The League of Illusion: Legacy (7 page)

Chapter Ten

The hours leading up to dusk seemed hellishly long for Jovan. Skylar had locked herself away in one of the rooms so she could privately contact the council, and so she could also meditate. Druids meditated a lot.

Rhys had holed up in the library. The man constantly had his nose in a book—whatever good it did him, Jovan never understood.

Jovan roamed the halls and other rooms restlessly. He stopped several times at the closed door where Skylar kept herself, pressing his hand to the wood. He considered knocking, with thoughts of other ways to pass the time and relieve the tension, but he knew Skylar would toss him out on his arse if he ever expressed those notions. Instead he wore paths in the carpets from his constant pacing.

When they finally did reconvene in the parlor for a meal the house cook put together, Jovan was as taut as a piano string and just as liable to snap if handled indelicately.

“Did you mention Hawthorne’s visit?” Rhys asked. He sat on the edge of his seat while Skylar informed them of her contact with the council.

“Of course.”

“And what did they say?”

“I don’t think they were surprised.”

“Of course they weren’t,” Jovan burst out. “The Hawthornes likely have a spy or two on the council.”

Skylar set down her tea carefully. “Are you trying to imply that the council’s corrupt?”

Jovan stood, no longer feeling hungry, and paced the room. “Yes, that is exactly what I’m saying. The council is an archaic organization with no real purpose but to meddle and dictate antiquated rules and regulations.”

Rhys sat up straight. “Well, naturally you would think that. Because their antiquated rules stop you from using your magic so recklessly.”

Jovan stopped to glare at him. “Are we really going back to that, dear brother? Still pricks your tight arse that I am and always will be better at it than you.”

Rhys set his knife and fork down on the table, wiped his mouth with his napkin, and stood. There was real menace in the way he regarded Jovan. “Father’s not here to interfere this time.”

“No, but I am.” Skylar sprang to her feet. “As it seems we are done with our meal, it’s time we made our way to Cross Bones to continue our search. Let’s remember, gentlemen, we have a job to do, and the sooner it’s done the sooner we can all part ways. I for one would be glad for that.” She set her napkin on the table, pushed back her chair, and left the room.

Without another word, Rhys followed her out.

Sooner or later, he and Rhys were going to have it out. It was inevitable. For seven years they’d endured a cold war, not speaking to each other, leaving when the other arrived, b n
t,ut now they were being forced together. Two opposing forces in the same cramped container. An explosion was imminent. The problem was, years ago Jovan would have bet without hesitation that he’d be the victor but now he wasn’t so sure. Rhys was a cold, unyielding man but Jovan could see the storms swirling in the gray depths of his eyes. And storms could be unpredictable and unyielding.

The ride to the Cross Bones burial grounds took them across London. Jovan chose to dismiss the driver and drive the coach himself so he could spend the entire ride up top and not have to be near either Rhys or Skylar. They both set his teeth on edge, although in very different ways. He didn’t know which was worse.

By the time they reached the cemetery gates, it was past dusk and the sun had sunk deeply in the west. The imposing, twisted iron gates were closed and locked, naturally, as no self-respecting mourner would visit a grave at night. But there were no mourners and a lock meant nothing to any of them.

He jumped down from the driver’s seat and opened the door for Skylar. She slid out, her leather satchel held tightly in her hand. He knew she carried her tools of the trade inside it. Jovan carried his own leather pouch slung across his chest,
his
tools inside.

“So, now that we’re here, how do we find this Evangeline?” Rhys asked as he surveyed the consecrated grounds from between the iron bars of the fence.

“With this.” Skylar held up the locket. “You just take care of the lock on the gate, I’ll take care of the rest.”

With a nod, Jovan raised his hand toward the chain lock on the gate, but before he could incant any spell, Rhys was there with a heavy iron bolt cutter, snapping the lock with the vise. He pulled the chain through the bars.

Chuckling, Jovan lowered his hand. “I could’ve done it with less effort, brother.”

