who had been watching her yesterday. Cam wished she’d known at the time; she wouldn’t have been so alarmed. But it was very unlike Mattie to send one of her sons out of the forest. Something had to be afoot.

  “Something’s wrong, isn’t it?” Cam asked.

  “Yes. Someone is doing evil.”

  “Evil conjure? Who?”

  “Not any of my people,” Mattie said. She leaned forward, staring intensely at a spot in the middle of Cam’s forehead for a moment. Cam blinked uncomfortably as Mattie searched for something in Cam’s aura. “And not any of yours,” she concluded finally and leaned back.

  “Who does that leave?” Cam asked. “There are only so many rootworkers in Gaynor County. I can’t think of anyone else.”

  “There must be someone else,” Mattie said. “I haven’t sensed this much malevolence since 1839.”

  Cam shivered.

  “Didn’t you sense anything?” Mattie asked.

  “We… had some idea,” Cam said. She didn’t mention Mary’s vision. Mary’s talent was one of the few secrets that Caro hadn’t shared with Mattie. They trusted Mattie and her family, but not all of the people that Mattie worked with. Mary’s skill made her far too valuable. If word got out about her visions, she could find herself the target of all sorts of conjure.

  “Hm. Tell Caroline and your grandmother that I will share anything I learn with them.”

  ‘Thank you,” Cam said, rising to leave.

  “That’s not all.” Mattie added.

  Oh lord. Cam sat back down. “More bad news?”

  “Not necessarily,” Mattie said. “Right now it’s just news.” She hesitated and Cam’s heart fluttered. “The Varennes girls are coming home.”

  Cam gripped the arms of her chair, feeling as though she’d been splashed with ice water. “Kat’s daughters?” She’d had two little girls just a few years old when she’d been murdered. They’d been off at boarding school for years. Cam hadn’t seen them since she was a child, and even then their paths had rarely crossed.

  “The very same,” Mattie confirmed.

  “Could they have anything to do with what you’ve been sensing?”

  “Whoever I’m sensing is here right now. The Varennes girls won’t arrive for several weeks. Anyway, I doubt they’ve been trained in our ways. They weren’t even old enough to talk when their mother died, and they’ve been raised by their father’s family.”

  “We were small when our mother died and I’ve learned,” Cam said, standing up to pace across the cottage. “We don’t know who has had access to them since Kat died. Just because their father’s family raised them doesn’t mean they haven’t had contact with their mother’s family.”

  “Cam,” Mattie interrupted. “I told you so that you wouldn’t be shocked when you saw them, not so that you could be distracted by them. There are more important matters at hand.”

  Cam blew out a shaky breath and came to stand in front of Mattie. “Yes,” she agreed, but secretly she knew that it would be a long time before she adjusted to the idea of Kat’s daughters returning to Gaynor.

  “Now,” Mattie said, reaching into her pocket. “I trust that your schedule is free this evening?”

  “The usual time and place?” Cam asked, fighting to keep her thoughts from Kat’s daughters.

  “Yes. Here’s a list,” Mattie said, retrieving a crumpled piece of paper from her pocket. “Burn it when you’re finished with it.”

  “Of course,” Cam said, scanning the items briefly before folding the paper and stowing it deep in her pocket. “We shouldn’t have any trouble.”

  “Martin will be there to meet you, as always,”

  “Very well,” Cam said. “Goodbye.”

  “Cam.” Mattie called her. “Be careful. There’s a black moon next month.”

  A black moon was the opposite of a blue moon. A blue moon occurred when there were two full moons in the same month. When there were two new moons in the same month, the second was called a black moon, and it was said to be an unpredictable night of great power. Cam’s mother had died beneath a black moon.

  Cam licked her lips, feeling chilled. “I will.”

  Mattie nodded and turned away, her eyes closing again as she relaxed in her chair. By the time Cam was stepping out of the house, blinking rapidly in the sunlight, Mattie might as well have been a million miles away.

  Brent was waiting for her not far from the door, with Martin, Mattie’s older son, watching him closely. Martin wasn’t as outgoing as his younger brother Louis, and he didn’t appear too pleased by Brent’s presence.

  “Cam,” Martin greeted her as she approached Brent.

  She smiled and waved, caught the unasked question in his eye and nodded her answer. She and Diana would be there when the clock struck two hours past midnight.

  Brent glanced between the two of them, sensing their familiarity and ease with each other, and seemed to relax a little. “We’re going now?” He asked.

  “Yes.” Cam paused to wave farewell to Louis,
who was chopping wood on the other side of the clearing.

