Emma appeared to barely be “in there.” She had a thousand-yard stare and all the color had left her face. She looked like despair, in the flesh.
“I’m sure Calista or somebody has told you about my power, right? Yes?”
Emma blankly nodded.
“Good. So you know that I could have transported Merritt immediately into any hospital, any emergency room or operating room on the planet.”
“Don’t listen to her, Emma,” I insisted, reaching across the table and taking my hand in hers.
Zillah laughed again. The sound of her cackle would haunt me for the rest of my life, which didn’t seem like it would be a very long time.
“Instead, I sat with her. Right there by the side of the road where she, and the back of the car, had landed. It took twenty minutes for her to die, Emma. And all the while, I kept telling her that it was your fault. That you were to blame. For her mother, and her father, and for what was happening to her.”
Josephine was weeping, Calista eyes burned with such rage I thought her hair might fire, and the lizards listened dispassionately. Emma squeezed my hand like it was a piece of driftwood in the middle of the ocean.
I choked back vomit.
“She begged. Begged me to call 9-1-1, to get help, to help her mommy and daddy. It was pathetic.”
The room was silent but for Josephine’s sobs. Calista reached across and rubbed her back. Emma’s eyes were fixed on the table and she shook her head slowly from side to side. I was completely numb.
“Now, I have another question, Emma. And don’t feign stupid. I know you know. Where is the Confederate gold?” Zillah growled. “And if you choose not to tell me, I’m going to hurt someone. The man who saved you. And the rest of his mermaid and merman clan. I don’t want to have to kill them all, Emma. I really don’t. But whomever helped you has to be made an example of. So, do the rest of them a favor and give me a location.”
Josephine composed herself at the mention of mermen and looked at Emma with her reddened eyes open wide. Emma met her gaze. Zillah caught the unspoken communication between them and she turned toward Jo.
“Josephine Berkshire. Do you have anything you’d like to add? Or do I set about exterminating all the mermen and mermaids in the Lowcountry?”
Josephine said nothing, and Zillah sighed. “Oh well, can’t say I didn’t try. I’m very disappointed. In all of you. Most of all you, Briar. You had the chance to join us, to exact revenge on the woman who stashed you in that godforsaken group home, but you turned it down.
“Wallace, do what you wish with those two,” Zillah said to the largest of the three lizard men, in reference to the two Marth Lou’s employees. “And she’s yours as well,” she continued, pointing at Josephine. “The rest of them will come with us to Stoneberry. Shall we?”
Zillah pushed in her chair and walked back toward the front door, signaling for the masked girl to be guided up and out of her booth and for the rest of the procession to follow her outside.
“Miss Martha Lou? Dr. Ibis calling on you, Ma’am.”
The voice from outside the door froze everyone where they stood or sat.
“If any Belle speaks, you all die here and now,” Zillah warned. She moved into the booth behind one of the employees and pressed a cold blade to the cook’s throat. “Answer him. Tell him you’ve closed early, to come back tomorrow. Do it now!”
The man Zillah had called Wallace, the apparent leader of the lizard men, cocked his head toward the door. “Let us have him. He’s off Frogmore. He won’t be able to overcome all of us.”
Zillah weighed her options.
“No. Not today. Not unless we have to. He’ll be dealt with in due time.”
Dr. Ibis rapped on the door with his hand. “Miss Martha Lou, my stomach’s just a’ rumbling, and it would do my heart a world of good to see your smiling face.”
Zillah commanded the restaurant’s chef and namesake to reply as she’d instructed.
“I’m sorry, Doctor, you’ll have to come back tomorrow.”
He paused for a moment and then spoke.
“Alrighty then, I’ll go and see Miss Juanita at the Fish Hut. Give my regards to your daughter and that no good rapscallion husband of yours,” Dr. Ibis cackled, a sound that faded as he walked off.
We all slumped as our hopes of a rescue seemed to vanish.
“Very good. We’ll wait a few minutes before we go, let that good doctor get far away from here,” Zillah said. She removed the knife from my neck and moved toward the door to peer through the window. I rubbed the spot instinctively.
