by Mari Freeman
From the looks of it, Trent was out cold. She was afraid to get too close to him. What if she lost what little control she had over her urges? Goddess only knew what her Demon would do if it were close to an injured Trent Nicholas. Save him, fuck him? In his injured state, she might have the urge to take a big ol’ bite out of his hide. She didn’t know what her Demon would do, but whatever it was, it wouldn’t be helpful.
It was up to her to recover the box. She took two large breaths. The easiest thing to do was go with her Demon, let it chase. She would deal with the aftermath if she caught the Vamp. She followed the path the girl had taken. Her feet beat hard on the graveled walkway. She sniffed. The air was hot and thick with Louisiana humidity.
The Vamps smelled of old meat, which made them easy to track. Nell caught up to her near the front of the cemetery. She wasn’t moving very fast. Judging by the huge gash Nell spotted on her side, Trent got in one good blow. The Vamp spun on Nell, fangs showing, but her hiss was halfhearted. The pathetic thing wavered in her stance as if drunk. She looked tired, her face far too young. Maybe too young to have been turned.
Nell felt a wave of empathy. Crap.
The surge of emotion brought on an instant shift. No intention. It was a natural reaction that was part of the Halfling curse. Little control over the Demon. Shit.
She found herself face-to-face with a starving, threatened Vamp, in her much-weaker human form. The girl lunged forward. Her attempt to attack was as pathetic as Nell felt at present. With no effort, Nell dodged out of the way and the Vamp rushed past her and ran shoulder-first into a tomb.
The withering Vamp grunted as she tried to regain her balance. With what strength the girl could muster, she flung herself at Nell, this time falling against her, bear-hugging Nell and hanging off her like a worn-out boxer. She was light and bony in Nell’s arms. She held her aloft, trying to lift the Vamp back to her feet.
Struggling to even to raise her head, the Vamp hissed again. Nell chuckled in amusement. The insult bolstered the girl, who mustered a bit of energy and struck at Nell like a snake, grabbing her shoulders and snapping at her neck. Nell’s own arms trembled with weakness.
Nell concentrated and managed to summon what little she had left to thrust with her Demon power. Bricks from a nearby crumbling tomb flew straight up. Not what she had intended. There was no control over the speed or direction of the flying blocks.
What goes up, must come down—and come down it did. A shower of bricks and mortar rained down on the two of them.
A large brick crashed hard on the Vamp’s back. She squealed and tried to turn her face away, letting go of Nell. Another connected with the crown of her head. Nell stumbled backward, only taking a hit to the leg as debris fell. The Vamp dropped the pack in an attempt to protect herself. She made tortured keening sounds as she stumbled backward.
The reeling, emaciated Vamp tripped on loose gravel and momentum carried her to the ground. She slammed onto her back. Her head made a loud cracking sound as it connected with the edge of one of the tombs. Gargling noises escaped her throat as her eyes closed.
Nell stood still, listening, letting her body settle from the changes and the thrust of telekinetic power. Her breathing slowed as she concentrated on calming down.
Her hands and knees hurt from the stretching and twisting of her skin and bones. Her shift was subtle, but it was still a shift. She clenched her fist to soothe the sore muscles. Dried blood dirtied her fingernails. She turned her head to each side to stretch her neck. The Vamp still lay unconscious. Good thing it was starving. Nell wouldn’t have had a chance against a Vamp otherwise.
Everything was quiet. Too quiet. The pack lay by the Vamp’s side.
Nell took two small steps toward the Vamp, prepared for the possibility of the creature playing possum. She nudged her with her foot. Nothing. The Vamp was out cold. She’d survive if someone came along and shared blood with her, but she was a bag of bones for the time being. Nell grabbed the pack. The Council could clean up this mess.
Convinced she was still not alone, Nell moved from tomb to tomb, sticking close to the darkened shadows. The button had popped off her shorts when she’d shifted and she held them closed as she headed back toward Trent, being cautious in case the male Vamp was lurking around the city of tombs. Hopefully Trent was looking for her by now.
