5. Necromantic Ex-Husbands Are the Worst
The throbbing in Marie’s temples subsided as she sipped her coffee. Her mind was filled with fear, betrayal, and a fresh sense of loss. Shirley hadn’t said anything of note since they left the square, but Marie knew the conversation they were about to have wouldn’t be easy. Ray was too far gone, but Marie wasn’t sure what to do about it. Despite his actions, she loved him. The Baron was a clever bastard and hard to resist.
“I know what you’re going through.” Shirley stopped. “Ok, not exactly what you’re going through, but I know what it’s like to lose someone to something you can’t explain.” The hardened exterior Shirley had worked hard to cultivate broke. Lines of exhaustion crisscrossed her face and pain lived in the deep wells of her eyes. “I know what I have to do, but I’m not going to force you to hurt someone you love.” Shirley looked around nervously, searching for something.
“Thank you.” Marie didn’t know what else to say. It was more compassion than she had expected. “I know Ray’s still in there somewhere.”
“I’m sure he is, but I need to be honest with you.”
A pit in Marie’s stomach grew hard. She could feel herself growing defensive at the mere implication. Shirley was going to tell her Ray was beyond saving. A tiny voice in her head had been saying the same thing. Hope contradicted the notion. “Alright, be honest with me then.”
“In my time with The Sixth Side, I’ve seen three objects of power. Maybe not exactly like this, but close. One man held on for about five seconds before he liquified—we’re talking full human soup. The other two lasted around two weeks. By the time we caught up with them, they were literal shells of their former self, hollowed out by the magic and left to rot. How you held that staff for a week and came away unscathed is nothing short of a miracle.”
Not entirely unscathed, eh? said a dusty voice in Marie’s mind.
Shut up, she replied. “How long do you think Ray’s had the staff?” Marie thought back to the purple energy that had coursed through his eyes and the cracks in his skin. Ray looked full to bursting. Shirley’s words of ‘human soup’ floated through her mind, but she shook them away.
Shirley shrugged. “Our best guess is a few weeks, but we can’t be sure. All we know is that he was declared dead a few months after you were sent to prison, the body was sent in for interment, and everything was normal.”
The casual way Shirley mentioned Ray’s death was irksome.
“I’m sorry,” amended Shirley. “That’s The Sixth Side talking.” She rubbed at her temples. “They try to break you of everything that makes you fallible and human. You’re supposed to be a threat that I am protecting against.” Shirley glanced nervously over her shoulder again.
“Something bothering you?” asked Marie.
“Apart from the necromancer trying to cause an outbreak that destroys life in New Orleans as we know it? Yeah, I’m pretty sure my bosses can hear every word I’m saying. When the time comes, I’ll be reprimanded, and they’re not known for taking a soft hand with punishment.” Her eyes never stopped moving, flicking between the coffee shop’s various exits and windows.
Marie looked at Shirley’s nervous movements with pity. They were the tried ticks of someone who had been abused and saw no way out. “Who was it that you lost?”
Shirley twitched. “Hrm?”
“You said you lost someone to something you couldn’t explain.”
Pain crossed Shirley’s face again. “She was,” Shirley faltered, giving the room another once over. “Her name was Sarah. Died in a little town called Clearwater a while back. Just before I met Nick actually.” A smile touched the corners of Shirley’s lips. “Back when I was a tabloid reporter, not sure if any of this shit was real, but trying my best to get to the bottom of it. A man killed her, employed by The Sixth Side. After all that, I’m still working with them.”
Marie didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry.” The words came out hollow.
“No, you’re not. You didn’t know Sarah, and you don’t really know me.” Shirley’s face was back to the hard mask she had worn before. “But believe me when I say, I have some idea of what you’re going through. Right now, you’re thinking Ray isn’t gone. You just saw him after all, so how could he be? You might think that it’s The Sixth Side talking through me, but I’m telling you, he’s gone. At least, the man you know is.”
Marie sat back, hearing the words, but still not wanting to believe them. “There’s a chance we could bring him back, right?” Marie knew the answer to her question better than anybody. She had looked into Ray’s eyes and saw a shadow of a man begging for it all to end.
Shirley struggled to find the right words. “Marie, I don’t even know how he’s still standing.”
The lump was back in Marie’s throat, and she did her best to talk through it. “If that’s true, what are we doing here?”
“Right here?” asked Shirley with a small laugh. “We’re in this empty coffee shop because it recently had its windows replaced with triple pane glass and went under new ownership, which means the goons in the van outside are going to have a harder time listening in on our conversation. You and I are talking because I believe you have a chance at a good life.” A fire burned in Shirley’s eyes. “Believe me, if you get a chance to walk away from it all, you take it. This life never gets any easier, and there will always be something to drag you back.”
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Marie considered the prospect of an ordinary life without contact with the forces that had plagued her for the past three years. Even in the few days since leaving prison, it had all gone up in smoke. Despite her best intentions, she was right back in the world of dark magic again.
Haven’t used it yet, reminded the dusty old voice. Its tone rang clear as a bell and rough as gravel.
Maries shook her head, only a little, but enough for Shirley to notice.
“You still feel the effects of the staff, don’t you?” asked Shirley with little surprise.
Marie jumped slightly. Oh, you’re in trouble now.
“Don’t worry, I noticed the day we met you, and assumed long before that. Like I said, your predecessors weren’t nearly as proficient.”
“How am I supposed to live a normal life when I’ve got that connection tugging at the back of my mind every day?”
