Chapter 33
Chapter Thirty-Three
“I’ve always wanted to spend some time in your house,” I admitted as Miss Elva ushered me through her main living room and back to her gleamingly clean kitchen, where a butcher block island sat in the middle.
“Sit,” Miss Elva ordered, immediately moving to where an apron hung on a hook and pulling it over her head.
Miss Elva didn’t talk to me – instead she opened a door and stepped into a pantry while I looked around her kitchen.
It was fairly small as kitchens go, but unless you’re a millionaire you aren’t getting a huge kitchen in houses in the Florida Keys.
It’s just the way it works down here. You pay a high price for square footage, but nobody complains because you spend most of your time outside anyway.
Miss Elva’s kitchen was done up in a soothing buttercup yellow and cream motif, with pots and pans hanging from hooks overhead and a Haitian-style art piece in dramatic colors on the wall.
Overall, by the kitchen you’d never know that a Voodoo priestess lived here, as opposed to the craziness that existed in her front room. I wondered at the dichotomy of it.
“Miss Elva, why does your kitchen not look like your living room?” I asked, and Miss Elva poked her head out of the pantry.
“The kitchen is where I work. You don’t see a surgeon going into a messy operating room, do you?”
Hard to argue with that logic.
Miss Elva came out of the pantry carrying a brown wicker basket with jars piled high and several small burlap bags.
“What are you going to make?”
“I’m not quite sure what I’m going to use yet, so we’re going in fully stocked,” Miss Elva said.
She opened another cabinet and pulled out a mortar and pestle, sliding it across the butcher-block island at me. She rooted around in her basket for a while before pulling out a jar of red flakes.
“Grind this. Counter-clockwise. Breathe through your mouth,” Miss Elva ordered.
“All of it?” I asked, holding the jar up to the light and shaking it gently.
“All of it; now hush, child, I need to focus,” Miss Elva said, hefting her weight onto a stool as she began to pull items from the basket and lay them in front of her. I noticed pieces of straw, small Popsicle sticks, twine, scraps of fabric, and a variety of jars full of roots and leaves.
“What are you making?” I asked and Miss Elva sighed dramatically.
“Did I stutter? Is there something making you unable to understand the words ‘hush, child’? Do I need to repeat myself?”
“No, ma’am,” I said, turning back to my task.
Now I was even more curious but, knowing she’d kick me off my stool if I said another word, I opened my jar and poured the contents gently into the small stone bowl, being careful to breathe through my mouth as Miss Elva had instructed.
Picking up the pestle, I began to grind the red flakes counter-clockwise, losing myself in the hypnotic rhythm of the grinding motion and trying not to let my worries for Luna consume me.
“That’s good,” Miss Elva’s voice interrupted my thoughts and I realized that I’d ground the little red flakes into a fine dust. “Pour it in this pouch.”
I did as I was told and handed Miss Elva the pouch, wondering what would happen next.
I was surprised to see that she had constructed a little man of sorts in front of her; the wrists and ankles were tied together, the mouth gagged and eyes blindfolded.
She was slowly stuffing herbs into the body of the doll.
“You’re making a voodoo doll? What are you stuffing inside it?”
“Confusion herbs. Valerian. Wormwood and the like,” Miss Elva said, concentrating on the task at hand.
I didn’t want to interrupt her process, so for once in my life I remained quiet, while she finished stitching the little doll closed.
When she was done, she looked at it for a moment, nodding to herself before turning to me.
“Go ahead, ask your questions,” Miss Elva said, getting up to pour herself a glass of water.
“I just…I thought voodoo dolls only worked if you had a piece of hair or a cigarette butt or something from the person you’re trying to control,” I said, resting my elbows on the counter as I studied the doll.
“You’re absolutely right. That’s usually what’s needed,” Miss Elva said, finishing her water with a sigh.
“But you don’t need that?”
“Child, I told you I was old magick. Sure, some of the newer priestesses starting out will need those physical bits to tie the magick to the doll, but I’m stronger than that. All I need is my intent.” Miss Elva smiled at me.
“So why use the doll at all? Couldn’t you just cast a spell without it?”
“I might do that too. I don’t know what we’re walking into. I prefer to have all my tools with me. You don’t go to a gun fight carrying a spatula now, do you?”
I refrained from pointing out that we were going to a potential gunfight and all she was bringing was a doll.