Rhys refused to respond, just pushed open one side of the gate so they could enter. It creaked as if it hadn’t been opened in years. Skylar went through first, then Rhys, then Jovan at the last.

Skylar handed Jovan her satchel and held up her arm, letting the locket hang down freely. “We’ll need some light.”

Jovan jumped at the chance to show off. He cupped his hands together.
“Accendo.”
A glowing ball of blue light developed inside. When it filled his palms, he released it, and it floated up in front of him.

“The locket will swing back and forth when we are moving in the proper direction. It will stop if we veer off the path.” Skylar held up the locket in front of her toward the north. The locket didn’t move. She turned to her right and did the same. It started to swing back and forth like a pendulum.

“This way,” she said.

They followed her along the narrow dirt path that cut a straight line through the graves. Some had elaborately carved stone markers spouting some sentiment about the deceased.
Here lies Mary Margaret Theodore, loving wife and mother
. But most had only had a stone cross with a name and date chiseled onto it. This was a place for the poor, there would be no crypt or stone statues of tribute. The grounds were not kept clean and trimmed. All they would find here were the dead and forgotten.

At the end of the path, where it veered off in two other directions, Skylar stopped and held up the locket again to get another bearing. The locket had been turning left on the path. They followed that along about four rows of gra sr re="-1">Skyves, when the locket stopped moving.

“She’s here somewhere.” Skylar stepped off the dirt path and started walking along the graves.

Jovan took the other side and the three of them read over the names of the poor dead looking for Evangeline. There were old men and young, wives and mothers, and children. He saw a small fresh grave with a child no older than three.

Then he found her.
Evangeline Stokes, born 1825 died 1844,
the year Sebastian disappeared.

“She’s here.”

Skylar and Rhys joined him at the overgrown grave. Other sites had appeared well attended to, but this one looked to be a half century old. The yellowing grasses grew to the knee, and vines wrapped around the cross like snakes. A shiver went down Jovan’s spine. There was a strong presence around the gravesite. He didn’t sense it was evil, just powerful.

Skylar dropped the locket into her jacket pocket then took her satchel from Jovan. She unfastened it and slid out a gilded mirror about the size of a dinner plate. “Please stand back. I need room.”

Jovan and Rhys moved back a few steps as Skylar knelt on the ground and set the mirror on top of the grave, crushing the grass beneath it. Jovan watched in silent respect as she pricked the end of her index finger with her hat pin and smeared the four corners of the mirror with her blood. As she drew symbols in red, she chanted in ancient Gaelic, the language of the Druids.

When she was done speaking, she peered intently into the mirror. The firelight hovered above her, and the eerie blue glow reflected in the surface. Frowning, Skylar moved the mirror, first left then right, and then tilted it up.

“What’s wrong?” Jovan asked.

“I can’t see anything.”

“Do you need more light?” With a finger he guided the blue sphere closer to her.

She shook her head. “No. That’s not it. Something is blocking me from
seeing.
”

Tightening his grip on his cane, Jovan scanned the area, peering into the dark shadows. “Something or someone?”

“I’m not sure.” She stood, holding her mirror. “Either way, I can’t scry.”

“So it’s a dead end,” Rhys said.

“Yes, I’m afraid so.”

“Not necessarily,” Jovan replied.

Rhys sighed angrily. “We already discussed this, Jovan, and you’re not doing it.”

“I don’t take orders from you, dear brother.”

Skylar slid the mirror back into her bag. “If you do it, I’ll have to inform the council.”

“Then tell them, what do I care? Their rules mean little to me, as we’ve already established.”

“Jovan, please,” she pleaded.

“I’m not leaving here without answers, Skylar. This is our best and only lead. We must find Sebastian.”

She nodded and gave him room. She glanced at Rhys to see if he was going to give Jovan any more grief. His brother just shook his head and said nothing else.

