The presence of the loa hung heavy in the square, the air thick with the stench of burning metal and something softer, the musk of herbs and incense. Ree understood that, fickle as they could be, the loa rarely liked to clash amongst themselves so viscerally. A fight between vessels was a clash of their divine wills. She imagined the loa considered it a grand waste of magic.
Ree lowered the hand still protecting Corbin to the ground, and he fell back in a heap of black velvet. He was staring at her, blue eyes fanatically wide, as if truly seeing her for the first time. It wasn’t a look of anger like she expected, or plain shock. It was a look ofwant.It was the look that had earned him the title of the Collector. The wail of police bells resounded, bouncing along the hollows of the square. The crowd splintered into two, bodies scrambling in all directions.
The world froze.
It was unlike anything Ree had ever felt before—intense, sudden, a shock wave of pressure. It was the mark of old, powerful magic. The spellwork of Simbi Makaya. Lord of sorcery. She had felt his presence before, used his magic for her own, but never likethis.The vessel commanding Simbi Makaya wielded his sorcery with the blunt force of a sword through steel, cutting through her resolve, compelling her mind to obey the enchantment of his will.Stay,the sorcerer loa ordered. And it wasso.
For a moment, Ree couldn’t move; Simbi Makaya’s magic kept her locked in place, pressing in like a shield. And neither could Anabelle—Ree caught her eye from across the square. She stared back, just as startled by the intrusion. So, it was clear—it was the work of another Voodoo. But who?
Ree watched as the police descended. Fabrice, Ory, and a few other Voodoos made their escape, as did the two Brotherhood alchemists, slipping into the chaos of swarming bodies. And then the pressure lifted, and she felt the magic of Simbi Makaya no longer, the pressure on her bones relaxed, his compulsion gone.
A figure stood at the edge of the square, a black woman drapedin dark violet silk, a scarf around her mouth. Only her eyes were visible, glowing with the force of her magic, two shining emeralds, even from such a distance. The woman turned away, lost to the crowd, just as Ree heard thundering footsteps behind her, and then someone barked, “Get on the ground! Get on the fucking ground!”
Lawmen had flooded the square, of course. They’d broken city law. Magic was intended to mend bones, to make items anew, but never to harm (officially). And what Ree and Anabelle had done? Ree turned her gaze back up toward the hangman’s rope, to Marcel’s cold body crowned in the white flare of sunlight. He’d dared only to use a single magic vial for harm. What then would the city make of the commotion they’d caused now, the violent mess two black witches had dared make in public for all to see? Tomorrow, when order had been restored, the mystics hauled off to be tried for their crimes, there would be one word whispered amongst the city officials and bourgeoise, one word emblazoned scandalously across the fronts of morning newspapers, a word more dangerous than any curse even Marie Laveau the First could hope to cast.Rebellion.
Ree caught a rush of movement beside her, the flash of metal of a baton.Crack!Pain erupted at the crown of her head, her fingers shone with red wetness. Ree’s vision blurred as she hit the stone, dimly aware that a man was standing over her. And then—
The unmistakable sear of aurum bound her neck.
The officer let out a whistle, low and full of satisfaction. “I’ve been waiting a long, long time to put these on a Laveau.”
He locked the remainder of the aurum shackles about her hands and feet and set out with her bound to him, dragging her along hot cobblestone that tore her gown and scraped at her back. But even as darkness overtook her, she saw only Marcel’s body swinging and heard only those foul words in her mind, playing in dark refrain:Serves him right.
When Ree awoke, she was certain of two things: that someone had taken a hammer to her head, and that it was going to take at leasttwo glasses of bourbon to see it mended. Clutching her throbbing skull, Ree sat up and looked around. She was in a cell, to be sure, no bigger than the size of a broom closet.
“I suppose this must be odd to you,” a voice taunted from the other side of the cell. Ree squinted into the darkness. Her eyes adjusted at last, her heart jumping. Anabelle. Like Ree, she was shackled by the foot in aurum, her throat bound in a thin circlet. Ree’s own shackles were twice the size, the collar around her neck as thick and choking as farm rope. “A Laveau in chains. Who would have thought?”
It took Ree a long moment to answer. In many ways, the time for speaking was long past. Anabelle had said everything Ree needed to know in that square.
Just how long had Anabelle been toying with her? Ree thought back to all those months ago, to that fateful night in the House of Flowers when Anabelle had passed her smelling of jasmine and juniper. Even then. Ree closed her eyes, held back the hot sting of tears. That had not been fate, if there existed such a thing. The only spellwork at hand had been the magic of careful planning.
“Was none of it real?” Ree rasped.
Anabelle lowered her eyes to the floor. “When it needed to be.”
“We were never going to leave New Orleans, were we?”
“No.” Did she imagine the way Anabelle’s throat wobbled? The sound of tears in her voice? “I just needed you—”
“—out of the way,” Ree finished, shaking her head. She truly was a fool.
Ree hated that she could still smell her perfume, that heady tangle of jasmine and juniper, even amongst the reek of piss and old flesh. It was useless, even now, to fight the pull Anabelle Dupont had on her. She might be able to pick out Anabelle’s scent anywhere: in the madness of the Quarter, amongst all those nameless faces and bodies upon bodies. Her mother had warned her, hadn’t she?So, you see it is you who commits the greatest sin of them all—you put a thing as fickle as love before your own magic.
“I was going to purchase your freedom,” said Ree bitterly.
Anabelle scoffed, jutting her chin. “Andyouwould own me instead?”
“Of course not. I would turn you loose. Set you free.”
“Merci, Mademoiselle! How generous the Laveaus can be.”
“I suppose that’s all I ever was to you, right? A Laveau. Cheating my way around town, as you say. Christ, none of that matters now. Marcel is dead.” Agony stabbed her heart. Something about saying those words out loud made them more real, more painful. “I suppose you blame me for that too.”
Anabelle took a shaking breath. “No, that sin belongs to the city alone.”
“And what about your sins, Anabelle?” The stone wall was ice-cold on the torn back of her dress. “You hurt my mother.”
“Your mother’s time is done. Marie Laveau wasted the throne for her own means. But not Jon.” Her voice had changed. It had a note of strangled hope. “Jon will return, and when he does, he will set things right.”