The tombs looked like little spooky haunted houses in the moonlight. She heard shuffling noises and crouched in a shadow beside one of the big community tombs. The noises got louder but she couldn’t see what it was. She moved through the rows until she finally caught a glimpse of two men ushering an unconscious Trent toward the front gate. They looked much healthier than the sickly Vamps who’d attacked them. Nell couldn’t take the chance. If they were Vamps, she had no more power to fight their strength. If they were Weres, well…she was still as weak as a kitten right now. All she could do was follow.
One of them broke through the chain that held the front gate closed and they headed down a side street. Trent’s arms hung limply over their shoulders as they carried him like a drunken friend. Nell had to hang back to prevent being seen. After two blocks, loud music drifted into the night. They were taking Trent into the heart of the French Quarter. She needed to catch up before she lost them in the crowds milling about, celebrating and drinking hurricanes.
She lurked in recessed doorways and alleys, trying to stay within a block of the trio. As soon as they turned onto Bourbon Street, Nell ran. If she lost them now she was in trouble. Far too many alleys and courtyards existed in this city.
Once she got to the corner, she could pick out the threesome only a half-block up. The revelers would work to her advantage now. She moved through the crowd of diverse tourists with relative ease.
The men maneuvered Trent around groups of tourists stopped in the middle of the street to drink or catch beads tossed from the balconies and galleries that lined Bourbon. There was a particularly large crowd of young men gathered outside one of the cathouses. A dark-skinned stripper stood on the sidewalk outside a bar called the Cat’s Meow. Her bright pink g-string and itty-bitty bikini top left little to the imagination. The shapely woman turned her back to them and shook her ass in a jiggling invitation to come in and see the rest.
One of the spectators stepped back, directly into Nell’s path. Since they were both watching the stripper instead of where they were going, they collided. The force of it made Nell falter and the pack slid off her shoulder. He managed to catch her and keep their collective balance.
Still holding her shorts closed, Nell tried to keep a grip on the pack. The reveler attempted to help her slide the pack back over her shoulder and Nell clutched it protectively. The guy backed up a step. “Sorry, babe,” he said, and then his face flushed when he looked back at the stripper and realized Nell knew the cause of his clumsiness.
Nell nodded and pulled away, gripping the pack. The trio was still heading off down Bourbon Street. She barely saw them duck behind a hotdog cart and rushed to catch up.
When she reached the corner, they were nowhere to be seen.
She spun back to the busy street, scanning in case she’d been mistaken. No sign of them. She headed down St. Anne, looking through cracks in the large gates that hid courtyard gardens and alleyways. She hurried down the three blocks to Jackson Square. She circled around a large group of tourists waiting to go on a Vampire tour of the city. If they only knew.
She’d lost them.
The sensation of panic and loss rushed through her body like a surge of adrenaline. She clenched her fist, feeling the burn of the moth’s brand, and started back up the street. If something happened to Trent, she didn’t know what she’d do. The thought of losing him made her stomach hurt.
Exhausted, she sat on a bench in front of the huge Catholic church that overlooked Jackson Square. Two men were playing a sad jazz melody on trumpets a dozen or so feet away. Nell suddenly felt very alone.
She needed help. The Council was her best choice.
Right now she’d gladly turn the box over to them if they’d help her find Trent, but she knew she’d never find the secret entrance to the clandestine meeting place on her own. She opened Trent’s pack, searching for a clue. She reached beneath the wooden box that was the cause of all this trouble, hating the sickening feel of the blood magic it contained.
She pulled out two t-shirts and some deodorant. Her own backpack had been lost in her change and fight with the Vamps. She fished deeper into the pack. His phone. She opened it, only to discover the screen asked for a password. Shit. She tried the very few things she thought might work—his birthday, his name and the numbers of his street address. No luck. She pressed the numbers that corresponded to her name. Not surprisingly, that didn’t work either. She tossed the phone back in the bag.