Jovan’s hands shook slightly as he took out what he needed for the ceremony. He’d never worked this spell before—well, not successfully, anyway. Years ago, he tried it s, hhtl on a dead rat. He’d gotten it to twitch its tail but nothing further. At least he had to try. If it didn’t work they were no further behind than they already were, but if it did work, they would get all the answers they needed. It was worth the risk to him.

He pushed four candles into the grave dirt, one at each corner. Then he took out a wooden mixing bowl and poured milk into it from one glass vial and honey from another. He mixed them together vigorously in a counterclockwise motion. When it was done, he dug a little hole in the soil in the middle of the grave and poured the mixture into it.

“A sweet libation to lure you, Evangeline.” He crawled on the ground to light each candle. “A beacon to guide your way, Evangeline.”

He stood then, sensing the fear and apprehension in both Rhys and Skylar as they hovered nearby. Some considered necromancy to be a black art. But Jovan knew that it was not the magic that made it black or white, it was the practitioner behind it.

He held his left hand up over the grave then drew his athame over his palm. Pain sang up his arm as his skin split open, but he didn’t flinch. Blood, dark and thick, ran down his hand and dripped liberally over the grave.

“This is mad, Jovan, you don’t have to go any further.”

Jovan ignored Rhys and continued the ritual. “A blood sacrifice to appease your pain, Evangeline.” He squeezed his hand into a fist to stop the flow. “Rise to me. Rise to me. Rise to me.”

As he waited, Jovan took out the handkerchief from his jacket pocket and wrapped it around his hand.

Skylar approached, reaching for his hand. “Let me see.”

“It’s fine, Skylar. You don’t need to coddle me.”

“I have some healing ability, why suffer needlessly? You don’t need to prove to me you are a man. I already know this.”

Reluctantly, he let her inspect his wound.

She unwrapped the cloth and peered into his palm. “Thank the sun it’s not deep.”

Rhys came up to stand beside them. “I don’t think it’s working. It would have happened immediately.”

Ignoring Rhys, Jovan closed his eyes as Skylar ran her fingertips over his cut. There was sharp stinging, and then a subtle calming heat swept over his skin. Her power enveloped him, seeping into his pores. Healing him.

He opened his eyes and met her gaze. A delicate warm glow surrounded the irises of her eyes. It drew him in, and he wanted to breach the distance between them and kiss her. To feel her. To taste her. Memories of her flooded him fully and he had to open his mouth to gasp the crisp night air or drown inside them.

Rhys was muttering beside him, and he wanted to turn to tell him to be quiet when a muffled crack of wood had them all flinching and gazing down at the grave of Evangeline Stokes.

“That can’t be what I think it is.” Rhys moved back two paces from the grave.

With his hand still touching hers, Jovan turned toward the grave. His heart pounded in his throat as the tall grass began to quiver from the movement beneath it. They formed a semicircle around the grave and watched in awe as the dirt beneath the grass pushed up and skeletal fingers poked through. Skylar gave a little gasp and shuffled closer to him.

More of the corpse broke through the ground. First a hand, then another, then arms, an sthe">Ignod the top of the head with wisps of long dark hair still clinging in desperation to the skull. Jovan had an urge to reach down and help Evangeline out, but to touch the undead was to risk his own demise, as the undead often liked to take the living down with them.

Finally, after what seemed an eternity, the entire corpse of Evangeline had crawled up from her resting place and stood before them on partially rotted and skeletal legs. The dress she’d been buried in now hung in tatters. Cotton fibers decomposed as well as flesh. A face that Jovan was sure had been pretty once was now a patchwork of gray muddled flesh and brittle bone. He had to admit, though, that she looked decent for years dead and buried.

“Now what?” Rhys asked.

“Now I ask her what we need to know.” Jovan took a step toward Evangeline. She turned her head to him. He couldn’t say she looked at him because she would’ve needed eyes to do that. Instead she had gaping gray cavities with bits of grass and clumps of dirt clinging to the sockets. His stomach roiled as he gazed upon her.