Deadly Curiosities (17 page)

“You must be Lucinda,” I said. “Welcome.”

She smiled, and her dark brown eyes met mine. I felt an instant affinity, and wondered if, like Sorren, she could glamor people. She seemed to guess my thoughts.

“
Non, cherie
. I didn’t spell you. We’re just likely to hit it off,” she said with a chuckle. Lucinda spoke with an accent I identified with New Orleans. Up close, I got a better look at her beads. I could make out complicated traceries carved into the onyx stones, marks I recognized as
veves
, part of the Voudon culture.

“Lucinda has agreed to cleanse your house of evil and strengthen the wardings to protect you,” Sorren said. He glanced toward Teag. “She’ll be doing the same at the shop and at Teag’s apartment.”

“Fine by me,” Teag said.

“I’ve known Lucinda’s family for quite some time,” Sorren said. “She comes from a powerful line of women who are on particularly good terms with the Loa,” he said. “She’s a descendant of Mama Nadege,” he added.

I knew that name. And I also knew that Mama Nadege had been dead for over two hundred years.

Sorren had told me stories about times Mama Nadege – both dead and alive – had aided him with difficult situations. I was honored and a little scared to be in the presence of one of her descendents.

Honored because I knew how much Sorren esteemed Mama’s magic. Scared because this sounded as if he were bringing in the big guns, so to speak.

“Thank you for coming,” I said.

“Something wicked’s come this way,” she said, with a smile to acknowledge her play on the old quote.

“Searching, I think. Yes. Curious. It wants your measure,” Lucinda said, and looked me up and down. “It feels your power. It has a connection to the pieces you’ve handled. And I think it wants to know how much of a threat you are.”

Lucinda eyed the agate necklace I wore to deflect evil. “Let me touch your necklace,” she said. I unclasped it and handed it to her.

She shook her head and I heard “Tsk, tsk, tsk,” under her breath.

“Is something wrong?”

Lucinda met my gaze. “Your necklace has served you well. Its stones have shielded you. They must be cleansed to... recharge... their power. You’ll need them again.”

She looked around my living room and found a side table next to a window. Light from the nearly full moon shone in brightly. Lucinda placed the necklace on the table and let the moonlight bathe it. Then she reached into her bag and withdrew a small pouch of powdered herbs with a spicy, pungent smell.

Next to the necklace, on the smooth wood of the tabletop, Lucinda sprinkled a dusting of her herbs and then drew a
veve
with her finger as she chanted quietly. My knowledge of Voudon was limited, to say the least, but I recognized that particular
veve
. Papa Legba, one of the most famous – and powerful – of the spirit guides.

Lucinda turned back to me. “If we had time to do this right, your necklace should sit in the moonlight for a full cycle of the moon to regain its energy. When the threat is gone, that’s what you must do. But for now, even a night with the moon so close to full will help.”

She turned away before I could thank her. Lucinda laid her large tote bag on a chair and rummaged into it, producing an abalone shell and a cigar-sized bundle I recognized as sage. She struck a match and lit the end of the sage bundle, letting it smolder in the abalone shell as she began to walk counter clockwise around my parlor.

Lucinda murmured as she moved around the room. Her pace changed, and she began to dance. An ecstatic expression was on her face, a look of total concentration and rapture, and I wondered if she had allowed one of her Loas to possess her to draw on the spirit’s power.

Teag, Sorren, and I followed Lucinda at a respectful distance as she danced her way around the perimeter of each room downstairs. A shake of Sorren’s head cautioned us not to speak. I felt a tingle of power in the air, something I associated with strong magic. But the power that rolled off Lucinda was very different from my magic, Teag’s, or even from the sense of the Dark Gift I got from Sorren.

The magic radiated from Lucinda, but it did not originate within her, at least, not from Lucinda the mortal. The magic that suffused the cleansing and protection spells Lucinda was invoking was much older even than Sorren, and I thought again about the Loas, ancient spirits whose followers had called on them for blessing and safety – and vengeance – for untold generations. I’d had a brush with that kind of power before, and I was properly in awe.