  “Why did you come here?” Brent asked as they walked back into the forest. The atmosphere between them was different now. It had been ever since he had grabbed her and stared into her eyes just before they were interrupted by Louis. Cam was uncomfortably aware of him, of his body, and her own felt sensitive, almost inflamed. It would probably have been a great deal worse if Mattie Deveraux hadn’t just imparted so much bad news. As it was Cam felt nervous and distracted.

  “I brought Mrs. Deveraux— medicine,” she said quickly, catching herself before she said ‘food’. Brent would have known immediately that was a lie, because she had given the entire basket of food to the Charmon family. “I had a bottle in my pocket,” she told him.

  “She’s ill, then?” Brent asked. Was it just her imagination, or was he walking closer to her than he had been a minute ago? Cam stepped to the side, practically off of the path, to stay away from him. She needed to think clearly. She was very close to escaping Brent. She hoped to lose him at the cemetery. Her mother’s grave was the last stop of the day.

  “Not exactly,” Cam said. “One of the other people in the clearing is.”

  Brent nodded agreeably and then pinned her with his stare. “They are rootworkers, aren’t they?”

  Cam stopped so quickly that she nearly fell flat on her face. “Excuse me?”

  “Practitioners? Whatever they call themselves,” Brent said. “You know what I mean.”

  “W-where did you hear about that?” Cam asked.

  “Gaynor is full of gossips,” Brent said matter-of-factly. “I’d never heard of such a thing before now, but apparently it’s some sort of religion.”

  “Not exactly,” Cam said. She didn’t want to tell him too much, but she also didn’t want to overdo her pretend ignorance. He was far too sharp. If he thought that she was trying to steer him away from a certain topic, he’d be certain to keep coming back to it. “Some practice it as a religion. Some don’t. Some have combined it with Christianity.”

  Her own grandmother was mostly Catholic; just as Solange had been, but she also practiced conjure. Caro appeared to have combined Catholicism and voodoo into a single religion, but she leaned more towards the Conjure. Cam was technically Protestant, like her father, but most days she felt more Catholic, thanks to her grandmother’s influence, and she had been working with roots since she was a small child. It was a highly personal thing, and was frequently different for each person.

  “Why do they call themselves that?”

  “Rootworkers? Because they use roots and herbs,” Cam said.

  “Like witches.” Brent said, and there was an interested gleam in his eyes.

  “Not at all like witches,” Cam told him, although she could see why he would draw the comparison. “They also use everyday items, like playing cards or mirrors. And most of the time conjure is used for good purposes, for health and protection. Well, so I’ve heard.” She added quickly. The last thing she wanted was to give him the impression that she actually had first-hand experience.

  “Conjure?” Brent asked, his eyebrows quirking.

  “Another name for it.” Cam said.

  “But it could be used for ill?” Brent asked.

  An image of the burning carriage house filled Cam’s mind. “Yes,” she told him.

  “To hurt people? Even to kill them?”

  He was probing too deeply and making her nervous again. “Theoretically,” She slipped into her vapid belle voice in hopes of drawing him away from the subject. “You seem to be getting a little carried away, Mr. Anderson. Isn’t there anything else you’d rather talk about?”

  “Brent,” he corrected her with a grin. “And don’t ever speak like that. It makes you sound like Miss Taversly, and I like you far better as yourself.”

  Cam turned quickly to face him, trying to discern whether he was joking or not. If not, he had all but admitted to liking her better than Marianne… was such a thing even possible? She’d just taken him to every hovel in the forest, including one inhabited by family full of ‘witches’. She couldn’t help but think that he had to be longing for ordinary girls like Marianne. His expression was very convincing though. How did he do that? When he looked at her he made her feel as if she was the most precious woman in the world.

  Perhaps Brent Anderson had some conjure of his own.

  “What about to make people ill?” He asked. This time his voice was quite serious.

  “Theoretically, yes,” Cam said. “Why are you so curious?”

  Brent turned to look at her, smiling slyly. “Why do you know so much about it?”

  “I grew up here,” Cam told him, feeling a little more confident when she caught sight of the cemetery’s picket fence in the distance. “There are some things you can’t help but learn about if you grow up in Gaynor.”

  “Hm,” Brent said. “Then why do I suspect that Marianne Taversly, for instance, doesn’t know anything at all about any of this?”

  “Why do you keep bringing up Marianne?” Cam asked him right back.

  “Because she is your polar opposite in all things.”

  “Oh,” Cam couldn’t help herself, and the corner of her lip quirked up in the pleased smile. “Whether you meant it that way or not, I’ll have to take that as a compliment.”

