“Bonjour, Grand Wizard.”
“Marie Laveau,” Gailon said, testing the name on his lips as if tasting a fine wine. “Oh, I’ve heard much about you.”
Marie nodded toward the door, motioning for Claudette to wait for her outside. It would be better for her to handle this little tiff on her own. A woman like Claudette, who’d grown up under Haiti’s hard-won sovereignty, had little patience for the likes of the Brotherhood and did not play nice by their rules.
Claudette passed her a final cautious look, then swept out to the carriages.
“I wasn’t aware that you discuss the business of blacks andcoloreds in your halls,” said Marie, feigning hurt, once Claudette had gone. “On account of how we aren’t allowed entry.”
“Is that your way of asking for an invitation, witch?” the younger of the two said. “Perhaps that could be arranged.”
Marie turned to look at him. He was smirking at her, but not cruelly, not like his master. He was closer to her age, with a clean-shaven face, and had the air of a university boy, pompous and self-assured—sadly typical for the Brotherhood of the White Hand’s chosen crop. But his hair was reddish-gold, not the snowy white of his master. Which meant he was not ascended, not quite yet. The higher an alchemist rose among the Brotherhood’s ranks and the deeper they delved into their mysterious rites, the whiter their hair became—leaving only the most magically formidable with strands of ash. Marie wondered if it was a point of pride for men of the Brotherhood—was their only mission to bleed the color from everything they had the misfortune of touching?
“Let us not be hasty, Silas. The Brotherhood’s rules exist for good reason.” Gailon’s eyes twinkled, as if the three of them were old friends reunited and not enemies sworn to never cross color and magical lines alike.
The child, who could be no more than three, waddled forward, clasping his stubby fingers around Gailon’s leg. Gailon tapped his staff once on the ground, and the child fell, hitting the wall behind them. The boy climbed to his feet, wetness in his gray eyes, but he knew better than to say a word. The alchemist had flicked him back as if he were a gnat buzzing in his ear.
So the child is his,Marie discerned. How terrible to have such a monster for a parent. But for all the magic in the world, the gods had never allowed folks to choose their mothers or their fathers. This Marie knew, unfortunately.
“As you wish, Grand Wizard,” Silas said, although his blue eyes were trained directly on Marie.
“Supposedly, you are a talented healer, Marie Laveau,” said Gailon. “But they say that your queen grows ill, weaker still by the day. Why are you here, on a plantation, healing men like us, when you could be with Sanite, healing her?Perhaps”—a strange light touched his eyes, black coal burning in a twinkling flame—“yourpresence here is merely a sham. I know Voodoo when I see it. Perhaps this is the work of your Quarter Queen?”
He dared call Voodoo dangerous when she’d heard the stories whispered about the Brotherhood of the White Hand—capturing runaway slaves for study and sacrifice all in the name of magical advancement. It was commonly believed among black folks that they transmuted more than lead and gold in those secret halls.
“Perhaps you’d better mind the business that pays you, Grand Wizard,” Marie said with a sneer. “And last I checked, that wasn’t exactly the business of negroes.”
Her eyes flickered to Silas, who lingered just behind Gailon. Did she imagine the twitch of his lips, the shadow of amusement that flickered across his face hummingbird-fast? There was some strange emotion burning in his eyes, something she’d need more than a few moments in a hallway to study. Which Marie decided made this man, whoever he was, far more dangerous than the Grand Wizard.
Without another word, she strode away, their gazes prickling her back like needles.
Sanite Dede was waiting for her.
The bayou house was unusually cold at night, filled with puddles of silver moonlight and the clinking of mortars and pestles, the toiling of potion-brewing and spellwork that couldn’t be done by day. The only light came from the sconces along the walls, where tiny candles had been enchanted to glow with violet and gold flame.
Marie and Claudette stepped through the beaded partition and crossed into the throne room. Marie was grateful for the stinging brine of vinegar and lemon that rose from the freshly scoured floorboards, the balm of sage, so different from the stink of death that clung to the chateau. Sanite was on her throne, as always.
“Marie, you’ve idled much, my child,” Sanite Dede drawled. She was knitting, of all things. “Tell me, Marie, what did you learn?”
“Permission to speak freely?” Marie cast her eyes imperceptibly toward the right of the throne, where Claudette stood, hanging on to every word.
Sanite waved a hand, bidding Claudette leave. She cast one last mistrusting green-eyed glare at Marie, the partition’s beaded veil rustling as she left. Claudette was not to be privy to Voodoo’s inner workings because she was not beholden, per se, to the sacred laws of Sanite’s court, not when she already belonged to the court of the old blood. She practiced Vodun—some might say the older, purer form of Voodoo—and served the Haitian Vodun Queen, Cécile Fatiman. She was here purely as a matter of oversight, an ambassador of sorts between their courts.
“Go on, child,” Sanite said to Marie.
“Corbin did not just call on me—he called on the Brotherhood too.” She paused, thinking on Gailon’s spite. “The Grand Wizard made an appearance.”
Sanite Dede clicked her tongue. The violet flame cast her in an unflattering light—eyes beadier, the hollows of her cheeks ghostly. “So, Gailon has seen fit to leave his dark hole for once. It makes sense. The mayor cannot heal himself, not from this. Even his own stock of mages could not temper the fever. He would have no choice. But he called on the Voodoos too. Meaning Gailon failed, didn’t he? He is no closer to solving this mystery than the rest of us.”
“Gailon believes, or at the very least insinuated, that this plague…is being perpetrated byyou.”
Sanite Dede balked. It was not so much an incredible possibility as it was impossible for her to do at her age. Sanite Dede held power, true power. But at eighty-eight years old, she was nearing her end, and her power, for all its vicious glory, was waning.
“The Brotherhood has always fancied themselves thinking men, and yet they still need wooden sticks for conjuring.” Sanite’s lips curled. “If I wanted to go about killing white folks, don’t you think I would have done that? But what good would come from chaos? What would I rule then, but ash and bone?”
But what if you did? What kind of world would rise from the ash?It was the briefest notion, a shooting star across the span of her darkest thoughts, fire-bright until it fell away.
Marie said only what was expected of her. “Of course not.”