See? I do have a sense of self-preservation sometimes.
“You go on out on the porch now. I have to run some charms on these pouches and I don’t want your thoughts interfering,” Miss Elva said.
“Fine by me, I could use some fresh air anyway,” I said.
I walked through Miss Elva’s living room, restraining myself from stopping to peer at all the curiosities on her shelves, and made my way to the uncomfortable visitor’s chair on Miss Elva’s front porch.
Even though she wasn’t sitting on the porch with me, I still knew better than to sit in Miss Elva’s rocking chair.
“Althea,” a voice said at my shoulder, and I swear I almost jumped three feet out of that chair.
“Damn it, Rafe! I told you not to do that,” I hissed, throwing my hand over my heart as I gave the pirate an evil look.
“Sorry, I forget you can’t sense me,” Rafe admitted, coming to float in front of me.
“Did you find anything out? Did you see Luna?”
“Luna? Why would I be looking for the witch? I thought I was supposed to go look for that crazy horn-wearing Pagan guy?”
That’s right. Rafe hadn’t been with us when we’d discovered Luna had been taken.
“Luna was kidnapped. Presumably by the killer. We have to go to the beach tonight and rescue her,” I explained.
Rafe stood tall and saluted me.
“I will protect my queen at all costs,” Rafe intoned.
“Well, yes, and maybe me too?” I offered, annoyed that he seemed to have forgotten all about me.
“You too – you’re not so bad,” Rafe said.
“Gee, thanks Rafe. Tell me what happened out at the festival?”
“Nothing, actually. I searched for a really long time. It’s like there was never a festival there at all.” Rafe shrugged.
“Really? No fire pit? No battened down grass? No litter? No tents?” I fired off questions at Rafe and he just continued to shake his head no.
“Honestly, nothing. I backtracked and then made sure that I had gone to the right spot, because it looked as though nothing had been there. But I finally found some confirmation of the festival.”
“What was that?”
“There’s sort of an energy portal that has been opened up. It must have been where the crazy dude called on the powers.”
This was not good.
“An energy portal? Like a passageway to hell?”
Rafe shrugged.
“Maybe, maybe not? It’s not huge. Just a bit of pulsing energy there. Something to keep an eye on, for sure. Especially with All Hallows’ Eve next month.”
Fantastic. An energy portal opened up to the underworld right before Halloween. I’m sure nothing bad will happen with that. At all.
Rubbing my hands over my face, I breathed deeply for a moment.
“One thing at a time here, Rafe. We have to get Luna. Then we’ll deal with the energy portal.”
Rafe shrugged his shoulders. He had all the time in the world.
I jumped as a ripple of energy ran through the house, powerful magick pressing against the back of me and causing the hairs on the back of my neck to stand up.
“I love when she uses magick, it’s so sexy,” Rafe breathed, his eyes wide as he peered into the house.
“Yes, super sexy,” I said as the front door cracked open and Miss Elva poked her head out.
“What are we doing about dinner?” she demanded.
“Dinner? I don’t know if I can eat,” I admitted.
“I passed a food truck on the way over here,” Rafe said helpfully. Miss Elva met my eyes.
“Go get us food. Rafe, you go with her,” she instructed as the door slammed behind her.
“Isn’t she great?” Rafe enthused by my side as I walked down the block and turned onto the next street.
“Yes, a real dreamboat,” I said, keeping my wits about me as I scanned the pedestrians cycling and walking by, looking for anything out of order.
The food truck was parked on a corner and advertised take-away Mexican food; the spicy scents wafting from it made my mouth water.
Food trucks had become all the rage in the Keys about five or ten years ago, and it seemed like we had a new one come through every week.
After ordering two platters of steak and chicken fajitas, I made my way back to Miss Elva’s to find her on the front porch, a satchel by her side.
“Sun’s close to setting. Let’s eat and get going. Rafe, did you find anything out today?”
Rafe hung his head in apology.
“I did not. Only that an energy portal seems to have been opened.”
Miss Elva whipped her head up at that news, then speared a piece of steak with her fork.
“Why is it that I have to take care of everything that goes wrong in this town?” she muttered to herself.
“Because you’re the boss queen of the world?” I asked, being more than slightly sarcastic.
Miss Elva pointed her fork at me.
“And don’t you forget it.”