She leaned back and looked up into the darkness. Nothing left to do but follow the only other clue she had. The box. It held a Voodoo talisman and she was in a city rich with Voodoo history. Nell flung the pack over her shoulder and headed back in the direction she’d come.
The front gate of the cemetery was still busted open, the lock and chain useless on the sidewalk. She slipped in and headed back to where the attack had commenced. The feeling of being watched or that she wasn’t alone was absent on this trip through.
Luckily, her pack had been left behind by the nasty Vamps. She fished inside the front pocket, relieved to find her wallet still there. At least she had a change of clothes and some money.
The wall of vaults that held the secret passage to the Council’s meeting place looked to be exactly what it was—a thick, concrete wall full of tombs. Where Trent had been heading to find the passage, she had no clue. Bodies were left in these things for a year to deteriorate. No way was Nell going to try to open any of the vaults to check for tunnels. She followed the wall around to the backside. More brick and stucco. No indication of a door or passage.
Using her fist, she banged on a small, round area where the stucco was missing and the brick looked loose. The muffled noise wouldn’t carry very far. “Hello?” she said aloud, but very low. She didn’t want to attract any more attention of the Vampiric kind.
This is stupid, she thought. The Council wouldn’t give a crap about Trent even if she could get in. All they’d want was the box and once they had it, Trent would be on his own. It was up to her to find him. Boy, he’d love that.
She exited the cemetery the way she and Trent had entered, over the wall, just in case there was someone back at the front gate waiting for her.
* * * * *
Sweat was running down the back of Nell’s shirt as she sat at an iron table outside a closed café. The place was deep in an alley off the major streets of the Quarter, giving her some sense of safety. She fumbled with getting minutes on the pay-as-you-go phone she’d purchased from a corner grocery. She’d bought the phone, a bottle of water, some Cheetos and a soggy turkey sandwich wrapped in cellophane.
She ate half the sandwich and all the Cheetos. The oppressive feel of the dark magic was wearing on her, making her stomach queasy. She wiped sweat and dirt from her face with the Wet-Nap she’d gotten from the deli counter then changed her clothes so she didn’t look like a street urchin.
She wondered about Trent as she combined the contents of both packs into one. Sorry she let the thought in, Nell imagined the worst—Trent dead and at the bottom of the Mississippi river. Closing her eyes and picturing him angry and chastising was much better. She needed to fix this. It was all her fault. She tossed the dirty shirt and damaged shorts in a trash bin on her way out of the alley. Time to move. And who she needed to find would be in a quieter part of the Quarter.
It had been years since she’d been here. She’d visited the city with a wicked-fun Sorcerer named Avery who had known the area and all its nonhuman inhabitants. That trip had been a party. Drinking and dancing with his coven, jazz music all night long in a back-alley courtyard. Waking up to cool breezes on the banks of the Mississippi river.
Nell trusted her instincts and let her internal compass lead her toward the river for a few blocks. The well-kept house fronts gave way to homes with bent, rusted wrought iron and broken boards. The smell of the dirty part of the city was getting thicker. The Quarter always held the most curious stench of rotting food and body odor.
Nell stopped under a streetlight. Soft jazz music filled the night air. It stopped and she heard voices and laughter and then the music picked up again. Late-night party in one of the courtyards.
She rounded the corner and saw what she was searching for. A small, black sign hung from the bottom of a very tilted balcony, its words long since worn away. The faint image of sticks and stones painted in dingy white on the bottom of the sign was enough to tell Nell she had found the right place.
The door was open, the shop itself deeply shadowed. A heavy drum rhythm drifted into the street from inside. A fat gray and white tabby lounged on the sidewalk, leaning on the bottom step leading inside the shop. The dirty furball didn’t flinch as Nell stepped through the door.
“You’s not bringin’ that dark charm inta my place, is you?” The voice, heavy in Cajun accent, came from Nell’s right. Darkness behind the counter veiled the speaker. The fact that the woman knew she had the damn thing doubly verified she’d found the right place. It also made her a bit nervous.
