Gathering Deep (5 page)

“They seem to have a tendency to do that with you,” Piers said with a smirk. “Strange for a photographer … ” he teased.

Lucy slapped his arm. “Shut up. You know why I fainted the last time.”

Earlier in the summer, Lucy and Piers had been with Dr. Aimes when he'd found a daguerreotype of Armantine Lyon, the girl Lucy had dreamed she was in a past lifetime. The unexpected sight of seeing Armantine's face in her waking hours had made her faint dead away. I hadn't realized back then what was happening to Lucy—or to me—so I'd teased her about it mercilessly.

“I remember what Josephine Dutilette was like to Armantine,” Lucy went on. “When I saw Josephine's eyes staring up at me … ” She shuddered. “Let's just say, that woman was a piece of work. I don't have any desire to ever run into her again, not in any lifetime.”

Lucy's father returned a moment later with a foam cube. He set it on the coffee table between us and opened it. Inside was a small, dark piece of wood that at first looked like a misshapen star. Then I realized it was a carved doll of some sort that had a bit of ancient-looking, rust-colored thread wound about its body.

“You still have that thing?” Lucy sounded horrified.

“Of course,” Dr. Aimes replied. “After we recovered it from Thisbe's cabin, we cataloged it, same as the other artifacts.”

The University of New Orleans, which owned the plantation and ran its living history museum, had also managed to buy an adjoining plot of land containing a cabin that once belonged to Thisbe. The historians all knew that Thisbe was an ex-slave and influential in the life of the area, but none of the university staff—Dr. Aimes included—had any idea of how powerful she'd really been. And they certainly didn't know she was still around.

“Mama Legba told you to get rid of that, Dad. She told you how dangerous it was,” Lucy said.

Piers shifted next to me, and when I glanced over at him, he was looking at the small doll with the same wariness as Lucy. He'd been there the day they discovered the charm, and I knew he was as upset as Lucy to see that Dr. Aimes still had it.

“It's
history
, Luce. This is probably more than a hundred and fifty years old,” Dr. Aimes said, his voice gruff with more than a little irritation. “You can't get rid of something like that because of some superstition. And besides, while I'm sure Ms. Legba meant well enough, since when do you put any stock in stories about spirits and curses?”

Lucy's mouth shut abruptly, and she glanced at me like she didn't know what to do. It's not exactly like she could explain to her father why she thought the charm was dangerous, not without explaining everything else. Not that he would have believed her anyway.

After all, the charm didn't look like much—just a gnarled little piece of dark wood—so I understood why Dr. Aimes wouldn't have paid much attention to Mama Legba's warnings about it, but the unease that filtered through the room once the foam crate had been opened was so thick and obvious that I couldn't understand why he wasn't sensing it. I couldn't imagine why he'd even want to have that thing near him much less keep it in his own house.

“I was talking to Professor Lamont about this,” Dr. Aimes told Piers. “He said his lab up at Vanderbilt could run some tests on it before we put it in the museum. I thought maybe you'd like to take it for me? I could get a courier, but if you go, you might get some extra lab time under your belt,” he finished with a smile.

“Oh,” Piers said, shifting again in his chair. “I don't know … Things have been pretty busy around here with the preservation crew,” he hedged. “I'm not sure if I can get the time off.”

“I can talk to Byron,” Dr. Aimes told him, waving away his excuse. “It shouldn't be a problem to give you a few days off from your usual shifts. Besides, now that we've found the journal, I'd like Lamont to take a look at it as well.”

“Thanks, but—”

“It sounds like a great opportunity,” I interrupted. I knew Piers was about to turn it down so he could stay close to me. Which was exactly what I'd been afraid of him doing—giving up pieces of his life to protect mine. It was exactly what I didn't want him to do, because I knew in the long run, he'd end up hating me for it.

“I don't know,” Piers said, clearly frustrated with me.

