Her skin prickled. She was being watched.
Henryk stood to the back of the procession, the horse he had rode in on some yards away. He hadn’t said a word to her, and he hadn’t needed to. Not when she knew why he was here. After the debacle in Congo Square, it was her understanding that all Voodoo and ceremonies would need to be under supervision. And it would seem the High Inquisitor had made it his business to do just that. But she wondered if it was more than that. Was the part of Henryk who had loved Marcel still alive in the shell of the man she saw before her now? And if he was…
Ree tried her best to put the thought from her mind. But still it rang, haunting her.Is that part still in love with you?
A hand squeezed Ree by the shoulder. She turned to find Father Antoine at her side. His lined face bore deep, timeworn grooves, but his light blue eyes were as bright as ever beneath a pair of bushy gray eyebrows.
“Responsibility suits you, Marie,” Father Antoine said simply.
He was using her birth name—her Catholic name—to grate her nerves, she supposed. “I do not keep your faith. So you needn’t have ventured out this far, old man.”
The priest was harmless—kind, studious, and certainly generous to the poor and needy. Père Antoine let his parish believe how they wanted and seemed to keep the Vatican at arm’s length. Until now.
His eyes crinkled at the corners. “No, but I liked to. And besides, your well-being is still of concern to me. Youwerebaptized Catholic, you know.” So, hewasteasing her.
“That was my mother’s choice.”As all other things in my life were.
Soon the pyre smoked, the air clouded with bittersweet poppy to bring rest, rosemary for remembrance. Her mother used to say that if you looked closely, you might see Baron Samedi in the smoke, hisskeletal face forming in the silver wisps. But Baron Samedi did not come, and Ree was glad for it. She was in no mood to entertain the loa, especially one such as Baron Samedi, who would call for dance and song as tribute, for laughter instead of tears. The Voodoos poured the god of death’s favored rum along his altar, lit cigars wrapped in wax paper, scattered coffee grounds into his stone hand.
Henryk was questioning Ory now. He took down careful annotation of what he said in a leather book. She wanted to scream at him, to curse his name loudly for everyone to hear. How could he stand there and pretend as if Marcel had never meant anything to him, as ifshehad never meant anything to him at all? It was easier before to distract herself with a bit of whiskey and lovemaking, but there was no distraction fromthis—the cold fury lacing its way up her spine and through her blood.
Antoine followed Ree’s gaze, his eyes softening. “I’m afraid Inquisitor Broussard believes, as most of my peers do, that magic must be…managed.”
But had he always believed that? Had he simply hidden his prejudices from her when they were children? What had she been to him exactly in those quiet, loving moments? And why had he asked her so desperately to leave that night eight years ago? But the answers hardly seemed to matter now, not when she could feel Marcel’s spirit drifting further and further away. What had become of his dreams of freedom? Those beautiful dreams of Haiti? Where might all those hopes and dreams go now?
“You’ll forgive me if I don’t share your sympathies,” Ree said. “That sense ofmanagementusually ends with a witch up on the end of a pike.”
“No.” The imploring sound of his voice surprised her. “Forgivehim,young priestess. His mother was killed by the magical-blooded. Now Inquisitor Broussard believes this is the only way to spare others from that pain. Belief can be a fickle thing.”
Ree stilled. She had never known how Henryk Broussard had become an orphan, only that he didn’t remember much about his life before he was sent to live with the rest of the children with theUrsuline nuns at the convent. But if his mother had been killed by those with magical blood? Well, that kind of hate didn’t die easy.
“And what about me, Father?” Ree asked finally. “Did he always hate me?”
But Father Antoine’s eyes only twinkled. “We are not always the sum of our beliefs, young Marie. Listen to me, I believe the boy you cared for is still in there. You saved his life, brought him back from the edge of darkness. You made him believe in more once. Maybe not in magic itself. But inyou.” His line of sight moved to the pyre. “And you may yet do it again.”
When he left, Ree approached the pyre. They hadn’t yet transferred Marcel’s body to the flames. She closed her eyes as she silently paid her final respects to her friend.Oh, Marcel. You fool.Hot tears stung her eyes.What I’d give to see you again.
It had been a quick thought, a selfish thought, one she had no right to. Marcel had other friends, other family. But she was so alone now. Without her mother. Without Anabelle. And now without him too.
Ree felt a familiar pull, the lightness beneath her feet, the shiver down her spine as a voice whispered,Is it so?It was the same dark voice of a man she’d heard as a child, the voice she’d heard in the sick ward while staring at a pale, bedridden Henryk Broussard, the voice she now knew belonged to Jon the Conjurer. Her father.Death is but a doorway,Jon sang.Open it, daughter. Open it further and see what you may find.
Then she felt the oddest sensation, like plunging into ice water, the magic flowing through her, surer, stronger than any magic she had ever felt. She reached for it, that spark of power living inside of her, the one she had always known had been waiting, patiently dormant. And it felt…well, it feltgood.It was life and it was death, and it was the pale dusk that lingered in between. It was power like she had never tasted.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Ree glanced down. But she was too late. The wooden lid to Marcel’s coffin burst forth, throwing itself open. And before she could utter a single word, a grayed hand was already emerging from thebox. And then another, until a man—no, acorpsehauled itself from the coffin and onto its feet. It straightened its body in odd, crooked movements, each one preceded by a sickeningsnap.
A scream erupted behind her. It was Nan, she recognized. Others too.
Ree was rooted to the ground, frozen in place. The blood drained from her face, her heart hammering wildly against her chest.
Marcel took an uncertain step toward her. But it was not Marcel, was it? Marcel was dead. Two days hanged. His soul was gone from this plane and on to the next. What then was walking toward her? But she knew. He was not human any longer, not even a corpse.
He was a zombi now.
Creatures of old folktales. They were the undead, the unholy resurrected, damned to walk the earth barren of soul, hungering for life and flesh. The portion of Voodoo forbidden in New Orleans. The same magic that had overthrown Haiti during those long years of revolution. It was the terrifying magic she’d glimpsed Jon wielding aboardLa Lune—the awakening of the dead.
A thin, grueling moan came from his cracked lips. As the zombi neared, she could see violet light burning in his irises, a strange cold fire. When she’d consumed the Conjurer Root, she’d seen the undead rising from the earth. Had that been some sort of premonition?
