by Rachael Wade
“You said he wants me to move on.”
“Of course he does. He doesn’t want you to hurt because of him. But just because he wants you to move on doesn’t mean you can’t wait for him.” He got up, pulled a blanket from an old cedar chest near the couch and handed it to me. “You’ve had a rough night. I can take you home in a few hours once you’ve had some rest, okay?”
“No.” I took the blanket from him and laid it across my lap. “I can’t sleep.”
“Please, just try.”
“I want to stay for a few days. I’m not ready to go home yet, I just got here.”
He looked at me, eased back down on the couch. “A few hours ago you nearly clawed yourself out of the car to get away from me, and now you want to hang out for a few days.”
“You’re not so bad after all. And besides,” I nodded toward the window, “it’s raining. I hate flying in the rain.”
He grinned, looked at me in disbelief. “What about your job?”
“I’ll figure it out. I need a little more time.”
“Well, I brought you here with the hopes that you’d stay for a little bit. You’re just making my job easier.”
“Maybe I’ll go sightseeing tomorrow. I’ve always wanted to see London—”
He cleared his throat, stood again. “I can’t have you gallivanting around this city right now, it’s not safe.”
“I won’t go by myself, you can come with me. You have all the time in the world, right?” I pleaded with my hands, gave him the puppy dog eyes.
“All right. I can’t argue with that.” Smiling, he headed for the door. “I’m going to run out and grab some human food, since you’re going to be here for a while. I won’t be far.” He slipped into his jacket and picked up his wallet. “Stay put, kiddo.”
“Okay, thanks.” I listened as he locked the door behind him.
Skimming the bookshelves again to find something to read myself to sleep, a small brown journal with scribbles and drawings on the cover caught my eye. I flipped it open, figuring it couldn’t be too personal if it was left sitting on the shelf. About halfway through, I examined what appeared to be a journal entry of some sort.
February 3rd, 1890
My Love,
It’s been some time since the crescent moon, yet I find myself still waiting for your return. Do I entertain such foolish thoughts? I cannot seem to simply let you fade, even when I am aware your love is my demise. You should know the men are growing impatient and seemingly restless lately. I am beginning to wonder what Samira intends to do about it, and I must admit I fear for our safety. I will continue to wait at the gate every month so that I may see your warm eyes and hear your wise voice again. Do pray that my head will catch up with my heart and soon shake me from my naïve deceptions.
Yours in eternity,
Arianna
I immediately shut the book, felt the worn leather binding with the tips of my fingers. Stepping to the window, I looked past the sheets of rain that watered the sidewalk and down into the street, suddenly felt like I’d stumbled upon something intimate. A wave of empathy moved through me, of feeling for the girl who’d left her love behind. She clearly missed him, and I sensed the regret in her words. Her longing reminded me of a conversation I had with my mother when I was younger, not too long after she and my father split up.
“That’s the problem with life, you know,” she said to me one afternoon, atop the Space Needle. “Once you know something, you can never unknow it. Truth doesn’t let you do that.” She looked out over Puget Sound and placed her hands inside her warm coat pockets, her light breath visible against the gray sky. “That’s the tragedy of knowledge.”
I could still see the heaviness in her eyes and hear the defeat in her voice. She hadn’t said much else to me that afternoon, but when she finally spoke, I knew exactly what she was referring to—the knowledge of my father and his string of affairs, the ones that fueled her addictions. She spent ten years hoping to fight it, stuff it away, or change it. Acceptance wasn’t an option. I imagined that was how Arianna felt, living with her decision.
“Camille?” Joel walked in, his long brown hair damp. “You all right?” He dropped some bags on the kitchen counter and noticed the journal in my hands, then set his keys down.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.” I set the book on the coffee table and folded my arms, kept my distance from him.
“It’s personal, but not off limits. Don’t worry about it.”
“Let me help you with that,” I said, rushed over to help put the food away.
“She gave it to me the last time I saw her. In case you were wondering.”