“I'll be fine,” I told him, pasting on a smile that I hoped looked genuine. “Besides, it'll only take a couple of days, right?” I asked, glancing at Dr. Aimes, who gave me a nod in answer. “You'll be back in no time. No big deal,” I said, trying to send him the not-so-subtle message that he should agree.

Piers didn't respond. He frowned at me with an undecipherable look in his eyes. But he must have known he was stuck. Between me and Dr. Aimes, he didn't have any other excuse that wouldn't have raised suspicions. “I don't know … ”

“Well, give some thought to it,” Dr. Aimes said.

“Lovely,” Mrs. Aimes drawled from the doorway to the kitchen. “Now if you would be so kind as to put that away so we can eat?”

Dinner was pleasant enough, but I could tell Piers was pissed about me insisting he go to Nashville. It hadn't done anything to help the tension that was already between us, and I was more than a little nervous about what he would say when he pulled me aside after dinner.

Alone in Dr. Aimes's cluttered office, Piers again went through all the reasons he shouldn't go to Nashville or leave me to myself.

“We haven't even talked to Mama Legba like we planned,” he said. “We need to meet up with her tomorrow, because you know that if the police came to her, they think the killing had something to do with the occult. Thisbe has to be involved.”

“So we'll talk to her first. But you know as well as I do that if you don't go, you're going to have to come up with a better reason. Usually, you'd jump at a chance like this. I thought we were supposed keep acting like everything's normal so we don't have to involve anyone else. Wasn't that the whole purpose of my story about Momma visiting a sick relative?”

“You're right,” Piers said, running a hand over his head. “But I don't like the idea of leaving you alone right now. Not with bodies turning up in the Quarter.”

“It's just for a couple of days,” I told him again. “Until then, I'll be staying with Lucy in a well-warded house that's been covered twice over by Mama Legba's protective charms. I'll be fine.”

He still didn't look convinced. “I still can't help but feel like you're trying to push me away, Chloe.”

I pretended like I didn't hear the question in his tone as I walked over to the table where Dr. Aimes had left the foam container and lifted the lid. Again, that uneasy energy whispered through the room. “This was Thisbe's, right?”

Piers nodded.

“Did you ever consider that it might be able to tell us something about her, or about what she might do next? If you're in the lab, we wouldn't have to wait to find out what they learn about it.”

He frowned, and I could tell he didn't like where I was going.

“Think about it,” I pushed. “If you're the one who delivers the charm to Professor Lamont, and if you get to help out in the lab, you'll have first-hand knowledge about anything they learn. That would be a lot more help to figuring out what Thisbe might do than all of us sitting here waiting for something else to happen.”

The way he scowled at me told me that he knew I was right. “I still don't like it,” he said.

“Me neither. Look, like Dr. Aimes said, you don't have to decide right this second. Let's see what Mama Legba has to say, but at least consider it?” Without thinking, I reached out and ran a single finger across the rough thread of the little doll.

A shuddering unease ran through me, and then all at once, the room around me was gone.

The smell of woodsmoke burned my nostrils and the light from the fire in the brick hearth cast a strange, pulsing glow over the meager furnishings in the room. My skin felt the fingers of the cold night beyond reaching for me through the sparse warmth of the fire, but I shrugged it off.

What did a little cold matter when I had power settled over me like a heavy cloak?

A bone-deep sense of absolute rightness and conviction flooded through me as I looked at the body of the man lying on the narrow bed. He was beautifully built, with strong features that even in sleep looked formidable and sure. Simply looking at him, knowing he was mine, had a warmth curling low in my belly. I had an overwhelming urge to press my lips against his broad and generous mouth.

But I didn't. There would be time enough for that later—a lifetime of days. But tonight, there was work still to be done.

I pulled a low three-legged stool close to the bed where he lay and rested his palm in the skirts that covered my lap. I already had everything I needed, but still I hesitated.

“No
,”
I thought wildly.

No more hesitation. No more second thoughts. I knew what needed done, and I would do it. I would keep him safe.

