“I—” Marie stopped.
Jon’s eyes found hers. For a moment he searched her face,snatching at the details of her features for his own. What was it she saw there, reflected in their gold depths? Pain? Love? She might never know.
The knot in her throat widened, her tongue like cold lead in her mouth. And yet she spoke anyway, voice quivering, heart stammering.Turn your heart to stone.She found the words at last. “I banish you, Jonathan, from this world,” Marie said, tears slipping down her cheeks. “I cast you out.”
Papa Legba nodded, the deal done. “And so it shall be. A soul for a soul.” The scales in his gnarled hands tipped, weighing just a little heavier.
Jon opened his mouth to speak, then suddenly froze. The skin around his face stretched oddly, as if a thousand invisible hands were prying into his flesh. And theywere.The spirits from the other side pulled and pulled at Papa Legba’s command, dragging Jon toward that strange silvery light.
As Jon’s thrashing body grew closer to the black door, it opened a little wider, waiting. Jon fought, but he was not strong enough to defy Papa’s command. No one was. The Lord of the Crossroads’s word was final.
“Marie! Please.Marie!” Jon yelled, voice curdled with dread. And he kept on calling for her.Marie. Marie. Marie.On and on, her name rang through the cathedral’s halls, a dull echo in her ear. Marie could not bear to look. And yet…she did.
The dead clawed viciously into Jon’s flesh, into his face, arms, hauling him across the stone to the tattered white veil. It drew apart, silently welcoming him. Jon dug his fingers into the ground until his fingernails snapped and broke, rebellious to the end. His eyes found hers, blood seeping from his mouth as he made a strange gurgling sound. Marie realized he was trying to speak.
“I…” Jon’s eyes shone, mouth gaping, teeth wet with his own blood. “…love you.”
And then he was gone, dragged down into that silvery light. The white veil drew closed, the glowing door shut behind it. The blinding light returned, flooding the room until the whole of it was swallowed in its white glare. Marie shut her eyes, and when she openedthem again, she was alone. The voices of the dead were gone. And she knew with a wave of sadness that they would never trouble her again.
Marie stood frozen, Jon’s voice still ringing in her ears.I love you.And even as she thought it might be a trick, one last way to deceive her, she knew it was not.No lies,they had promised each other, after all.
With tears spilling down her face, Marie raised her eyes to the ceiling, to the god she could not see. She screamed, a sound of bone-deep ache, twisting remorse, sin that needed to work its way out of her like a sickness. God did not answer. She was alone. Only the crows were listening. They were silent, staring from the rafters. But even as they flew away, one by one, high into the dark—she knew.
The crows would not forgive.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Ree
Black spots danced in Ree’s vision when she came to. A burlap sack covered her head, veiling the world. The ground was cold beneath her, sodden with damp. The back of her head pulsed with a dull, throbbing ache. She must have fallen after Silas attacked her, hit her head. She tried to move—no use. Her arms were twisted behind her, her wrists tightly bound. With aurum, she suspected from the metallic stench of her own flesh burning. Magic would be of no use then. She was out of cards, and the game was done. Saints, she was well and truly fucked.
Then it hit her—a soul-splintering crack in her chest, fissuring right down the middle. Something in her snapped, broken, as bits of Marie’s memories rushed in, flooding her mind in fragments of sight and sound:Her mother standing in St. Louis Cathedral…great fire in her hand, Jon descending from the air, a flock of black birds surrounding him…Marie shoving her hand to the ground, invoking the sacred opening ritual of the Veil…
One last memory flared—blinding and final.Marie cradling Ree as a baby, the little glowing star on Ree’s brow, the soft press of her kiss against it, sealing it with love and magic.The image fizzled, then slowly faded from view, a little boat pushed out into a sea of nothingness, on the path of no return. Her mother’s memories hadreached their end. And she knew why. Marie was dying. Oh, gods, Marie Laveau was dying. She’d sent those memories in one final bid to Ree, and here she was too slow, too late—out of time.
The sack was ripped from Ree’s head, light returning to her world as a voice sneered her name: “Marie Laveau the Second.”
Her vision adjusted—she was in a darkened field, kneeling among swaying sugarcane, the stalks turned shriveled and pale against the moonlight. Mayor Felix Corbin stood before her, leaning on his fleur-de-lis cane, countless of the city’s policemen proudly flanking him. Behind him stood the shadow of a towering, galleried white house. It was as her mother’s memories had shown her. The great chateau, the palace where he’d long lived as a king, a man who’d built the riches of his court from sugarcane and blood.
“I hope you will forgive the circumstance of our meeting, Mademoiselle. But I’m afraid the matter is urgent.”
Now, as her eyes adjusted to the light, she found Henryk kneeling across from her, bound and gagged. To her horror, there were the others: Claudette, Nan, Ory, Fabrice.
“My apologies,” said Ree.
Corbin smiled at her, delighted. “You do have your mother’s tongue.” He twirled his cane. Her eyes darted to the hunting rifle at his shoulder. From the toxic smell, she was sure that it was loaded with aurum bullets.
“Why am I here?”
“Tell her, Silas.”
The smell of foxglove overwhelmed Ree. Silas stepped out from the shadowed corner of the fields. Ree watched him, her blood boiling. The Grand Wizard’s eyes were blank. Ree had seen her mother captured by the Brotherhood, betrayed by Silas, only to be saved by him in the end. He had saved Ree too, hadn’t he? She remembered the bayou, the snatchers.Hello again, little witch.Now she understood what the alchemist had meant. But the Grand Wizard couldn’t be trusted, not completely, since he’d forced her mother into a bargain she couldn’t refuse. That was why he’d known about Marie’s condition; they were tethered by some strange force of equilibrium.
“The mayor is a very generous man, little witch,” Silas said. “He intends to offer us all a deal. You see, when the Inquisition beginstheir tribunal, they will leave no magical stone unturned. I highly doubt they will be satisfied with just your arrest and execution. They will want the Brotherhood too. Let us consider the source.” He turned to Henryk, took the gag from his mouth. “Is this true, Inquisitor?”
Henryk’s eyes narrowed into furious slits. “Fuck you.”
Silas only laughed, the sound of dry leaves underfoot. “Charming.”