“Can you smell him?” Zillah asked Wallace. His forked tongue flicked all around his face as he turned his head slowly from side to side. He shook his head.
In deep thought, Zillah looked over her hostages. “Send Tyrus outside to check. Human form only.”
The lizard standing nearest us grunted and reverted back to human, pulling his hoodie back on. He unlocked the door and opened it slowly.
No sooner was it cracked, when he flew backwards, slamming against the far wall, where he slumped to the floor. A cloud of dusty gray smoke billowed from the doorway.
Zillah drew her blade and both men left standing assumed reptilian form, on high alert.
Suddenly, a voice bellowed from the back end of the restaurant, followed by an assortment of items being scattered on the floor, thrown by an unseen hand.
“By the bones of a black dog, the shell of the sea turtle, the stem of a snapdragon, and the root of High John the Conqueror, I bind you and all of your foul reptile clan and cast you out! Return to Scape Ore Swamp! For as long as I shall live you’ll not leave the borders of Lee County without pain enough to make a rattlesnake bite feel like a cool breeze on a hot summer day!”
Dr. Ibis was shouting, his voice taking on a commanding tone. Somehow, he’d materialized at the rear of the restaurant, stepping out of the men’s room and casting his hex. Immediately, the three lizard men began to shriek, holding their heads. The nameless one gathered Tyrus from the floor and they both fled through the front door, over Zillah’s protests.
“Kill him! Fight through it and kill him! You’ll break the spell and end the pain!”
Wallace advanced on shaky legs toward Dr. Ibis, who looked surprised at being challenged.
Calista and Josephine stood up and tried to get between Wallace and the doctor, but the hulking lizard shoved them both aside effortlessly. Calista banged her head on the table and collapsed back into the booth.
I watched as Dr. Ibis reached onto a pouch at his waist, rubbed his hands together with a substance he drew from the bag, and then he opened his palm and blew a cloud of yellow smoke into Wallace’s face.
Blinded, the giant slashed wildly at the air where Dr. Ibis stood. The wizened old man ducked past the clumsy attack and started toward Zillah, who was standing next to the mystery hooded girl who had yet to make a sound. Knife in hand, Zillah grabbed the top of the mask and pulled back, exposing the girls’ slender throat.
With a quick, sure slice, Zillah slit her throat, letting her slip to the floor beneath the table. She then took the knife and threw it, with aim honed over centuries, dead center into Dr. Ibis’s forehead, where it sunk in deep and true.
The root man dropped to his knees and then face first to the floor.
“No! No, no, NO!” Josephine screamed, and Zillah bounded out the door.
“Stop her, Briar!” Emma yelled, and I flew out of the booth and toward the door. I hit the parking lot in time to see Zillah sprinting toward a tree at the edge of the gravel lot, scant moments from reaching its shadow and sure escape.
Rage filled my soul and I extended both hands, desperately trying to summon my power.
And… nothing.
Zillah hit the shadow and her lead leg disappeared. A flash of almost silvery blonde hair trailed her as she vanished into her private dimension –
Until she didn’t.
She fell backwards, yanked violently from the shadow
s, thrashing wildly, filling the air with an agonized scream.
“You will not!” Calista’s voice bellowed from behind me.
I turned to see her, holding a towel to her head to staunch the flow of blood, leaning on the railing by the steps. I watched in astonishment as the thick trunk of the tree next to Zillah snapped and the top half flew across the street, landing next to a convenience store. Cars slowed and stopped, and sirens could be heard.
I approached Zillah and saw that she was suffering desperately. Calista’s power had pulled her back, but mine had put her down.
Bones pierced the skin on her arms and face, and she gurgled and gasped in a growing pool of her own blood.
I knelt down and reached out to touch a radius or ulna that extended perpendicular to her forearm.
Looking back over my shoulder, Josephine, Martha Lou and her daughter, and Emma stumbled out into the daylight. Calista and Josephine embraced.
“Dr. Ibis is okay. He’s having a moment,” Emma said, as she brushed past her two sister Belles, arriving near me.