I placed milk and eggs in the fridge. “It must’ve been really hard for you, to read those things. I can’t imagine.”
“It was. It is.” He tossed oranges into a big wood bowl, offered me one.
“Thanks.” I began peeling it with my fingers, unable to concentrate on anything but the sadness in his eyes. “What happened there? In Amaranth.”
He handed me a knife to cut my orange, plopped onto a barstool at the counter. “It’s a long story.”
“When are you going to tell me why Gavin’s doing this? The reason he wants to defeat her. It’s more than just her laws, I know it is.”
He looked at me for a moment, and I stopped cutting my orange, made sure he had my undivided attention. “There is more to it, isn’t there?”
“He went because of her laws. If he ends her reign, the curse will be lifted and we don’t have to live this way anymore.”
“There’s something else. You clearly hate the place, and you didn’t want Arianna to go there. Tell me why.” I set the knife down and sat on the stool next to his, leaned in to fix his eyes to mine. “It’s more than you not wanting to give up your life here. She said she was afraid in that journal. Please tell me what’s so bad about this place.”
He hung his head for a moment. “I told you he has a plan, and I just told you the reason. The details are too complicated and I can only tell you so much.”
“He left me with you not only to protect me, but for you to explain things to me, remember? How do you expect me to wait around for him to come back if I don’t know what this is all about? All of you have been trying to spare me, trying to keep these secrets from me, only giving me bits and pieces. I’m tired of it.”
“It’s for your own good.”
“I’ll decide what’s good for me. Look, you said work with what I’ve got, right? Well … you were right. I’m in your world now, whether I asked for that or not.” I placed my hand on his arm. “So let me in.”
He sighed heavily and stood up to retrieve the journal from the coffee table, slowly slid it toward me. “There was a war. A bad war. Samira is bound by Gérard, the original conjure father, the one who gave her power, to send immortals to Amaranth to be freed from their curse. But nothing stops her from running the city the way she wants to. Those who go there … pay a price. A lot of persecution goes on. The inhabitants rebelled against her and her servants, and almost everyone died.”
“Arianna?”
“No, thank God. But of course, Samira and her army won, and after they won, the survivors were forced to submit to her rule again, and it got worse. Eventually things settled down. All thanks to a leader who stepped in and helped restore the peace there.”
“A leader?”
He nodded. “Someone from the inside.” He watched while I casually flipped through the withered pages. “Once peace was restored, Samira executed the leader and his wife, then covered it up.”
“Okay, so Gavin’s angry with her for persecuting the immortals? She’s ruled for centuries, it doesn’t seem like that is going to change any time soon. What makes him think he can change that? Or that he has to be the one to do it?”
Joel pulled his eyes from mine and pointed to the necklace that hung from my neck. I followed his signal, grabbed the locket between my fingers. “I don’t understand.”
“D
id Gavin give that to you?” he asked, looking at me now.
“Yeah, he told me it was his mom’s.” I looked down again at the locket, popped it open to examine the delicate inscription inside. If my heart had wings it would be with you always. My eyes ran over it, searched for any connection. All I knew from what Gavin told me was that his father was killed and then his mom disappeared. I looked back at Joel, stunned. “No. Please don’t tell me his parents had anything to do with this.”
“What did he tell you about them?”
“His parents were the leaders? They were killed … in Amaranth?” I sat back, heartbroken, my words strained, my throat tight. “I can’t believe this.” I pulled my old trusty menthols from my pocket, lit one up. “Samira killed them? So he went there for revenge? He’s putting his life on the line for something that can’t be undone?”
“No, it’s more than that. He wants justice, to help the people there. He wants to see everyone set free from her rule for good.”
“That’s insane. That’s impossibly ambitious. It’s like, killing God.”
“No,” Joel replied, his tone sharp. “She is not God. She only wants to be.”
I shook my head, astonished. Then I remembered. “Wait, he told me his mom left just a few years ago. You’re saying this war happened back in the 1800s.”