Lucinda wasn’t finished until she had led our quiet parade through every room in my house, upstairs and downstairs, including the tiny attic. Baxter followed us, sniffing the air curiously, as if he wondered about the sage and whether it meant food.

Finally, as if she were closing an invisible circle, Lucinda returned to the place where she had begun her chant. She raised her arms to the ceiling and let her head fall back. I heard words in a language I did not recognize, some spoken in Lucinda’s buttery accent, and some in a huskier, strange voice.

Lucinda opened her eyes wide as if looking into some mysterious realm the rest of us did not see, and cried out three times. A tremor shook her whole body, and then she slumped, like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

In the blink of an eye, Sorren was behind her to catch her, although I had not seen him move. His vampire speed always unnerved me, nearly as much as his ability to move in utter silence. Sorren gathered Lucinda into his arms like a child and laid her on my couch.

“Get her food,” he instructed. “Bread, fruit, and water. It’ll refresh her and also serve as an offering to the Loas to say ‘thank you’.”

I hadn’t been home for a couple of days so I’d skipped going to the store, but I did have a loaf of bread handy as well as an apple, which I sliced and put on a plate next to the bread. Personally, I would have wanted some cheese to go with it, but Sorren hadn’t mentioned it and I didn’t know how Loas felt about cheese, so I kept it simple.

By the time I returned, Lucinda was sitting up and chatting with Sorren and Teag. She accepted the plate gratefully and took a drink of water, then sighed.

“Everything is cleansed and blessed,” Lucinda assured me. “My wardings are strong. Powerful Loas helped me. Not much will break through easily.”

Not exactly an iron-clad guarantee,
I thought.
If I take her literally,
‘
something’ could break through, but it will have to work for it.
Still, it was better than before.

“Thank you,” I said, meaning it from the bottom of my heart.

Lucinda reached over to pat my hand, and I felt a slight
zing
that had nothing to do with static electricity. This was one powerful practitioner. “You’re Sorren’s friend. That’s good enough for me.”

I yawned, and hurried to cover my mouth, not wanting to look impolite. Baxter, seemingly unfazed by everything that had happened – or at peace with Lucinda’s brand of magic – stretched up on his hind legs and scratched at my knees to be picked up. I settled him onto my lap.

“Now that your house is taken care of, Lucinda and I will accompany Teag back to his place and make a similar warding,” Sorren said. “Tomorrow night, we’ll do the same at the shop. They’ve all been warded before, but it’s best not to take chances.”

“Do you think whatever came here will come back?” I asked.

Lucinda frowned. “If it does, it’ll know that powerful spirits are watching over you. And if it has lesser spirits in league with it, the wardings I cast won’t let them get past the sidewalk.”

I glanced at Sorren. “Will it stop Corban Moran? Will it stop a demon?”

Sorren and Lucinda exchanged a glance I couldn’t decipher. “For Moran, the warding should cause him more trouble than I think he’ll want,” Sorren said.

“Loas are jealous spirits,” Lucinda replied. “Once they’ve been invoked, they feel a mite possessive.

They won’t take kindly to a demon poking about.”

In both cases, less than an iron-clad guarantee, but magic didn’t come with a warranty. It would have to do. I had a moment’s mental image of a bunch of frustrated spirits and demon minions milling around outside my piazza gate.

“Thank you,” I said again. “And thanks for doing Teag’s place as well.” Lucinda inclined her head. “Of course.”

I rose to walk them to the door. Baxter nested happily in the warm cushion I had left behind. “Good night,” I said, suddenly feeling the full effect of the last few days. I locked the door behind them, turned off lights and scooped Baxter into the crook of my arm, and then headed up the stairs to bed. Maybe it was Lucinda’s wardings, or sheer exhaustion, but I slept like a log.

T
HE NEXT MORNING
was drizzling rain. I muttered at my alarm when it rang. I was supposed to be off today but with Maggie still recuperating from food poisoning, it was just another day.
Teag and I are going to have to hire some additional help as soon as this is over
, I promised myself.

I was running late. Baxter waited patiently while I showered and dressed, then playfully pounced from step to step as we went downstairs, certain that kibble would shortly appear in his dish. He was not disappointed.

