“That,” she jabbed a finger toward the tree, “is his house!”
I knew the legends of a bigfoot-like creature living near Honey Island, but didn’t realize anyone actually knew him. I’d always heard rougarous were private and reclusive.
“It’s not like there aren’t,” she waved her hands around, “other trees he could live in.”
“Aren’t there other fishing holes you could spy on?”
She made a shocked sound. “It’s the principle of it.”
“What principle?”
“I was here first.”
I almost reached out to the Crossroads to ask it to look up the territory covenants between swamp supernaturals, but Card whistled. “Where do you want this thing?” he called out.
“Gone,” Lilt Keyva called back, and wow, did her voice carry. “I want it gone.”
“Wait!” I made a give-me sign. “Show me the coin.”
She reached into the folds of moss near her hip and withdrew a single coin. It was large, heavy, and glowed with a rich, copper light. Stamped clearly in the center of it was a spindle with thread.
The power that radiated off of it was no illusion. This was Fate’s coin.
“All right.” I slogged over to Card and looked up at him. “We can’t take the tree down.”
“Why not? You’ve got a magic axe. I have very good supervisory skills.”
“Like hell you’re going to sit on your ass while I do the work. If it’s coming down, you’re chopping and hauling.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“Gary lives here.”
“The rougarou?”
“You know Gary?”
He shrugged. “We’ve met once. At a party. Well, not really a party. More like a murder. Well, not exactly a murder, but there were several creatures who did not walk home under their own power after the gathering, if you know what I mean.”
“I have no idea what you mean. Lilt Keyva just wants to be able to see the fishermen when they show up on that bank over there. Gary’s taking her glory, and she’s territorial about this spot.”
He looked past me, and scowled at the siren. “What about Gary?” he asked. “Maybe Gary got here first.”
“Do you want that coin, or do you want to try to find a reclusive rougarou and ask him his opinion of his neighbor and her claim on the fishing hole?”
Card glanced out at the dense trees and undergrowth and water, then looked back toward the angry siren again.
“Right,” he said. “Let’s get this tree out of the way.”
ChapterEight
I lookedup into the huge spread of limbs and moss and leaves above us. There was enough greenery to make the sky feel a world away, the sun distant and small. Birds lived in those branches. Other animals too.
Old trees like this were important, not just for the natural world, but also for the magical world.
This was an old spirit that radiated patience and welcome. It was a part of the magic here, a part of what kept this place magical.
“We can’t chop it down,” I repeated, in case Card hadn’t heard me. The bug bites were starting to add up to some serious itching. I tried to keep my hands off the worst of them. “But I don’t know what else we can do for Lilt Keyva. She really wants this gone. Really, really wants it gone.”
