by Erin Johnson
“Hmm.” I folded my arms and nodded. “Right. Right. And what kind of reprimand would you give him?”
Maple considered it, frowning. “A stern talking-to, I think.”
I choked down a laugh.
“What?”
“Maple, my friend, you are many things, but stern is not one of them.”
“I can be stern.” She frowned at my skeptical expression. “I can!”
I chuckled.
After a few moments of easy silence, Maple asked, “How’d your lessons with Edward the Strong go today?” I’d snuck off for a few hours of learning magic. She wiggled her brows.
“It’s not like that.” I raised my brows at her skeptical expression. “Honestly, it’s not.” I sighed. “And it’s going all right. I’m getting quicker at revealing things—but it’s still not consistent.”
Maple smiled. “You’re making great progress. Slow and steady.”
I smiled my thanks, then glanced around the tent. Most of the seats had filled by now.
“Should be starting soon.” Maple folded her hands in her lap.
I leaned over. “I still feel a little bad. Like we’re betraying Rhonda, somehow.”
Maple crinkled her nose. “I know what you mean. Do you think it’s bad? Should we leave?”
I frowned, considering it. The eerie, waltzing accordion music lent the decision extra gravity. I shook it off and laughed. “I don’t think so. We’re just watching a show, and Rhonda seemed pretty tipsy the other night. Maybe if we talked to her now, she’d feel totally different about it.”
Maple pressed her lips together. “Maybe. But she seemed pretty upset.”
“Ladies and gentlemen!” A small, round man in a vest, with a pocket watch bellowed at the top of his lungs over the accordion music. “Take your seats! The marvelous, the miraculous, the mysterious Madame Zerna shall begin her performance shortly.”
His announcement was met by an eager murmur from the crowd. Maple and I settled in, and within minutes, the show began.
The candles in the chandeliers extinguished as one. Gasps from the crowd filled the complete darkness that followed. Maple’s hand found mine and I gave it a squeeze. The eerie accordion music continued, softer now, and in the center of the tent a dozen candles flared to life.
It took my eyes several long moments to adjust to the near darkness, but soon I could make out Madame Zerna. A winding turban bedecked with a feather hid her blond hair, and a brocade velvet cape draped over her shoulders and round form. She sat facing us at a low table, the heavy dark tablecloth pooled about her feet.
Atop the table sat a deck of tarot cards, a crystal ball filled with a glowing, swirling mist, and a candelabra of black candles. Behind her a small cast iron stove heated up a bubbling cauldron. The liquid inside glowed green and sent up crackling sparks now and then. A familiar scent, sweet and clear, rose up from the cauldron.
“Cedar.” Madame Zerna’s voice cut across the hush over the crowd. “For banishing malevolent spirits.” She lifted a jar high for the crowd to see, then extracted a handful of soft, fuzzy green leaves.
“Mullein.” She tossed them into the cauldron and more sparks glowed up toward the rafters. Maple squeezed my hand harder. “For communication with the dead.” From a corked ceramic jar, she pulled a spriggy, green weed. “Wormwood, for summoning spirits and assisting them with manifestation.” This, too, she tossed into the cauldron, and the green light emanating from it grew more intense.
From a small tin, Madame Zerna swiped a fingerful of a creamy amber balm. “Myrrh oil for augmenting my powers.” She anointed her forehead, cheeks, and wrists with it. Finally, she scooped up a china teapot and dipped it into the cauldron.
To the hot, green water she added a sprinkling of dried leaves. “And Mugwort tea, for talking to the deceased.” She swirled the tea in the pot, then poured it into a teacup and sipped it. “Let us begin.”
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, then let it out. Her eyes flew open. “Can we cut the accordion music?” It stopped on a dime. “How many times did I say…” Madame Zerna grumbled to herself as she closed her eyes again and raised her palms over the teacup.
Green steam curled up into her face. The dark tent took on an herbal smell, and with her face lit from below with green light, this was the first time magic had felt like what I’d imagined—a witch muttering over her special potion. Suddenly, a white circle drawn on the stage around Madame Zerna and her table glowed brightly, strange runes and markings shining all around it.