I toasted two slices of bread, slathered them with peanut butter and stuck them into a sandwich bag so I could eat at the store. I’d wait for coffee until I got there, too. I liked to have time in the shop before the customers started coming in. Baxter was staying home today. With a quick kiss for Baxter, I slipped out the door, making a mental note to stop for groceries on the way home or I’d be eating dry cereal for supper.

Teag was already at Trifles and Folly when I arrived, and I smelled fresh coffee brewing. He was the best assistant manager ever.

“How did it go with Lucinda last night?”

“She made short work of the apartment,” Teag replied, sipping his cup of tea. “Sorren suggested that she also ward Anthony’s place, to keep the folks who are out for our heads from deciding to go after him to get to us.” He looked as if that possibility had cost him some sleep. “I have a key, so I let her in since he was working late.” He sighed. “I don’t know how I’ll explain the smell.

“I couldn’t sleep last night,” he confessed. “So I spent some time on the Internet and the Darke Web.

Anthony sent me a list of names for the murder victims the police have connected along with the three his friend found out about, so I did some digging and plotted where each body was discovered. I left the map in your office. Take a look when you have a chance. Maybe it can narrow down our search.”

“The real question is – search for what?” I said, tucking my things beneath the counter and heading to the back to make my coffee. He followed.

“We’re pretty sure Moran is behind things, but what does he want? What’s the demon got to do with it? And what’s up with the dead men – or the missing salvage team?” I munched my peanut butter toast as I thought about all the important stuff we didn’t know.

“I’ll watch the front,” Teag said. “Why don’t you have a look at the map?”

His insistence told me that Teag had already formed a theory and that he was waiting for me to validate it or poke holes, so I headed to my office, where Teag had left a map.

I spread the map out on my desk. The old Navy yard was about a forty-five minute drive from the historic section of the city, over in an area that was mostly used for shipping and warehouses. It wasn’t the prettiest part of town, but it also wasn’t known as particularly crime-ridden. Many of the murders had either happened near the Navy yard, or the bodies had been left there. Either way, it suggested a connection. Or maybe it was just a good place to dump a corpse and not be seen.

I let out a long breath and picked up a pencil. I drew a line from dot to dot, and it was an amoeba-like, squiggly sort of thing. With the dots connected, I could see what was inside the sort-of-circle. Squinting, I could make out the names of some of the buildings. To my eye, a lot of what was enclosed by the circle was empty space. That might mean that there really were no buildings – possible since the old military yard was being repurposed, and so many of the original buildings had either been torn down or were abandoned. Or it could mean that any buildings that were in use weren’t big enough to bother mentioning.

I grabbed a piece of paper and made some notes. First, I wrote down the streets that made a rough border around the area where the murders had occurred. Then I wrote down the names of the biggest buildings along that route that showed up on the map. A couple of them appeared to be warehouses.

One spot had a building without a name. There was an office building and something that appeared to be a lab or a research facility. Not much to go on, but it was a start.

When I refilled my coffee, I poked my head out to see if we had customers. One stalwart soul had braved the rain and was browsing, but Teag was taking care of him. I went back to my office and plugged in the names of the buildings I had identified on the map.

None of the places I found screamed supernatural trouble spot. I copied down the names and address of the warehouses, came up completely dry on two of the other buildings, and read the Wikipedia entry about the Navy yard for good measure.

“Made a sale,” Teag sang out when I heard the door close behind our customer. “How about you?”

I brandished my notes as well as a printout of the Wikipedia page. “I found out a few things.”

“Spill!”

I recapped my results, and then smoothed the print out on the counter. “Here’s a tidbit that might be important. The whole Navy yard area has been in use for a long time. During the Civil War, several of the old warehouses were used as hospitals or holding areas for prisoners of war.”

“Meaning some bad mojo,” Teag supplied. I nodded.

“Caskets of soldiers killed in conflict during World War I, World War II, and Vietnam came through the yard, and the unclaimed bodies were stored there until arrangements could be made.” I added. We both knew that could mean restless spirits.

Teag gave me a sidelong look. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”