  “It was intended that way,” Brent told her, and Cam felt as if she was glowing.

  Get a hold of yourself, Cam, he’s only buttering you up for information.

  “Well,” Cam said as they emerged from the forest and began to climb the hill on which the graveyard stood. “I’m afraid this is the end of our journey. I am perfectly capable of going alone from here.”

  “You’re going to the graveyard?” Brent asked with a frown.

  “Yes,” Cam told him softly. “And I require privacy.” For more reasons than one.

  Brent hesitated. He couldn’t exactly argue with that. What kind of a man would force his company on someone who wanted to visit her mother’s grave alone?

  I’m free of him. Cam thought with relief. Free of his captivating stare, his questions, and heat that flooded her at the mere sound of his voice.

  “As you wish,” he told her, and they bid each other farewell at the church gate, under a sky that was beginning to darken with clouds. Cam did not allow herself to watch Brent walk back down the hill, but instead lifted the latch on the cemetery gate and let herself inside. Gaynor Hill Cemetery was a soft, peaceful place, a sharp contrast to the painful, fiery death that Solange had suffered. Wide rows of white tombstones stood in the shade of tall oak trees. The oldest grave markers, which dated to the late 18th century, were obscured entirely by green ivy. A white marble angel stood in one corner of the cemetery, weeping stone tears into a shallow pond. Behind the pond a stand of weeping willows rocked in the breeze. The church itself was small, pretty and unremarkable, but there was something comforting about the graveyard.

  Cam stood for a moment under the oaks. She could see her mother’s headstone out of the corner of her eye, and it was as if it beckoned her. She hesitated for a moment and removed an empty glass jar from the pocket of her skirt. She glanced around to make sure that she was definitely alone, and then stooped to grab a fistful of soft Mississippi earth. Graveyard dust was the richest and most powerful dirt. It had the life and souls of ancestors in it and empowered the hands that touched it. When the jar was full and her hands smelled of rich, warm earth, Cam went to her mother’s resting place.

  ***

  Unseen, Brent stared at Cam from just within the forest. She made a striking picture, all alone in the cemetery on the hill, outlined against the clouds and watched over by a lone raven in one of the graveyard oak trees. He was still contemplating all that he had learned on their walk, but one thing he didn’t need to mull over was the way that he responded to her. Besides his ever growing attraction to her, which had made their walk together almost painful at times, there was something about her that captured his imagin
ation. She tried so hard to stifle her natural vitality, to react to his questions the way that she thought she was supposed to, but she fought a losing battle. There was no stemming her fury or stopping her smiles. If he studied her closely enough, every emotion was there, easily read from her eyes. What he couldn’t understand was the source of those powerful emotions. He couldn’t imagine what caused her fear or what gave her that faraway look in her eyes.

  He knew she had secrets, that much had been obvious to him from the beginning, but what he couldn’t understand was how everything fit together. He felt instinctively that she was somehow involved in what was happening to Hattie, but he couldn’t imagine how to connect the two of them. What he did know was that he wanted her. It was an irresponsible and selfish desire given the circumstances, but he wanted to touch her, to talk to her, to lick the secrets from her skin and listen to her whisper late into the night. For now, his priority had to be his dying sister-in-law, but he couldn’t let Cam go either. She touched him too deeply, stirred him too powerfully.

  ***

  That night, Cam didn’t let herself fall asleep. She waited until the clock struck an hour past midnight and then climbed out of her window and crept across the balcony. She stopped when she reached her sister’s darkened window. Nerves made her hands shake as she reached up to tap the glass, using just the tip of her fingernail to make the slightest of sounds on the pane. There was no response, so Cam tried again, tapping just a little bit louder. Finally, on the fourth tap, the curtains were pushed open, so quickly that for a moment Cam worried her father had discovered them. But no, it was Diana who stood on the other side, already dressed, candle in hand. Cam beckoned quietly to her sister, who set the candle down and promptly unlatched the window.

  “Are you ready?” Cam asked.

  “As I’ll ever be,” Diana confirmed drily, but there was a gleam of excitement in her eye. They made these errands every few weeks, bringing supplies to Mattie’s son Martin, who was in charge of stocking a hideout where escaped slaves were hidden until they could make the perilous passage north to freedom. Cam and Diana had never actually been to the hideout, nor had any contact with the escapees, but they brought food that Caro and Grandma squirreled away in the kitchen. They had been running these errands since Cam was fourteen and Diana seventeen. It was one of the few things in their life that hadn’t changed after Diana’s scandal. It was also one of the few things that they could do to take a stand, since they had no political standing and no finances of their own.