“Spirits of the dead, it is I, Madame Zerna. If any of you wish me to communicate a message to someone in this tent, speak now! Speak, so that your loved ones may know peace.”
Chills rippled up my spine and the back of my neck. Maple leaned closer to me, and though her shoulder brushed mine, I could only barely make out her outline in the darkness.
“I’m getting something. Yes. Yes.” Madame Zerna lifted her face. “Is there a John DeLee in this tent? A John DeLee?”
A man’s voice from across the tent called, “Yes. I’m John DeLee. Is that my Cate?”
Madame Zerna wafted the green steam into her face and closed her eyes. “Yes. Cate’s here.”
“Cate!” the man sobbed.
My chest tightened as my heart reached out to him.
“Cate says she knows. She’s happy in the Otherworld, and she wants you to move on. It’s time.” A pause followed, and Madame Zerna’s brows drew together. “She—she says to feed lettuce to someone new.” Madame Zerna shook her head. We were close enough to hear her mutter, “I don’t know what freaky stuff you’re into John, but—”
“Oh Cate. Cate, I want to move on,” John cried from the darkness across the tent. “But no turtle could ever match up to you.”
A murmur rippled through the crowd. “A turtle?” someone cried.
A turtle suddenly floated above Madame Zerna. Aside from the hovering, the green aura that limned its edges clued me in that this was a ghost turtle. Incredible. I gaped up at it. I’d never seen a ghost before.
“Next!” someone yelled.
“I want to speak to my wife!” shouted another.
Apparently, I was the only one impressed. Madame Zerna slammed her hands down on the table, startling the tent into silence. “This isn’t a democracy, I decide—Oh!” She gripped the edges of the table and lurched forward, the feather on her turban hovering above the teacup.
“A new spirit wishes to speak.” Her voice dropped lower and she groaned. The candles on her table guttered. “A powerful spirit. Too powerful, a portent of death! I cannot hold him!”
Madame Zerna threw her head back and screamed. Maple and I screamed as well, clutching each other in the dark. Shouts and shrieks rose up from around the tent as Madame Zerna shouted, “I see! I see! I see my own death! I shall be murdered!”
Maple whimpered and I hugged her close, my stomach tight with fear.
“Soon, the pale man with eyes ringed in black and a skull upon his throat shall cut me dead!” She slashed an arm through the air, cutting through the green mist which now hung around her in a haze.
She turned her wild, wide eyes to the audience. “You all are witnesses to this premonition of death.” Her chest heaved and she pressed a hand to her heart. “The pale man with a skull upon his throat shall murder me!”
The lights cut out completely, veiling the tent in utter darkness, cut by the screams from the crowd.
9
The Saw
Late the next morning, even Wiley’s obnoxious comments couldn’t take my mind off Madame Zerna’s performance the previous night. Hardly aware of what my hands were doing, I stacked muffins on the tray, readying the tent for the first wave of human tourists. I’d even gone to Edward the Strong’s caravan earlier and about five minutes into our lesson, he’d sent me back to the booth, saying I needed a break today. I’d begrudgingly returned.
I’d hoped to avoid Wiley for longer, plus I wanted to get better at m
agic. But he was right. I’d hardly slept the night before. Even though Maple had to be in the castle early the next morning, she’d spent the night in the tent Amelia had conjured up for us while we worked the baking booth.
True to Amelia style, the white tent with colorful bunting, wrought iron beds, and magically locking tent flaps was stylish and top of the line. Neither of us had slept though.
I knew Madame Zerna’s performance was all an act—wasn’t it? There’d been something about it though, the way she’d predicted her own murder and the lights going out after, that didn’t seem planned.
“I mean, she’s cute and all, but if Maple thinks cute’s gonna make me listen to her, she’s got another thing—” Wiley huffed. “Are you even listening to me?”
I looked up from the muffins to glare at him. “I’m trying my hardest not to.”
A scream sounded in the near distance. I froze, then glanced at Wiley, who looked back at me, wide-eyed. Another one came. Definitely a woman screaming. “Stay here and watch the tent.”
