I took stock of my situation as I stood outside my parents’ home with them ensconced safely inside, unaware of the danger mere feet from their doorstep. I prayed to whatever gods were out there that Mimi and Rufus were wrapped around each other so deep, they would never hear a whisper of what was about to happen in their front yard.
Then I went for my blade, and I knew it was predictable, but I had to try. She parried my move with one of her own, slapping my hand with her knife right across the tops of my fingers and splitting the skin. I pulled back in shock and pain, startled by the attack, desperate to regain my footing and take control of the situation, mostly because I needed to get her away from this house and very very far away from my parents.
“Uh-uh-uh, Miss Landry,” she hissed and laughed and addressed me like she knew me. “I’ve got you surrounded. No more funny stuff. Another move like that and this knife is going right through your pretty gut.”
I cast my eyes around and felt other beings, strange and ethereal, wisps of their existence shuddering through me, before I saw them. And then, as if they wanted to be seen, the shadows took shape and came to life and where she and I had been alone, we were now surrounded by at least twenty others.
She stood just outside the parameters of the reflection in the window, a purposeful position I was sure that forced me to shift slightly right to catch a glimpse of her. Long dark hair, huge kohl-lined eyes, thin lips slashed in a scowl, and a long, lean body poured into skintight black leather. Tall imposing controlled. Everything about her exuded lethal power and spitting hatred—for me personally or my kind in general, I could not tell, but it rolled off her in waves she bathed in it the black putrid funk clung to her everywhere.
What did not cling to her was a chill.
Veda Mathew, I could only assume.
And the dreaded Black Copse.
“I’ve already been assigned.” I spoke into the window and caught her glare. “You are not my Keeper. You aren’t even a Keeper, Veda.”
A flash of fire roared across my back as a razor-bladed whip tore through the skin and my scream filled my belly throat lungs but I held it in because releasing it would attract my parents and I could not risk their well-being twice in one lifetime. So I corralled the pain and agony to fit within the confines of my skin, allowing it to reach my extremities but go no further. I watched as she stepped toward me, two long-legged strides, then she fisted my hair in her hands as she pulled me close.
“Aren’t you a smartie? I know I’m not your assigned Keeper, Juma,” she whispered in my ear as I recoiled from her warm breath. “If I was, you would be long dead by now.”
“That’s assuming you could catch me,” I retorted and immediately regretted my temper and inability to shut the fuck up as she dug her nails into the shreds of my back and pulled. This time the scream burst forth from my lips at the same time she grabbed me around the throat and covered my mouth with her hand.
“Shut up. Now,” she warned and I marveled at her brute strength, her arm like a vise around my neck. “I would hate for your mum and daddy to pay the price of their daughter’s inability to behave.”
“No.” I shook my head and fought her grip despite the fact I knew resistance was futile. She had me right where she needed me, my most vulnerable position, all of my strength thrown off balance and effectively irrelevant. I cursed my more sentimental self, the woman caught up at that window weeping for her folks and her lover and herself, so lost in all the nevers and stolen moments of her lives that she failed to notice the small army amassed within her reach.
“Relax, Juma,” she continued as if we knew one another and that intimacy more than any of the violence already committed against my body infuriated me. “I’m not here to make a scene and I certainly do not want to kill those beautiful old souls inside that house upon which you so lovingly gaze, but keep it up and I will and it will be ugly. I will release you when I am good and ready. Understood?”
I stopped moving and glared at her in the window and she laughed, the sound full of venom and devoid of life.
“No wonder Dutch loves you so much.” She shot me a look and winked. “You are a freaking firecracker. Isn’t that how you people say it down here?” she asked without really wanting an answer, more just enjoying the sound of her own voice. I couldn’t help but watch her in mild horror. I was little more than a toy in her game of cat and mouse with her brother. She didn’t want anything from me, she just wanted to fuck with Dutch.
“Wipe that look off your face, Juma,” she sneered and released me, so quickly shifting moods, “or I’ll do it for you.”
“What do you want, Veda? Why are you here?” I asked as I wiped my bleeding fingers on my jeans, never taking my eyes off her as I wondered to myself how I came to this place, how I landed in the middle of this twisted and vile war with The Gate. Caught between life and Death and Dutch’s crazy baby sister.
I knew the answers mattered little but I asked the questions anyway, for the irony of it all, the sheer fuckery as Dutch would say, was impossible to ignore and worthy of at least a few moments of reflection.
“Honestly”—Veda grinned like she was about to let me in on a big secret—“I really just wanted to play a joke on you, yank your chain a bit, but then I got here and you’re acting quite fierce and calling me Veda before I had a chance to properly introduce myself, and you just kind of messed up everything.”
And where her eyes had been dancing, they now shaded over and all of her appeared rather menacing and cold.
“I so badly wanted to keep going with the charade.” Here Veda pronounced it sher-ahd instead of sher-aid, sounding so like Dutch and yet more unlike him than I could have ever imagined because for all his dark and dangerous black devastation, at least he had a soul—his sister most definitely did not. “But I could tell you didn’t. Uh-uh, not you, Juma.” She shook her finger at me. “Super serious Juma. Still, it’s such fun saying Dutch’s name around you. Even if you did ruin my good time with your know-it-all attitude, your expression when I mention him makes your lack of personality a forgivable sin.”