I took the knife I'd prepared and carefully shaved a bit of his hair from his temple and added it to the lock of my own hair that I'd already cut, binding them together with a few drops of red candle wax. Always red for power.

Then I took a bit of sewing thread and pierced the clump of wax as I murmured the words that would bind him to me. The man shifted in his sleep as I finished the incantation, but I ignored him. Working more quickly now, I fastened the clump of wax to the small figure I'd carved from one of the great oaks on the neighboring property. I'd selected the largest of the trees for its constancy and power.

When I was finished, I looked at my handiwork for a moment, sensing the warmth that built in my palm where the charm rested. Magic like this should have been more than enough to bind most, but he wasn't like most. He had a strength and a power to him that everyone could sense—the others, who made way when he passed by. The slave driver, who'd never raised the whip to mar his back. Even his master, who refused to sell him, no matter the price offered.

I knew well enough it would take something stronger than a simple binding to hold him safe when he was so determined to die for the sake of living. Not that he'd told me any specifics of what he was planning. But he didn't have to, because I could smell it in the air, cutting through the smoke from the fires that boiled the cane. Disquiet and recklessness has its own particular perfume—sweet and thick smelling, with a little rot underneath. For weeks now, that scent had been thick in the fields, wafting through the cabins filled with uneasy bodies, and following Augustine everywhere he went.

Before she'd walked off into the swamps and left me behind, my mother had whispered to me secrets that her mother had taught her. Secrets of blood and life, of power and magic so thick it could smother a person. My whole life I'd hidden away those secrets from the hateful eyes that looked at my skin like it was my fault. From those who saw her in my blood, like I had any choice.

But I'd use those secrets now. I'd save him.

Taking the bright blade of the knife, I made the smallest of incisions in his palm. He didn't so much as stir this time, so I pressed the knife deeper, carving through the skin of his hand, following the strong, steady curve of his lifeline. As the blood welled, dark and shining in the flickering light, my mouth formed words that my tongue had never tasted. Words I hadn't even realized I knew.

When his palm was filled with the inky darkness of his own blood, I took the small figure and I placed it in the pooling blood. Dark rivulets ran over the edges of his cupped palm, staining the material of my skirt, but I didn't waver. Ignoring my ruined dress, I twisted the little carved man until it was coated with Augustine's lifeblood.

My mouth kept on chanting those strange words until my throat went hoarse and the blood began to slow. Gently, I bound up the wound and placed his bandaged hand back on the bed. Only then did I allow myself to relax any, satisfied at the work I'd done.

Only then did I allow myself the pleasure of pressing my lips to his.

As I pulled back, the sleeping man's eyelids flew open. But all I could see was the whites of his eyes.

I jerked away from the carved doll and gasped as I came back to myself. I wasn't wearing a long, roughly spun skirt but the same shorts I'd had on earlier. We weren't in a fire-lit room but still in Dr. Aimes's cluttered office.

“Did you hear anything I just said?” Piers asked, his tone dripping with irritation.

“What?” My voice came out breathy and unsure.

He let out a sigh. “See, this is exactly what I was telling you. You're not ready for me to go anywhere yet.”

I tried to focus on what Piers was saying and not on the fact that I might be losing my mind. “I'm fine,” I said, failing miserably to keep my voice steady. “I just got a little lightheaded or something.” I couldn't quite meet his eyes. “It's stuffy in here,” I added, which wasn't exactly a lie.

Piers took me gently by the arms and brought his face down to mine. The irritation in his expression had been replaced by concern. “You still feel lightheaded? Do you need to sit down?”

I could still practically feel the man's lips against mine, and I felt unaccountably guilty. I had to force myself not to pull away from Piers. “I just need some air. I'll be fine,” I said, hardly able to breathe with him so close, watching me like he was waiting for me to prove him right.

“Okay. Let's get you some air.” Piers finally released my arms to put the lid back on the box. I wasn't sure if it was him giving me some space or that the box was closed that made it seem like air in the room around me sighed with relief.