Jon clicked his teeth from behind her. Marie spun, saw that he was leaning against a pillar, his clothes and skin sodden, mouth set into a furious line. “Still, you do not learn, Marie.” His golden eyes went flat black. “Shall I teach you, beloved?”
Jon the Conjurer broke apart into a thousand screeching crows. The birds flew around her in a storm of whirling darkness, clawing into her flesh as they circled in a flurry so black Marie thought she had gone blind. The crows were screaming at her, viciously taunting her weakness until she had no choice but to cover her ears from the madness. It was too much. Something was clawing at her face,at her eyes. Marie squeezed them shut. But the Conjurer meant only to mock her, to demonstrate that the limits of his dark magic knew no bounds.
The murder of crows broke apart. Marie opened her eyes. Jon was crouched over Sanite, a small blade in his hands. “I’m going to give you one last chance, Marie.One.Give the child now, or…” He balanced the knife in his hand like a wand. “I finish what I started with your precious Quarter Queen many years ago.”
Furious, Marie stepped forward, tears in her eyes, a bolt of fire flickering to life in her hand. But Sanite gave the barest shake of her head. Marie closed her fingers, crushing the flame.
“So be it.” Then Jon ran the blade along Sanite’s throat, blood spurting from the neat little line he’d carved, spraying along the blade’s silver handle, his hands and face.
“No!” Marie howled, lurching forward. But it was too late. She thrust out a hand, and Jon was flung to the far end of the hall. She wailed for Sanite, Ogoun’s fire spilling from her mouth, pouring out over the stone until it had formed a flaming wall.
Marie knelt by her queen. The old woman was lying on her side against the stone, the blood from the knife wound along her neck and from her torn eye seeping into the cracks.
Sanite gurgled and gurgled, choking furiously as she tried to speak, her one good eye on Marie. It was completely white, still filled with that terrible all-seeing magic, even as the life faded from her.
“You will look, Marie Laveau, and you will never find. What…you seek…” Sanite gasped, blood spurting from her lips. She pulled the golden cloth from her hair and placed it in Marie’s hand with trembling fingers. “Does not lay outside of you, butwithin.As above, so below. So within, so without.”
That eye hung on Marie’s face for a moment longer, and then it was rolling up into the socket, unseeing. Sanite fell slack until Marie was holding only her golden cloth. Marie stared at it for one painful moment, realizing what Sanite intended for her to do, then slowly tied it upon her head. At once, she felt all of Sanite’s strength, that terrible wrath, her many faults, the few virtues—all of it flowed into Marie. She felt the tignon change and transform until it became a crown, as Sanite had intended.
The fire parted. Jon stepped through. Marie was still kneeling when he approached her. But she had the strength of the Quarter Queen within her now. And she understood, at last, Sanite’s final lesson. Not Jon’s.
As above, so below. So within, so without.
Marie was shaking. Jon held his hand out to her, just as he had during their second fateful meeting, at the masquerade. She’d wanted so desperately to learn his secret magic, his tricks. And learn she did.
“Join me, Marie.” One last chance. She stared at his hand…
She tookit.
“What a righteous queen you are.” He’d meant it as a taunt, another cruelty to seed into her spirit.
“No.” Marie slowly lifted her head to face him, tears stinging her eyes. “A mother.”
By the time Jon realized what was happening, Marie already had the aurum collar in place. It burned her bare hands, but she ignored the pain, that same blistering ache, and closed it around Jon’s wrist with asnap.
Jon let out a howl, stumbling back in disbelief. She knew what wearing those chains again meant to him, what it would cost him.
She slowly rose to her feet. “I am sorry, Jon.” And it was the truth. Shewassorry.
Jon watched her, his golden eyes wide. It was the first time she’d ever seen him truly afraid. Marie supposed she should be thankful. He’d taught her pain could be useful, that it could be anchored to make one’s magic stronger.
“Take this off,” Jon demanded shakily. Not a monster, she realized, but simply a man broken by his own pain. “Marie.”
She ignored him. The truth was she didn’t need to taunt him with illusions of the past, trickeries of power. No, she didn’t need any of that, not when she had the real thing.
Power surged through her in a furious burst of light. The ground shattered, cracks traveling along the stone. She knew what lay beneath. But did Jon? Her magic began to carve itself into the stone, into the veve shaped like a doorway, a flickering veil. Something older, something powerfully ancient coursed through her veins,pulled from the dark well of the earth itself. The air split, then circled around her in a furious gale. She was on the threshold of death. She felt the soft caress of its hand reaching from the great beyond, reaching for her.
Horror slowly filled Jon’s face. After all, Marie had sought at first to learn the secrets of the Veil for Jacques. Not forhim.Jon was a man of contingencies. So, with Father Antoine’s blessing, she’d been forced to make her own.
“I would have joined you, Jon.” Marie’s magic intensified. “But not at the cost of my daughter. You would kill her. And that’s just not something I’m willing to forgive.”
Marie felt herself floating, higher and higher until she hovered over the bloodied stone, until Jon kneeled directly beneath her, frozen.
She began the forbidden incantation, drawing upon her magic. It came to her, rippling over her body—her eyes, forearms, glowing fingertips. Finally, she dropped to the ground, her magic flowing from her in throbbing waves, her dark hair scattering behind her.
“Marie…” Fear edged his voice now. “What have you done?”
Unbidden magic crackled with her fury and despair. “Everything you taught me.”