Veda laughed at her own joke and I couldn’t help but wonder: If this was Dutch’s sister, what on earth was his father like? And instead of worrying about myself and what I needed to do to escape the horribly sick woman standing before me, I got lost for a few seconds in sadness and remorse for Dutch because bless his heart he’d turned out as loving and gentle as he did with this one as kin.
“God, I love your eyes when I say his name.” She held her sides and the shadowy beings partially hidden by the night seemed to come to life. “So shocked and full of horror that yes, this woman, this thing cutting and carving me for no bloody reason, is the sister of my lover.”
With those words she stopped laughing and had I thought her sinister before, in silence Veda was terrifying, as I could almost hear the crazy underneath the surface of her skin screaming for its release desperate to run wild and I could only wonder at how long she could hold it in control it keep it together. She began a slow circle around me with hands on her hips and eyes agleam, studying me, taking me in, and calculating whatever equation of crazy she developed during her very purposeful analysis.
“Quite honestly, Juma,” her voice filled the night air again. “I had no idea my brother had a loving bone in his body, so full of gloom and doom is that one, still upset mummy and daddy killed his girlfriend.” Veda rolled her eyes. “And then, poof! here you come with your fuckable mouth, because I know he’s shoved his dick between those full lips of yours—what man wouldn’t—and perfect tits, gorgeous face, and what I can only imagine is a pussy made of gold, and you’ve got my brother wanting the world to bow down at your feet.
“The feet of a goddamned disgusting Poocha.” She stopped in front of me and looked down, her eyes full of unadulterated hate. “Is that it, Juma? Or is there something up here as well?” She tapped the side of my head with her forefinger and although I detested her touching me, I didn’t dare move.
“Is your mind as captivating as your body?”
I remained silent in the face of her question, assuming that if she desired an answer she would say as much. Veda wanted nothing more than to hear herself speak and torture me before ending my life. I knew this and so did she.
“Has Dutch told you about the dining room at Kowdiar Palace?”
She gripped my chin and her fingernails cut into my cheeks as she glared at me and abruptly changed the subject.
“No, he’s mentioned very little about his childhood,” I replied.
She rolled her eyes but did not release her grip on my face.
“Of course he hasn’t. Poor tortured sweet Dutch, always bemoaning his very existence despite the fact he was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and the power of The Gate at his fingertips.” She spat and released me. “Daddy cannot stand his carrying on.”
My blood ran cold as the word daddy slipped from Veda’s lips and lingered in the space between us.
“What do you want with me?” I asked again after several seconds of silence.
“Which explains the dining room and Daddy and his tools,” Veda continued as if I had not spoken, “because honestly, there is only so much caterwauling one can stomach before strict punishment must be delivered. And no one delivers a good punishment like Daddy.”
I looked down at my feet and cringed. I knew where this story was headed and it was nowhere I wanted to follow, but I felt I would be given little choice. I considered my location and my surrounding environs and how well I knew the terrain. It was as familiar to me as the lines on the back of my hand, it was dark, and—for the unknowing—downright treacherous.
“Look at me, Juma, when I’m speaking to you.” Veda slapped me on the shoulder with the flat of her blade. “Do not disrespect me,” she warned, continuing. “I’m trying to give you some insight into the man you love, I would think you’d pay attention, right?” She glanced around at her crew for support, her gathered group of yes men.
“Now, where was I?” she asked and put on a little performance as if trying to gather her thoughts when she and I both knew exactly where she was and what she was about to do. “Oh yeah, I was going to tell you about your boyfriend and his affection for the dining room table in the main dining hall. You’ve never been to the Palace so you don’t know that there are several smaller dining halls and then the private one for my family’s use. The room is stunning, high ceilings”—and here she waved her arms high to evoke the expanse—“and large windows overlooking the lake, custom cabinetry and the most gorgeous china collection I think I’ve ever seen.
“Mummy has a thing for china and buys pieces whenever she travels.”
I cocked my head to the side in the darkness, my head awash in disbelief at Veda’s casual tone, her familiar body language, as if she and I were girlfriends and she was giving me the goods on her older brother’s best friend.
“But what steals the show in that room is the centerpiece that draws your attention as soon as the doors open—the table. It’s huge and ornate, with beautiful carvings of Lord Ganesha and his rats, and some of the most memorable, delectable meals have taken place upon it.”
Veda’s eyes twinkled and danced as she relayed her memories, seeming both genuine and facetious at the same time and because I didn’t know her, I couldn’t tell whether she was indulging in the art of double-speak or if her words were truth.
“Interestingly, Daddy also had it fitted with these leather cuffs on either side of the table, spread about six feet, two inches apart from each other”—and here she returned to her deadly self and my stomach churned with dread—“they’re perfect for all those times James—may god rest his weary soul—would catch Dutch and bring him back to the palace for some reconditioning, as Daddy likes to call it.”