Dropping to one knee, Emma leaned down close to Zillah’s face. “I could help you. I could take away all the pain.”
Zillah grunted and groaned unintelligibly.
Emma and I locked eyes and I shook my head from side to side. She nodded in understanding. We rose and joined the other Belles.
“Does she have a chance?” Calista asked.
“Slim,” Emma answered.
“None,” Calista corrected, and we watched as a cinder block from near the dumpster at the edge of the parking lot soared through the air and unmercifully finished off Zillah March.
Squad cars flew around the corner, filling the small parking lot, blocking Dr. Iris’s blue Nissan XTerra and our Range Rover.
Officers began to pour forth from their vehicles when they suddenly stopped in their tracks.
They were all frozen. Time had stopped.
Leave now. Rendezvous at Montagu.
The words filled our minds simultaneously, the work of Aleta.
No one will recall having seen any of you here this afternoon. Hurry, I can’t maintain my hold on this many minds for very long.
Josephine had gone back inside to retrieve Dr. Ibis, who’d evidently survived his head wound thanks to my twin. He was still shaky, leaning on Jo for support, as we arrived at the cars.
“Calista, let me help you. Your head…” Emma suggested, but Calista refused.
“Later for me. You ride with Dr. Ibis. Make sure he’s okay. I’ll be fine.”
“Briar, can you drive us?” Josephine asked, tossing me the keys to Dr. Ibis’s XTerra. Emma slid into the backseat with him to continue ministering to him.
“Sure,” I replied. I was in a bit of a haze. Shifters, spells, trees snapped in half with a thought… all of this was the realm of fantasy or science fiction, certainly not part of my boring life. Waitressing at The Dixie Garden and browsing Netflix between a series of bad Tinder dates was about as exciting as my life was supposed to be.
While we were getting loaded up, I watched Calista open the back of the Range Rover with her mind, and the body of the girl Zillah had killed came floating through the air and gently came to rest in the back of Calista’s SUV.
I pulled out onto the road behind Calista when questions flooded my mind.
“How does all this work? I mean there are, like, actual lizard people running around. And one still inside the restaurant?”
“Aleta took care of Wallace,” Josephine explained. “Have you ever seen the Men in Black movies?”
“Sure,” I replied.
“There are detectives on the police force here who sort of ‘clean up’ after any messes left by any paranormal activity,” Josephine continued. “They’ll see that Wallace’s body vanishes before it ever reaches the morgue. The two who Dr. Ibis chased out are well on their way back north to their swamp. If they’re spotted somewhere, it’ll make the news and then disappear from the headlines in a day or two. They don’t want the National Guard descending on Scape Ore Swamp. They don’t want to be bothered.”
Mostly satisfied with her answers, I nodded and looked out over the steeples and sunny streets of Charleston, amazed that so much was happening that so many of the college students and tourists we passed were blissfully unaware of.
“How are you feeling?” Emma asked Dr. Ibis in the backseat.
“Finer than frog hair split four ways, Miss Emma. This old man thanks you more than he has words to say.”
“We should be thanking you,” I said. “If you hadn’t come along when you did…” I got choked up and found it difficult to continue. Just then, I felt a warm rush from Josephine’s proximity, and the stress of the day’s events dissipated. “Anyway, we were all very lucky.”
Dr. Ibis chuckled. “Oh, sweet child, the spirits led me right where I needed to be. You just need to know how to ask, and they’re happy to help.”
We arrived at Montagu to find Aleta Indigo on the front porch in a simple blue dress that on anyone else would look nice, but on her made me feel like a turnip.
No one on the street can see any of you. Aleta spoke directly into my, and I assumed everyone else’s, mind. Come inside. Virginia’s waiting.
We made our way up the rickety steps and Aleta embraced each of us in turn, hugging her uncle the longest and hardest. She held him at arm’s length and looked him over, letting him pass only when she was satisfied with his condition.
Calista trailed behind, the hooded girl hovering behind her.
An ashen Virginia hugged each of us, wiping fresh tears from her cheeks. She led us into a sitting room surrounding a large table on which Calista brought the body to rest softly.
