Beneath the Black Moon (Root Sisters) (23 page)

It
was lovely outside. Cam hadn’t realized just how much she’d missed going for
her walks until her father offered her his arm and they walked together into
the woods. It was late afternoon, and the sky was a vivid orange streaked with
violet clouds, almost reminiscent of the day that Cam had drowned. It was
lovelier, though, not still and deadly but lively and beautiful. The trees were
tall and ancient, their leaves the deep green of summer. The forest smelled of
grass and pine needles. Birds whistled to each other, and Cam and her father
stopped to observe a tiny hummingbird that darted across their path and hovered
over a flower, its entire body beating like a winged heart.

They
passed the cypress swamp for which the house was named, and the path grew a
little soggy underfoot. Mr. Johnson had to pause once when his boot became stuck,
and he laughed at Cam, who hopped lightly from one dry spot to the next, in
order to avoid the mud altogether. The water of the swamp was deep green, still
and shimmering under the graceful fronds of the Cypress trees. For a moment,
Cam’s heart was in her mouth. She hadn’t been near a body of water larger than
her bath since the incident at the creek. As she stared at the mirror like
surface of the swamp, it was as if she were once again under the water, staring
up at that beautiful, unbroken surface and knowing that she was dying. Then
something, perhaps a frog, leapt into the water. A ripple rode across the
water, tearing Cam from her memories and reminding her that she was safe above
the water.

“Alright,
Cam?” Her father asked. Cam nodded and they pressed on, past the swamp and
through the deep forest, which was more difficult to navigate but freed them
from the burden of making conversation. Cam allowed her mind to wander as they
climbed over fallen logs and pushed through tangled thickets. She didn’t
realize that they were heading towards the creek until they were almost upon
it. She stopped immediately, pulling her father to a halt along with her.

“What’s
wrong?” He asked her, and Cam stared at him wordlessly for a moment, wondering
if he had already forgotten, or if he were simply so unfamiliar with the forest
that he didn’t realize they were just a few yards from the very creek that she
had almost died in.

“Papa,”
Cam began tentatively, “Papa we’re almost at-”

“The
creek, I know,” he told her.

“You
know?” Cam couldn’t imagine what would make him bring her back here.

“I
want to see it,” he told her.

“What?”

“I
want to see where it happened. Is the spot near here?”

Cam
was at a loss for words. “Not far,” she managed finally, and her mouth was dry
as cotton. The swamp had been disturbing enough. She didn’t think that she
could return to the spot, not now. Maybe not ever. “Papa, I don’t think-”

“Camilla,
be a good girl and humor your papa,” he said, and his tone was unyielding, “now
we’re almost at the creek. Is it upstream or downstream from here?”

Cam
still couldn’t understand why he cared, but she didn’t want to ruin what had
otherwise been an unusually pleasant afternoon with her father. Had it been
anyone else, she would have gone home without a second thought, but her father
was different. Much as she resented him, there was some small, strange part of
her that still wanted to please him, to be close to him. “Downstream,” she said
finally.

“Take
me there.”

They
walked for nearly twenty minutes before Cam suddenly stopped. She wasn’t sure
whether it was the lingering bad conjure in the air, or just her own terrifying
memories, but her heart was suddenly thumping fit to burst from her chest, so
this had to be the spot. She didn’t want to look at the creek, didn’t want to
see the water, but she couldn’t stop herself from turning to confirm that this
was indeed the place.

When
she caught sight of the rock where she had placed her boots just before her
ill-fated wade through the creek, Cam’s blood all but froze, and she took a few
steps back. Her father, on the other hand, stepped forward. He moved right to
the edge of the creek and surveyed the water silently.

Cam
let him examine it for a moment, hoping that he would finish and suggest that
they turn back. When a few minutes passed and he didn’t say a word, she cleared
her throat. “Papa?”

He
didn’t respond, didn’t even turn back to glance at her, but she could see him
shake his head.

“Is
something wrong?” She asked him. The sound of the creek rushing through the
forest was making her jumpy. She was so nervous that she could practically
smell the same herbs that she had scented before the water had turned on her.

“It’s
very strange,” he said quietly, and his voice was so low that Cam had to take a
step forward just to hear him properly. “It’s not even that high. Why,” he
said, as he stepped into the creek, “It shouldn’t have even been above your
knees.”

“Papa,
I should like to go home now,” Cam said. She wasn’t sure what to say to him.
Aunt Beth wouldn’t have asked any questions, she never did, but their father
was a different matter.

“How
did this happen?” Cam’s father asked her, gesturing to the water. “It doesn’t
seem possible.”

“I
fell,” Cam said. “I fell into the water.”

“It
is very peculiar,” her father said. “Nothing seems to make sense on my
property. My wife dies when the carriage house inexplicably bursts into flame.
My daughter nearly drowns in a knee-high creek. Tell me what’s happening, Cam.”

Cam’s
blood had run cold at the mention of Solange. It had never occurred to her that
her father might connect her drowning with her mother’s mysterious death, but
it made sense that he had, as both were unexplained, senseless, and sudden.

“What
is happening at Cypress Hall, Cam, what am I missing?” He turned to her now,
and Cam was alarmed by the expression on his face, altogether too hard and too
suspicious. She wondered if this was why he had asked her on the walk in the
first place, to question her.

“I
don’t know. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Why
did this happen?” He asked, pointing to the creek. “Why do these things always
happen to us? What is it that I can’t see? I’ve tried to make sense of it, but
there’s something that never quite falls into place. Cam—” he stepped toward
her, reached out for her, and the wind blew past, rushing between them and
making strands of Cam’s hair dance.

“Papa,
you’re frightening me,” Cam said. She couldn’t stop thinking about the last
time that she had been at the creek, and between her own horrifying memories
and the way her father was behaving, she was beginning to feel that she was in
the midst of some sort of nightmare.

