Chapter 8
DANIELLE
The cathedral archives felt like a tomb—which, considering we were literally surrounded by centuries of the dead, wasn't entirely inaccurate.
The musty air carried whispers of old prayers and even older secrets as we hunched over the Les Gardiens du Voile documents by the light of Dea's purple witch fire.
My hands trembled as I traced the intricate binding diagrams. Each line represented a thread that held back something that had killed eleven thousand people.
It was impossible to wrap my mind around the magnitude.
"Okay, let's back up. We need seven bloodlines," I muttered for the tenth time, as if repeating it would magically make the missing families reappear. "Specific families to work in perfect synchronization during the celestial alignment."
"Which is in three days," Kota added grimly, checking her phone. "During the new moon. Perfect timing for a supernatural shitstorm."
Dea looked up from a family genealogy chart she'd been studying. "What happens if we can't find representatives from all seven lines? What if the Collector really has eliminated them?"
"Then we improvise," I said, though the words felt hollow even as I spoke them. "We find a way to adapt the ritual or—"
"Or we're all dead," Lia finished bluntly. "Along with everyone at the reunion party."
The silence hit like a brick to the face. Even Lucas and Noah, who were doing their whole protective-shifter thing at the entrance, looked like someone had just told them Christmas was canceled. Forever.
I rubbed my temples, feeling a headache brewing that had nothing to do with the questionable coffee I'd chugged earlier. "You know what I really miss about the old days?" I muttered. "When the biggest crisis was running out of rum on a Friday night."
"You and me both," Kota agreed.
Don't get me wrong—I could handle a good old-fashioned life-or-death situation. Those were simple. Straightforward. Someone tries to kill you, you try to kill them back. Preferably with more success. Easy math.
But this? Having the fate of every poor bastard in the city—hell, maybe the entire country—sitting on our shoulders like the world's worst backpack? That was a special kind of torture I hadn't signed up for.
I was about to suggest we pack up and head back to Willowberry when Dea suddenly went rigid. Her eyes rolled back, showing only whites, and her voice dropped to a whisper that seemed to come from somewhere else entirely.
"The threads are not broken," she said in a tone that made my skin crawl. "The bloodlines persist. They are hidden and protected. They are waiting for the call."
"Dea?" I reached for her, but Lia stopped me with a sharp shake of her head. This was the lifeline we needed. Shaking whatever spirit had hitched a ride would be monumentally stupid.
"The Castellano line... the old cemetery by the river.
The Moreau branch... hiding in plain sight among musicians.
The Fontaine family... they weren't killed.
.. changed their name." Her voice carried an otherworldly quality that definitely wasn't hers.
"They're all still here. All still alive. We just have to find them."
The spirit released its hold abruptly, and Dea stumbled backward, catching herself against the nearest shelf. She pressed the heel of her palm against her forehead and winced. "Ugh, that was like having someone rummage through my brain with oven mitts."
"What else did you learn?" I asked as Lia helped steady her. "Because whatever just hijacked your noggin felt important."
"I got the impression of a roadmap." Dea rubbed her temples. "The families everyone thought were wiped out? They're not dead. They just got really, really good at hiding."
We spent the next hour digging through the archives, turning Dea's spirit-guided intel into actual leads. Dusty ledgers, faded marriage certificates, and yellowed birth records became our new best friends as we traced bloodlines through generations of careful camouflage.
"This is interesting," Lucas said, holding up a yellowed property deed. "There's a notation here about perpetual care arrangements for cemetery plots tied to the Castellano name."
Noah frowned at a church registry. "And this mentions 'special musical arrangements for the Moreau family relocations’. What the hell does that even mean?"
"Probably code for 'we're helping these people disappear’," Lia said, studying another document. "Look at this birth certificate. Someone scratched out the original surname and wrote one over it. You can still see traces of the old name underneath but it’s difficult to make out either name."
I stared at our meager pile of cryptic paperwork. "Okay, we've got cemetery caretakers, underground musicians, and name-changes. Someone left us a puzzle with half the pieces missing."