“I was hoping—”
“You was lookin’ for someone to enlighten you?” The woman appeared from behind the counter as if materializing out of the night itself. Her bright yellow skirt swished against her legs in the low light. The brightness of it and her startling appearance made Nell blink. Something splattered on Nell’s face. The shock made her retreat, stumbling down the steps and back onto the sidewalk. The cat hissed.
Nell wiped her face. Ash and who knew what else. She brushed it off on her thigh. The woman stood in the doorway, making it clear Nell was not to bring the pack or, more importantly, the necklace back into the building. The old, dark-skinned woman’s face was wrinkled by time and hardship. Her skirt was tattered, the bottom hem torn, strings hanging loose and dirty. Her tight, red camisole shirt showed every bony curve of the tiny woman’s ribs.
The woman lit a half-smoked cigar. “You.” She jutted her chin out and tilted her head to study Nell. She pointed a crooked, boney finger at her. “You brought me that Chinese root when you’s here last, you did?”
Nell huffed in surprise. She and Avery had come to see this woman and he’d brought a gift of some rare root. Nell couldn’t remember what it was or why he’d brought the stuff. “My friend did, yes.”
The woman plopped down on the highest of the three steps and tucked her skirt between her spread knees. “You got more now?” She let out a large puff of smoke that formed a perfect ring.
“I’m sorry. No.” Nell thought through what she did have with her—a little makeup, deodorant, the newly acquired phone and the content’s of Trent’s backpack. “Werewolf hair.”
“Ain’t so rare ’round these parts, girly, but useful. Very useful.” Another smoke ring floated in front of Nell’s face.
“I just need you to look at something. See if you have any clue where it may have come from. Perhaps you’ll know who might want it. I’ll stay out here.” Nell started to pull her pack off.
“Holy Jesus, chile!” She snubbed the cigar out on the step. The cat brushed against her leg on its way inside. “Not out here in front o’ the Lord and everyones. Bugaboos for miles can feel that creepy mojo. Lucky girly to be alive this long. Come whid me.” She got up and headed down the street, leaving the door to her shop open. Who steals from a Voodoo Queen? Talk about bad karma.
Nell followed for two blocks. The woman stopped by a high wooden fence. She fiddled with the lock on the gate then pushed it in. The gray and white tabby shot through the opening. They followed him through, down an alley into a gorgeous courtyard full of flowering plants and twinkling lights.
The old woman stopped and pointed, indicating Nell should sit. There
were several tables with big green umbrellas, decorated with plants and brightly colored bowls. A fountain gurgled from an unseen location, probably tucked behind one of the large oleanders. Beautifully painted wood screens hid the plumbing and wiring that was outside most of the hundred-year-old homes in the French Quarter.
Nell sat at the closest table. The old Voodoo Queen walked away. Nell rummaged in the pack and pulled out Trent’s shaving kit. From that, she retrieved his brush. Werewolf hair.
“Your hair most likely be of more interest.” Again, Nell was startled by the seemingly ghostly appearance of the old woman. She sat at another table a few feet away from Nell and poked that chin out again. “What exactly is you?” she asked as the cat wound itself around her feet.
Nell stood as another, younger woman entered. She couldn’t have been more than twenty, her skin a flawless, silky caramel color. She was dressed in bright green cotton pajamas.
“Hello.”
Nell realized the woman’s eyes were cloudy. She was blind. Although her face was young and her voice sweet, the woman’s power billowed before her like a cloud. This was the Voodoo Queen. “Hi. My name is Nell Ambercroft. I’m trying to find a friend.”
She gestured for Nell to sit again. “I am Barri.” She took the seat next to Nell, turning the chair so they faced one another. “You mean your wolf?” Her fingers unerringly touched the brush in Nell’s hand while her blank eyes remained on Nell’s face.
“Yes. My wolf.”
“And you need to know the power of the gris-gris you have in the magic box. You are not in a position that one would envy, little Dragon.” She lifted the hair off the back of her neck and twisted it into a bun on top of her head. “My aunt was correct; your hair is a far stronger ingredient for mojos than the simple wolf fur.”