“I wasn’t kidding when I said our kind has been trying to resist Samira’s rule for a very long time. It isn’t only those of us living here on earth, but those living in Amaranth, too. The war happened back in the late 1800s, shortly after Arianna wrote that passage. But Gavin always says it’s been five or six years. To him, it feels like it was just yesterday. He’s carried the burden with him, to avenge them, for over a hundred years now.”
He grabbed a smoke from my pack and lit one up for himself. “Gavin’s lived in his grandfather’s house in Louisiana for years, he just traveled to Europe now and then to get away. His father chose to go to Amaranth. His mother couldn’t take living in the house without him, so she up and left. She went to join him. They helped bring peace to the city before Samira killed them. She got rid of them, and then made the people think it was an accident, that they’d eventually be forgotten. She fooled them all.” He shook his head, angry now. “Their deaths are the reason Gavin became one of us.”
“Why kill them? Those poor people…” my hand automatically made its way back to my locket, clasped it tightly as I stared off into space.
“She uses people to get what she wants, and then destroys them. It’s all rooted in the hoodoo and Voodoo side of things, the fact that Samira and Gérard are hybrids: part witch, part vampire.” He chuckled. “Freaks the supernatural, you might say. The people stored away in Amaranth give them unlimited, permanent energy, keep them in rule. So she’ll do whatever it takes for the people to see her in a trusted light. Showing false compassion for the loss of their leaders resonated with them. They respected her more for it. It made them feel she cared about them.”
“That’s why Gavin changed? To avenge his parents?”
“That’s another story for another day.” He exhaled, his tone definite.
I snapped the locket shut and gazed forward at a picture on the refrigerator of him, Gabe and Gavin, in what appeared to be some sort of pub.
“When we were human.” He nodded to it. “Not too long before he lost his parents, actually.”
“Samira already has so much power,” I continued, disgusted, trying to understand. “What is she after, then?”
“She’s bound under Gérard’s spell, has to keep shuffling people in to the city to feed his power. But she’s had to wipe out the entire city once already. It’ll get harder and harder for her to continue down that road.”
He rested his cigarette in the ashtray and stole a piece of my orange, cut it up in little random pieces, a kid playing with food. “Still, she’ll continue to take advantage and cause the people to suffer as long as she reigns. She hates that they get to have their curses lifted.”
I blinked, my focus still frozen on the old picture in front of me. I took another drag, enamored by the sight of Gavin as a human with his warm brown eyes. “You said he was still human when his parents died in Amaranth. How did he find out about them?”
“He would go visit them.”
“In Amaranth?” I turned to him, curious now.
“Yeah, every month when the portal opened.”
“I thought humans couldn’t enter.”
“They can, but they don’t. Gavin was an exception. It was a part of a deal his parents had with Samira. Their service for visitation rights, and no harm done to Gavin.”
I turned back to glare at the picture once more, homesickness washing over me. I needed to get back to Louisiana, and fast. Stretching, I turned to glance at the clock on the wall and gave an exaggerated yawn. “Sorry to cut you short, but I’m beat. Would you mind if I passed on the sightseeing tomorrow after all? I think I’m ready to go home now, and I really should smooth things over with my boss if I want to keep my job.”
“Okay, sure,” he replied, taken aback by my sudden change of subject. He stopped toying with the orange and looked over at me, confused. “Well, uh, let me just get some things together and we can leave.” He headed into his bedroom, left me with the quiet. I glanced at the picture of Gavin one last time and ran my fingers over a page of Arianna’s journal before I shut it, ready to bid London farewell.
CHAPTER 14
Inverted
“Sorry about the food I didn’t eat back at your place, I can pay you back for that stuff.”
“Absolutely not necessary.” Joel smiled at me graciously.
“These eggs are great.” I washed the last bite down with orange juice, ready to head in to work. Carol generously forgave my absence, thanks to the supposed flu bug, and gave me permission to work a night shift to make up for it. I was shocked she’d kept me around this long, but her “punishment” fit my new lifestyle perfectly.