"At least it gives us hope," Lia said, stuffing documents into her bag. "And actual places to start looking."
"It's like winning the lottery," Kota quipped. "One that involves preventing apocalyptic doom."
The climb back to street level felt like ascending from the underworld. When we finally emerged into the humid New Orleans night, the city felt different. It was more alive and infinitely more dangerous. Every shadow could hide a harvester. Every stranger could be working for the Collector.
"Where should we start?” I asked
Dea lifted her long, red curls off her neck and fanned herself. "I vote we start with the cemetery. Maybe there's a Castellano descendant hanging around that can tell us what happened to those who came after."
"That’s actually a great idea,” Dre replied as we reached the pack parking lot.
We were loading into Lia's SUV when my phone buzzed with a text from Cami. "Emergency at the plantation. Something's wrong with the guardian spirits. They're going crazy."
"Change of plans," I announced, showing them the message. "We're all going back to Willowberry. Now."
The drive back felt like being in an Indy 500 race.
I gripped the door handle as Lia took another turn a little too fast. My mind was spinning with everything.
"Dea," I said, tilting my head to look at her.
"Have there been more spirits hanging around Willowberry lately? Besides Mary Alice, I mean."
She had the ability to see ghosts that the rest of us couldn't. We'd made an unspoken agreement early on that she wouldn't tell us exactly how many spirits called the plantation home. Not knowing the full extent of those who remained made it easier for Lia, Dre, and me to live there full-time.
The plantation's history was complicated.
It was beautiful in some ways, and horrific in others.
We knew there were souls who had never found peace.
People who had suffered and died on that land through no choice of their own.
We respected their presence, tried to honor their memory, but living day-to-day, knowing the exact number of those still trapped there would have been overwhelming.
Dea considered this, her brow furrowing. "There have been some newcomers, but not many. There are a few old plantation spirits who've always been around.”
"How many are we talking about total?" Kota asked.
"Maybe a dozen, give or take. They've been keeping to themselves. There weren't enough to cause any real problems." Dea paused, studying my face. "Why? What are you thinking?"
"Just trying to figure out if—" I started, but was cut off as we pulled into the parking lot.
Lia came to a screeching halt and threw the car in park.
The plantation's usually peaceful grounds were in absolute chaos when we got out. There were dozens of spirits visible to all of us. They were flickering between trees like angry lightning bugs. They didn’t seem like the benevolent presences Dea had described.
These spirits were agitated, aggressive, and very, very pissed off.
"What the hell is going on?" I asked Cami as we jogged toward the main house. She was beneath the portico with Cyran and about a half dozen of his relatives.
"It started about an hour ago," she explained.
Her usual calm was cracking around the edges.
"The spirits appeared, then became agitated, and finally downright hostile.
They're not attacking anyone, but they're making it impossible for our guests to sleep.
Mary Alice is trying to calm them, but even she can't get through to them.
There's something else. Look at the oak trees. "
I followed her gaze, and my blood turned to ice water. The ancient oaks that had stood guard over Willowberry for centuries were changing. Their leaves were turning black, starting from the tips and spreading inward like some kind of supernatural blight.
It wasn't just the trees that caught my attention.
The pixies that called the plantation home were in full panic mode.
Talewen, Ceisella, Jalin, Adern, and Janoac were all flitting around furiously.
Their tiny bodies left trails of sparkling pixie dust as they darted from tree to tree.
Their normally cheerful chiming voices had turned into urgent, high-pitched squeaks as they worked their magic, desperately trying to combat whatever darkness was creeping through the oak's ancient bark.
Ceisella hovered near a particularly affected branch.
Her hands glowed with silver light as she pressed them against the blackening leaves.
They began turning green, but I felt the drain on her.
Talewen and Jalin were working in tandem.
They were weaving protective spells around the trunk of the largest oak.
Their combined magic created ribbons of golden dust that seemed to slow the blight's progress.
Adern and Janoac buzzed frantically around the canopy.
Their tiny forms were barely visible except for the shimmering trails they left behind.