I watched as a broad smile curved Veda’s thin lips and I wished she would just kill me and get it over with because I knew her words were going to do much more harm than any violent act she would commit against my body.
“Does Death recondition her Poochas?” she asked with sincerity. “Does she have special punishments for you when you step out of line?”
“I’m not sure,” I began but she waved me off and I fell silent.
“Even if she did,” Veda continued, her tone still quite casual and almost friendly, “I doubt she is a master of technique like Daddy. Most folks comment on the way Daddy works a knife, but honestly, my favorite part is the strap-down. Just after the body—and let’s be straight here, when I say the body, I really mean Dutch—has been tossed onto the table, all bloody and disgusting, Daddy makes his first pass, methodically placing each of Dutch’s ankles and wrists into a strap. I love listening to the metal clink as the straps are pulled tight and Dutch’s breathing becomes slightly increased because my brother knows what’s coming and even if he pretends he’s not full of fear and loathing, I can hear all of it in his breath.”
She paused and allowed her poisonous words ample time to ferment and rot and work their way into my psyche, all the while smiling beatifically, as if she found some inner peace in the laying of her story at my feet. I wanted to run before I learned more of the horrors Dutch endured at the hands of his father in that room of beauty and art and perversion and death but everywhere my eyes flashed in desperate search of escape, Junta stood.
“Daddy has a special set of knives he had made just for reconditioning that he keeps in a sideboard near the table, rolled in this beautiful red velvet case with a butter-soft leather lining, and he loves to take his time opening it, moving the roll in such a way each instrument clinks against the other, making this magical sound that’s like music and yet not.” Veda paused and caught my eye as if to make sure I was paying attention to each and every word she uttered. “But you want to know what the real magic is, Juma? The real magic is the way Dutch always turns his head at the sound of those knives and watches Daddy study each one as he decides which to use. From the bulging tendons in his neck, I get the feeling Dutch doesn’t want to look because he doesn’t want to know what’s about to happen to him but he cannot help himself. He must watch and after watching, he knows and he tries to appear brave, like he doesn’t give a fuck because he’s the great Dutch Mathew and nothing scares him, but I’ve been in that room and I’ve listened to his screams and his pleas and his cries for help as Daddy is carving him up like the animal he is and I will be the first to tell you, I know exactly what scares him.
“My daddy and those knives scare him.”
Veda opened her mouth to continue, reveal something more horrific than what I’d already learned and what she enjoyed repeating in such loving and rich detail, but my soul had room for only so much darkness and she had tipped me past my filling point. I could not stomach another syllable of the torture unleashed upon that beautiful man I loved more than life itself, so I did the only thing left to do: I ran.
Straight into the path of one of those shadowy beings—one of The Black Copse, I assumed—standing to my right and I did it on purpose because I knew Veda wouldn’t expect it and it was my best shot at killing her and making it to the neighbor’s backyard, over their fence and into the creek. If I could make it to the creek and run north, I would hit the woods, and easily escape, mostly because I knew the area and Veda and her team did not.
Only they did.
Or at least one of them did because even though I killed that shadowy thing with ease, there were at least ten others waiting for me in the pitch black of the far corner of the neighbor’s yard. Right at the point where I would catch the creek, they laid in wait. I managed to kill six of them, but in all fairness, there was nothing fair about a ten-to-one battle. I was valiant and deadly and gave as good as I got until they got me better.
And then she joined the fray.
“Oh fuckity fuck, this is going to be fun.” Veda laughed as she approached from my rear and slashed once twice three times before she sliced her blade through my back and pulled up, gutting me right next to the tiny water
way I splashed in as a kid, my blood mixing with the water and flowing downstream.
Like I said, the bitch had superhuman strength—killing me was nothing.
“You made me do this, Juma,” she whispered in my ear as her knife sliced through my heart and lungs and my mouth filled with blood as my life drained into that creek and red clay and all of me became one again, returned in a most inhospitable manner to my Georgia roots.
“You were going to do it anyway, Veda.”
And here she laughed and it sounded genuine and I hated her for it.
“This is what I love about you, Juma. You are wickedly smart because you’re right. I was going to do it anyway,” she agreed. “Fuck yeah, I was going to do it.”
28: DUTCH
I stood outside the Landry home for what felt like hours but was probably just a few minutes and I wondered to myself, what the fuck next, Dutch?
As soon as I’d arrived in Atlanta, Grant had hit me with news of Veda and The Black Copse and the look on his face made me stop and maybe reconsider all of Avery’s cautionary words. I still wasn’t sold on big, bad Veda and her cast of psycho killers, but I could admit the possibility existed I needed to give her a second thought, maybe look into her doings a bit more, find out what the fuck she’d been up to as of late.
And if I wasn’t such an asshole, that would have been the moment I took two seconds to text some sort of apology to my closest friend and confidant, but I was an asshole, so I didn’t bother apologizing to Avery. Instead, I immediately ran a perimeter search of the city, checked in with every Dosha in the area, ran another perimeter search because I was an anal fuck and did things like that, and when I turned up nothing but sightings and affirmations that yes, Veda was in town but no, she didn’t say why, I wound up here: 218 Sycamore Terrace.
Juma Page 18