I skirted around the long table and dashed off toward the sound of the screams. Wiley jogged along next to me.
“I said to stay with the tent.” I threw my arms up.
He mimicked me. “And I didn’t listen.”
Mick, the canal ride guy, joined us, along with several other carnival workers who’d been setting up nearby.
“I think it came from over there.” A lady pointed down the pier.
As we jogged down across the wooden planks, looking left and right, a loud groan sounded.
Mick pointed. “Came from Scullivan’s tent.”
We dashed over to the white-and-black-striped tent, smaller than the main one in which Madame Zerna had performed the night before. Mick pried at the tent flaps, but they wouldn’t budge.
“They’re enchanted shut.”
I glanced over at the railing and remembered what Maple and I had seen, crouched behind the bench the other night. “There’s a staff entrance around the side.” I waved for the others to follow and led the way around the side of the tent to the back. I paused for a brief moment at the flap that announced Staff Only, then pushed through.
I stepped into a dressing room with a vanity and mirror and lots of stacked trunks and racks of clothing. To my left, another flap led into the main tent. I shoved through, followed by Wiley, Mick, and several others.
I gasped and pressed a hand to my mouth.
“Sea snakes,” Wiley breathed.
Mick turned and vomited on the ground.
I stared at the center of the tent, toward the low stage. There, Madame Zerna lay dead, cut in half on the “saw the lady in half” table. I gagged, though there wasn’t as much blood as I would have expected. That’s me, always looking on the bright side.
A short figure stood in front of the table, holding a bloodied saw in one hand. My stomach clenched, and for once I felt grateful for Wiley’s presence as he drew his wand and barked to one of the other carnival workers, “Send up the signal for the police.”
Slowly the figure turned, and unease brewed in my stomach. Shards of cobalt glass crunched under red-and-white high-top shoes as they shuffled along the straw-covered ground.
“Rhonda?”
The seer grimaced and dropped the saw. It clanged about her feet and got buried in the bloodied straw. Rhonda twiddled her fingers in a wave. “Heyyyy, Imogen.”
10
Prison
My legs burned as I hiked up the streets of Bijou Mer to the royal grounds. After we’d discovered Rhonda standing over Madame Zerna’s body, one of the workers had launched a magic signal, similar to fireworks, alerting the police to a death. Inspector Bon and his officers had swept through minutes later.
As they carted a struggling Rhonda off, she’d thrown her head back and peeked at me out of one eye. “I’m getting a vision, I totally am. I see you coming to visit me, Imogen. I see you helping me! Help? Please?”
I shook my head, trying to clear away the image. For the next couple hours, I’d answered police questions, and then left Wiley in charge of the tent. My stomach tightened as I climbed to the royal road and its more even cobblestones. I fully expected the tent to be on fire by the time I returned.
I let out a little sigh. At least Iggy had promised to keep Wiley in check.
The guards at the gate recognized me and let me in with waves and hellos. I lifted my hand in a half-hearted wave, back. “Hey, Fred, can you point me toward the prison?” Not every day I uttered that phrase.
I followed his directions right, away from the forest and the palace. I trekked down a sloping path through a thorny bramble patch, and then stopped at a portcullis. The iron grate barred a tall, arched entrance into a fortress made of mud-colored stone. I could see an open-air, two-story courtyard beyond, with rows of cell blocks.
“State yer name and business, ma’am.” A guard with an eye patch sat behind a barred window next to the portcullis.
“Uh, Imogen Banks. I’m here to see Rhonda the Seer. Are visitors allowed?” I jerked a thumb back toward the way I’d come. “If not, I’ll just—”
The guard looked up from scanning a scroll of paper. “Yer name’s here on the approved visitors list. Let me get ye a badge.”
“Oh. Good.” My stomach dropped. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to see Rhonda, I did. I just… didn’t want to see her in a prison. And not just any prison, but the prison where I hoped to avoid seeing a certain couple of people.