“You
don’t have to be afraid of me,” he told her. “Fear whatever is happening at
Cypress Hall. Yes, fear that, but not me. There’s no reason for my questions to
make you feel uneasy.”

The
breeze blew again, colder than last time, whipping at the creek, and whatever
part of Cam had taken over and made her compliant and obedient for her father
crumbled. “Well you are making me feel uneasy,” she said sharply. “I nearly
died at this creek not a week ago and you’ve brought me back. Why? If I’d known
that we were coming here I would have stayed in my room. I want to go home now.
If you’re not ready, I’ll return home alone. Goodbye,” she said quickly, and
turned to go, hoping that her father would come back with her. This place made
her nervous, it still felt so bad, so evil, and she didn’t want anything to
happen to him there.

There
was a pause, and then Cam heard her father step out of the creek to follow her.
“Very well Cammie,” he said finally, “let’s go home.” Cam sighed with relief,
but she hated his tone, it was almost . . . defeated, as though he had
surrendered to an opponent that he still couldn’t identify.

They
didn’t speak another word the whole walk home, and Cam’s father didn’t question
her about the creek again, but Cam returned to her room in a worse state than
she had left in. The coldness was back, the evil frost that had slid into her
bones after she drowned. Cam slipped into her warmest dressing gown and decided
to go to bed early. But the gown couldn’t protect her from a chill that rose
from her soul, and sleep refused to come. She stood by the window for over an
hour, rubbing her freezing hands together and staring out over the lawn, gazing
at the spot where the carriage house had once stood. Suddenly it seemed
preferable to be consumed by fire than to be devoured by the cold poison of
conjure in her veins.

How
like Solange, to leave this world in flames. Cam remembered little of her
mother, but she remembered her heat, the way she had held Cam close to her
breast and rocked her to sleep when she was frightened. When Cam closed her
eyes, she could still feel it. She could imagine her mother’s soft hand on her
hair and her warm dress beneath Cam’s cheek.

The
only other time Cam had been so warm and felt so loved was when she was with
Brent, feeling him touch her, with reverence, with fierce desire. Brent was all
but lost to her now, but Cam needed something, needed some contact, something
to hold.

She
turned away from the window and knelt beside her bed, reaching under it with
shaking hands. After a moment of searching her hand brushed against leather,
and she pulled out a small, striped valise. It had been years since Cam had
touched the bag. It was dusty and faded, and Cam could smell a strange musty
odor as she lifted it onto her bed. The night that Aunt Beth held her
coming-out party, Cam had left the dance early and gone upstairs to pack her
favorite childhood items into this valise. At the time she had been
entertaining the idea of running away. Cam had abandoned that plan when she
realized that there was nowhere for her to run to, but she had left her dearest
possessions hidden in the valise, afraid that otherwise Aunt Beth might stumble
across them.

If
she had been more relaxed, Cam would have taken the time to examine everything
in the valise. It had been years since she had seen Betsy, her favorite doll,
or Lee, the wooden lion that Sam had carved for her just a few weeks before his
death. But Cam wasn’t looking for her old toys. There was a small exterior
pocket on the valise, which she quickly unbuttoned. Nestled inside was a glass
vial full of silver ashes. Cam pulled it out, along with several old stockings
that she had stuffed in for padding, and cradled the item in her hand. She had
collected the ash the day after her mother’s death. It had been a bizarre,
disorienting morning. Everyone had been crying, and Cam’s father had locked
himself in his bedroom. Diana had been the one to finally coax him out of it
three days later, and Cam still wondered if her sister had slept at all in the
hours between their mother’s death and their father’s emergence.

Someone
had told Cam that her mother was in a happier place, in the sky with the
angels. She hadn’t believed it. Cam could remember staring up at the cloudy
sky, which was white in some places and gray in others, and thinking that her
mother couldn’t possibly be all of the way up there. It was too distant. How
could one woman make such a long journey? On the other hand, Cam could imagine
her mother in the ash. She could almost feel her there. She had raided the
kitchen for a jar, but found only a vial, and under that dismal sky she had
filled it with the ashes of the carriage house.

At
first the vial had been a comfort to her, but as she grew older Cam had come to
see it as morbid. She had packed it away in the valise when she was sixteen,
and that was the last that she had seen of it for several years. Now, with the
vial in her palm, Cam’s finely honed senses could confirm what she had merely
suspected as a child. There was the faintest echo of her mother in those ashes.
It wasn’t much, but it was the closest that Cam could get to her and suddenly
she didn’t care if it was morbid to keep the ashes.

There
was something else in the vial, the remnants of the very conjure that had
killed Solange. It was dark and destructive, but it was also dormant,
slumbering in the ash. It had been fourteen years since it had been called upon
to harm anyone and Cam didn’t fear the magic as long as it slept.

She
put the valise back beneath her bed and climbed under her covers with the vial
still clutched in one hand. The ashes had still been warm when she had
collected them as a small child, and though that heat and long since faded, she
tried to call it back, to force the warmth back into her hand.

I
feel as if I’m dying, mama.

Help
me.

She
was drowning again, this time in the coldness and the loneliness and the lies.
For a while she didn’t feel any better, and when she finally succumbed to sleep
her blood was still like ice and her heart was still burdened. But as her
breath became softer and the tension eased from her frame, warmth began to
return to her. Deeply asleep as she was, Cam still felt the warmth, and she
dreamt of Brent. She dreamt of his face over hers, of the strength of his hands
on her body and the scent of him. She could hear the low rasp of his voice and
feel his breath on her skin, and it brought her peace.

The
door to Brent’s home was unlocked. Cam hesitated, listening for voices or
movement. All she detected was that same lingering darkness.