“I can’t promise anything, but I imagine dealing with The Baron would be a good start.” Shirley sipped her coffee with utter normalcy as if she hadn’t just suggested making a play against a minor god.
“Deal with The Baron? The last time I tried, I ended up in prison and my husband took my place.”
Shirley nodded. “I know, I know. Look, The Baron might be powerful, but at the heart of it all, he wants something, and people who want something can be bargained with. Right now, his plan isn’t going nearly as well as he would like. We’ve got six blocks quarantined and last I heard, everyone who was infected is now far away in a secure facility. The public thinks it’s a biological attack, and belief in magic, voodoo, or anything spiritual has stayed stagnant. Whatever he plans next is going to be desperate.”
“What makes you say that?”
Shirley paused, picking her words carefully. “It’s not going to be easy to hear, but Ray can’t have much time left. Based on what I saw at the square, he’s fighting, but he won’t be able to hold off the power in that staff forever. The Baron needs to make his play now, or he’s going to have to go find someone else, and odds are, they’re going to melt the second they touch that staff. He got lucky with you two.”
“But I don’t understand how. We’re no different than anyone else.”
You think normal people see a celebration of the dead when they walk through Congo Square? Asked the voice. I was pretty damned good back in the day, but not that good.
“I don’t know what to say other than you are. No one could have wielded the staff like you described without some otherworldly connection.”
Marie bit her lip. “Ah, otherworldly?” she asked, hesitant at first, but realizing she had nothing to lose. “Out of curiosity, did you see anything different in Congo Square, aside from the zombies and the all-powerful necromancer?”
Shirley leaned back in her chair. “Aside from that? No.”
Marie nodded. “Alright, what I’m going to say is a little weird.” A flush crept up her cheeks even at the thought.
“Really? You think you can weird me out after all this?”
“Fair enough. Well, I see dead people.”
Shirley simply nodded and took another sip of her coffee. “Well, we’ve all seen dead people recently thanks to Nick. You want to be more specific?”
“Both times I was at Congo Square. They were everywhere, milling around with energy that felt like static.”
“And the staff was there both times. Maybe it’s amplifying a natural part of you somehow. Why was it that you became a tour guide in the first place Marie? Why voodoo?”
Marie hadn’t thought about it much. It had all seemed the natural path at the moment. “As a kid, my mother would read me stories about Marie Laveau and the other prominent figures in the New Orleans voodoo scene. Myths and legends became part of my heritage, the good and the bad. By the time I was working age, I knew more about the ‘secret’ history of the city than what you could find in books, and I couldn’t afford college. Becoming a tour guide was the next logical step. I’m sure it happens to a lot of people.”
Don’t think it has anything to do with your namesake? asked the voice in her head. You go to the lair of the prominent Voodoo Queen and don’t think that has a damned thing to do with it? The voice was almost angry, impertinent.
Why are you still here? Marie tried her best to amplify the thought.
Maybe I’m not.
“Marie?” Shirley waved her hand through the air. “Still with me?”
Marie jumped. “Yeah, sorry, what did I miss?”
“What effects are you still feeling?”
If you tell her, they’re going to lock you up.
“There’s a voice. It’s old, I’m not sure who it belongs to, but it came back when I got close to the staff.”
Asshole. I’ve been here the whole time. Some of us just know how to keep our mouths shut.
“Well, I’d be lying if I said that wasn’t concerning.”
“You wouldn’t be the only one. It’s also annoying as all hell.”
Shirley nodded. “I can imagine.”
“You still haven’t told me what we’re going to do about Ray.” While talking about the voice took one weight off Marie’s chest, the greater still remained.
“I don’t know,” admitted Shirley. She put her hands on her temples, trying to think it through. “I can’t promise that he’s going to come out of this alright, but I can promise if I’m given the opportunity, I’ll do everything I can for him.”
Everything she can. Doesn’t sound like much. The voice barely concealed its contempt.
Marie didn’t think it sounded like much either, but it was the truth, and given the situation, it was all she could ask for. “It’s not ideal, but it’s good enough for me. So, let’s talk about how we’re going to get—”
Shirley’s phone played a tri-tone alert that pierced the diner’s calm air. “Shit,” she seethed, fumbling with the phone and pushing a button to silence the alert.
Marie’s heartbeat sped up. “I’m guessing that’s not a good sound.”
“No, it’s not.” Shirley swiped through screens on her phone, looking more concerned by the second. “That’s the sound for when Nick’s got himself in deep shit.”
“How would he have managed that from a hospital bed?”
Shirley laughed. “We’ve managed worse from hospital beds. Looks like he managed to escape with Lopsang and James and… Oh wow.”
“They didn’t hurt anyone, did they?”
“Physically? No. Mentally, I’m not sure about the effects of a well-placed poltergeist.” Shirley flipped her phone around to show Marie an image of several distressed secret agents covered in ectoplasm while a well-dressed specter wailed above them. “But, believe it or not, that’s not the alert.”
“Right, why would it be?”
Shirley ignored the sarcasm. “The alert means Nick pushed his panic button. He’s been captured. Looks like he followed the right hunch or met up with the wrong old friend. Either way, we should follow his tracker.” Shirley drained her coffee cup and stood to leave.
Marie followed suit. “Can I trust you?”
“No. I’m a government agent, but you can trust that I’ll do my best.”
Marie shifted nervously. “Right, well, let’s go get them out of whatever mess they’ve made now.”