I smiled at Joel. “Breakfast for dinner is my favorite.”
“Glad you like that. I don’t get to do this very often.” He laughed, scooted back into the kitchen to adjust my radio’s volume. An old cassette of Johnny Cash’s greatest hits played as he started washing the dishes. I eyed my vintage floral apron that he wore, slung low on his waist, swaying as he moved. I started chuckling again, caused him to swing around and glare at me.
“Don’t start that again. It’s not my fault you don’t have any masculine aprons.”
“That’s because aprons aren’t masculine, genius.”
“Don’t make me have you for dinner, princess.”
“Whatever, Betty Crocker. Knock yourself out.” Winking, I slipped out of my chair to toss my plates into the sink next to him, smiled as I admired the apron one last time. His broad shoulders and tattoos enhanced the ensemble, added to my amusement.
“If you can’t handle a vampire confident in an apron, then get out of the kitchen.” He jabbed me with a wet spatula and I shoved him back, then grabbed my bag from the table. “Let me know if you hear from them?”
“I can’t hear him when he’s there, remember? I promise I’ll let you know as soon as I know something. It’s going to be a while—”
“I know, I know. Wishful thinking.” Grabbing my coffee, I made my way to the door.
“Have a great day at school, honey,” Joel called after me, a goofy smile on his face. Well, at least the babysitter doubled as entertainment. Giggling like the child I didn’t think I’d ever been, I slammed the door.
By the time I made it to the bookstore, my mind was on overdrive, trying to figure out how Gavin was suppose to tackle his whole plan and make it back to Louisiana. On the way home from London, Joel broke down the specifics and explained them in human terms for me. Still it sounded impossible. And just plain reckless. Apparently, he intended to get everyone to rise up against Samira, break free from Amaranth with them, and then come back to the real world. Quite the hefty feat, and much more than he
originally let on. Still, there was a lot I didn’t know, and that gave me some peace. I kept looking at my watch, remembered sunset was imminent.
I walked in the door to find good old Carol rushing to hug me, her multicolored floral dress an eyesore. “So good to see you, dear. We’re so happy to have you back again.” She latched onto me.
“Thanks, it’s good to be back.” I immediately felt guilty for what I was about to do, but I knew I had to stick to the game plan. I wouldn’t have come into work at all, knowing I was about to give up my favorite job for good, but it was an excuse to get away from Joel, and I had to make it look convincing in case he checked on me.
“Well now, I know coming in for a night shift to help out with inventory isn’t at all appealing, but we really need the help.” She winked and straightened her dress. “Feel free and start right here, and let me know if you have any trouble.”
“Actually Carol,” I peered around, taking in the last glimpse of my beloved bookstore, “I was wondering if it would be all right if I took my break early tonight.”
“I don’t see a problem with that. No, not a problem at all,” she shook her head as she spoke. Her fire-engine-red curls bounced around as her head moved. “Just get a few of these shelves taken care of, and then you can leave when you’d like.”
“Great.”
“How is everything with that fellow of yours? Haven’t seen him around here lately.”
“He’s fine.”
“No trouble on the romance front, then?”
“Everything’s peachy.” I waited for her to get the hint.
She stared at me for a second with those curious old-hen eyes, waiting for me to elaborate, no doubt. I waited, glanced around. “Good to know dear, good to know,” she finally said, “Well, I best stop dilly-dallying,” she adjusted her glasses and left me alone. Without wasting a second more, I hurried off.
After rummaging through a few shelves, I dashed out the door as soon as Carol was out of sight and jumped into my Jeep, making sure Joel was nowhere in sight. I’d told him to meet me at nine when my shift ended to follow me home, so as far as he knew, I wasn’t getting off for at least a few more hours. But vampires were stubborn. And sly. For all I knew, he was hanging out around the bookstore to make sure Andrew didn’t show up. Or to make sure I didn’t do something stupid.