The guard unlocked a little side door next to the iron grating, and I followed him in. He locked it quickly behind me and then led the way across the courtyard. We startled a flock of seagulls into taking flight and circling round the fountain in the center, then climbed a wide, steep staircase up to the second story.
Men and women yelled out to me, others sobbed, and still others played cards through the bars in neighboring cells. My one-eyed guard nodded to other guards we passed, stationed along the corridor. We made a left, then a right, moving away from the courtyard, deeper into the fortress.
“We keep the murderers in the murderers’ wing,” my guard grunted.
I nodded, trying to hide my dislike of the place. “Right. Makes sense. Got to stay organized. Wouldn’t want to put them in the cat stranglers’ ward or the baby punters’ dungeon.”
The jailor glared at me with his one good eye. Tough crowd.
My stomach tightened with anxiety as we stood before a long, narrow hall, with raucous cells on either side. As we started forward, arms shot through the bars and grasped at me. I tried to keep my eyes focused straight ahead. Though noisy and crowded, the place was actually tidy and clean and smelled of straw.
“Imogen?”
My stomach plummeted at the familiar voice. I turned, reluctantly, and found Nate standing at the bars to his cell. He gripped them and stepped closer. “It is you. You’ve come to visit me. I knew you would. I knew you felt it, too.”
“Er.” I scratched at the back of my neck.
The jailor looked from me to him to me again. He turned, muttering, “Awkward….”
Nate’s handsome face fell, his chin covered in a dark beard. “You are here to see me, aren’t you?”
A cackle, coming from a couple cells up on the other side of the hall, cut through the din. “You are so dumb.”
I looked up, but already knew who to expect. Pritney, somehow still looking sophisticated in her linen prison uniform, leaned against her bars. Her blond locks were piled on top of her head in a loose bun, with tendrils falling in just the right places. Seriously, how did she do it?
Nate scowled at her, then turned to me. “I don’t blame you for not wanting to see me. I don’t. I’m sorry.” His thick brows lifted in the center. “I know I lied, but if you understood our cause, you’d see I’m not a bad guy.”
I stepped away from him. “You’re a murderer.”
“So is your friend,” he hissed, his face turning red and furious. I recoiled, and his chest heaved. His face so
ftened. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. It’s just—I still have feelings for you. Don’t you see, we could be so good together?”
I shook my head, backing away, and followed the jailor up the hall. Nate continued to call after me, and I did my best to drown him out.
As we passed Pritney, she sneered. “You think you’re safe now, don’t you?” She pouted. “Pritney and Nate are locked up and now I can snuggle down, safe in my bed.” She dropped the baby voice. “But you’re not, Imogen. Horace is coming for you, up in your golden palace and—”
“Oh, hush it!”
I darted forward the last few steps to Rhonda’s cell, the last on the left. She leaned against her bars and called down to Pritney, “Spoiled rich girl.” She shook her head and rolled her eyes. “Stop being so dramatic.” She turned to me. “Oh thank the sea goddess, you’re here. I’m literally dying in here—literally!”
So much for not being dramatic.
“Here yeh are.” The jailor motioned to Rhonda. “Enjoy your visit with your daughter.”
My what? I looked around. Did I have a child I didn’t know about?
Rhonda raised her brows and opened her eyes wide, giving me a play along look. “So good to see you, Mom.”
The jailor waggled his brow at me (the other covered by the patch). “You know, you twos looks like yous could be sisters.” He winked.
At least I think he did. Winking was a lot less effective with an eye patch.
He took several steps down the hall. “I’ll give yeh some space.”
I nodded my thanks. Not that anything in this hall could be particularly private with everyone watching and listening—but the din of shouts from the other prisoners did hide our conversation somewhat. I stepped up to the grating to Rhonda’s cell. “What is going on?” I hissed through clenched teeth.
She whispered, “I figured they’d only let immediate family in, so I put you down as my mom.”
I stepped back and scrubbed a hand across my eyes. How did I get involved in these things? I dropped my hand and leaned back close to her as she gripped the metal slats. “Well, Rhonda, that might be believable, aside from the obvious.” I gestured back and forth between us.