Aleta opened our minds and we were all connected, filling in Virginia instantly on the confrontation and aftermath at Martha Lou’s.
Calista telekinetically loosened the knots holding the mask in place and slipped it off, revealing a young girl of no more than fifteen, with black hair and olive skin. If I had to guess, I’d say she was Native American. Beneath the mask, she’d been gagged.
Around the room, each of us shook our heads. None of us recognized her.
“Doctor, is there anything you might do to communicate with her spirit?” Virginia asked, the first time she’d spoken aloud since we arrived.
“This ain’t the ideal place for such a conjure, but I may be able to help, Miss Virginia.”
He had us sit down, leaving him alone with the body. He produced a pouch from a satchel slung over his shoulder and sprinkled it around her body as he circled her. He muttered unintelligible words under his breath as he worked.
“This would be better if we had a white goat,” he said, and Aleta nodded knowingly. He pulled a single, long feather from his bag, dark and wide with a white tip. Still whispering, he ran it up and down her body, almost touching her, but not quite. Once he’d completed his incantation, Aleta rose and struck a match, setting the feather aflame in Dr. Ibis’s hands.
He held the burning feather in his open palms, rubbing them together when he finished. With his index finger, he traced the ashes around the girl’s mouth and left streaks in the form of a rough symbol on her left cheek.
“Before you rest, give the answers we seek. Under authority of Doctor Buzzard, I bid you speak.”
A soft, disembodied female voice filled the room, speaking in a language that was completely foreign to me. I exchanged puzzled looks with my twin.
“Aleta, are you able to understand her?” Virginia asked quietly.
“Yes. She’s speaking Yamasee. She’s terrified. Jo, can you help me?”
Aleta stood next to the body, holding the dead girl’s hand. Josephine held Aleta’s free hand and placed her other on the body. Dr. Ibis stood near the girl’s head, whispering his spell.
“Her name was Huata. Huata Nest of Owl. She’s from… Oh, this isn’t right at all. She’s the grand-daughter of a great shaman. She was brought here from…” Aleta closed her eyes
in concentration. “She was taken from her people. There was a war… somehow she was transported through time. Oh, okay, that makes sense. She had a gift… she could block powers. It wasn’t something she did consciously. It’s why none of you could use your powers at Martha Lou’s. She’s being pulled… I… her grand-father is here… he’s trying to pull her across the water. Uncle, let her go… her grand-father is… Oh!”
Aleta fainted straight away. Dr. Ibis bent down and whispered to the girl on the table, then stood up bolt straight, as if he’d been struck by lightning, clapped his hands twice, and collapsed on the floor next to Aleta.
“Should I…?” Emma asked, standing up.
“No,” Virginia replied. “They just need a moment. That was very taxing for them.”
Josephine rubbed Aleta’s shoulder and helped her to her feet.
Dr. Ibis stood up next, stretching his arms over his head and then shaking out his hands. “Miss Virginia, if I could be alone with Huata, I can make her passage more comfortable. Help guide her to her grand-father.”
“Certainly. Take all the time you need. Belles, let’s go into the dining room.”
We gathered around the long, oak table in the dining room. Josephine went to the kitchen to get drinks for everyone.
“Did you say that girl is Yamasee?” Emma asked.
“Yes,” Aleta answered. “That’s what she called herself.”
“And you mentioned a war, right? That must have been the Yamasee War.” Emma looked around the table, only to be met by blank stares.
“Go on, Emma,” Virginia prompted.
“I have to thank my mom for this, of course, but the Yamasee were sort of a confederation of tribes in Georgia and South Carolina, down into Florida. They had their own language and everything. They banded together to try to drive out European settlers and traders, in the early 18th century. The Yamasee War was when pretty much all the Europeans in the Lowcountry had to retreat to the fort at Charles Towne and fight for their lives. Around 1715, if my mom drilled it into my head correctly. By the end of the 1700s, the Yamasee had been routed and scattered, and their language was all but extinct. Some linguistics professors would love to talk to you, Aleta.”
Southern Charmed (Hell's Belles Trilogy Book 2) Page 10