Chapter Twelve Marie #2
A rumbling laugh caught Marie’s attention.
She turned to find Mayor Felix Corbin the glowing picture of health, almost as if he hadn’t been one breath away from dying of Jon’s plague only days ago.
Marie plucked a glass of wine from a passing tray, wordlessly slipping through the muzzy haze of cigar smoke and merrymaking.
“Bonjour, Felix,” said Marie. “You seem to be on the mend.”
“Marie Laveau,” Felix said with a slow smile. He had on a dashing mask of copper and gold. “I suppose I have you to thank for this small miracle.”
“What else are friends for?” Marie held his gaze until he looked away. As she had hoped, he had not so easily forgotten the debt he owed her for saving his life.
Mayor Corbin blanched a little at the memory. He leaned in, plucking a dark curl from Marie’s shoulder. “Such pretty hair! What a pity you wear it veiled.”
That colored women had once been forced to keep their hair covered while strolling the streets of New Orleans during daylight hours was common knowledge.
Although the days of Spain’s control of New Orleans were long gone, Marie still wore her hair this way in the ritual of tradition.
“Such were once the rules, Mayor. Surely you need no reminding?”
He lifted his copper-and-gold mask, flashing the side of his face that Jon’s plague had eaten away at. “Could you—”
“I couldn’t. Such magic is beyond my reach.”
She very well could. Marie knew what he wanted—what they all did.
To have that ugly reminder of Jon’s power wiped from the skin, from the city’s memory, as if the whole ordeal had never happened.
How curious it was that a man who publicly flogged the backs of his slaves, created ghastly scars in dark flesh without a second thought, wanted a single scar gone.
Corbin frowned, his eyes lingering bitterly over her. “I doubt very much anything is beyond your reach, even your queen’s rules. Some might say you saved my life to bend them in your favor.”
“I was only doing as I was bid, Monsieur.” Under Sanite’s careful rule, her Voodoo had limits. There were certain expectations for her power to keep the peace. And healing him of his scar was simply not one of them.
“You do not fool me, witch. You may wear a mask, but I have glimpsed the face that lies beneath it. Do you want to know what I think?” He leaned in, his voice a warm breath at her ear.
For all the honey in his voice, Marie heard the venom too.
“I think you are far worse than that wretched Voodoo Queen of yours.”
“And why is that?”
Corbin pulled away. “Because at least Sanite serves her people. But you?” His eyes flicked over Marie, silently appraising. “You, Marie Laveau, serve only yourself. And that’s a trait I quite admire, actually.” Those eyes brightened with interest. “Send Sanite my regards, Madame Laveau.”
“Of course,” said Marie. She bowed her head, dipping low into the expected curtsey.
Felix pulled his mask back down and excused himself to entertain Governor Jean-Francis, who’d just arrived from Baton Rouge, two golden-cheeked courtesans hanging on his arm, a cloud of simpering fools in his wake.
The air rippled, like the wingbeat of a bird had flown over her.
She was overcome with the familiar smell of snakeroot and something older and unnamable.
It was the smell of ancient magic, viscerally divine, as if the gods themselves had stepped foot into the mortal plane.
By the time Marie raised her eyes again, someone else entirely was standing before her.
He was a tall man, powerfully built, with dark skin that gleamed in the lantern light, smooth as a blackbird’s wing.
A gentleman’s top hat sat upon his head, and a black feathered crow mask obscured most of his face, except for his eyes, which were bright gold, the piercing eyes of a hawk. Marie knew exactly who he was.
The orchestra began a new song. Lovely. Mournful. The kind of number that swept you along in the gentle swell of its waves, each lambent note begging you to follow it to its very end.
“Get up, love,” Jon the Conjurer said, a hint of a laugh in his voice. “A queen never kneels.”
Jon was different than he had been that fateful day ten years ago, when he had been chained to the flogging post. The man before her was no slave.
He held himself tall, dignified, reeking of self-assured power.
His eyes were as she remembered: keen, almond-shaped, molten like the liquid gold the alchemists sought.
His hair was full of beautiful dark coils, longer than she remembered.
His right ear bore a curious little piercing, an amber crescent moon.
“Hello again, Jon,” she finally said.
“Marie Laveau.” He spoke her name softly, like a spell, his gaze raking over her. “Shall we have this dance?”
He offered his hand. Marie stared at it, acutely aware that a man like Jon did not offer himself so freely, even for a dance. She had to remind herself this was the man who’d nearly undone her queen, who was supposed to be the strongest of them.
Marie hesitated, cheeks burning as Jon waited patiently for her next move.
She had nothing to fear, really, Marie reminded herself.
This was the game Sanite had asked her to play, after all.
And what danger was Jon the Conjurer to her?
If it was the throne he was after again, he could have it once Marie got what she wanted from him.
Marie placed her hand in his warm, strong grip.
He pulled her into a dance, and they fell into easy step, familiar with each other in a way that startled her.
His hand lightly caressed her lower back, and she shivered.
Dappled starlight shone above them, winking in and out as they glided across the mist-covered cobblestone.
“You make for a vision in white, Marie. Tell me, did you choose the color in remembrance of the day you married your husband”—his eyes fell over Marie’s white owl costume—“or in mourning for the day he died?”
Marie’s mouth quirked into a wry smile. He hadn’t intended to wound her, she realized. He was testing her. “Both.”
“Did you like my invitation?” he asked, a touch of dark mirth in his voice. “I confess I made a bit of a mess trying to reach you.”
“I would prefer if you had not killed men to get my attention.” Her eyes slowly found his, the gold searing her just as intensely as the first time she had met him. Her heartbeat quickened.
His hand was on her cheek again. Marie did not shrink away from his touch. How long had it been since a man had touched her? Since anyone had? It was lonely work, the work of Voodoo. Jon knew this best.
“They were no innocents, priestess,” Jon said softly. It was as if he could read her thoughts, as if he too were remembering that day they stood in the dusk together beneath the crows. “You know what they are. What they do to us. And you do not care?”
She cared. Those men had been masters in every sense of the word. They owned folks because they could. But there were some free colored Creoles who owned their own people too. Would Jon kill them as well? She stared into his eyes and saw cold resolve. Yes. Yes, he would if it came down to it.
“You’ve made things considerably difficult for the Voodoos, Jon. Sanite Dede is not happy with your handiwork.”
“When is that old crone ever happy with anyone?” This drew a laugh from Marie, and he stared down at her, eyes twinkling.
“I confess, even after everything…she is fond of you. Why do you think you still yet breathe in her city?”
“Her city? If this were truly her city, do you think our kind would walk about collared and heeled like fucking dogs begging for scraps?” Anger deepened his voice now. Magic vibrated from him, emanating along his skin in cold waves.
Marie grew silent. Jon spun her in a twirl, and she fell into his chest, against the hard, corded muscle beneath his shirt. Marie blinked, gathering her senses about her. She had one mission. One task to be done. Nothing more. “Sanite wants you gone by dawn.”
“And you?” Jon asked, drawing near enough that they might kiss, his lips a breath from hers. “What do you want, Marie?”
He was watching her closely, a glimmer of mischief in his dark eyes. Another test. “Things you couldn’t possibly give me,” she said at last. “Not yet.”
“I could give you power beyond your limits, priestess. Show you magic older than this land”—his gaze flickered to her lips, then back up to her eyes—“and pleasures you’ve not dared imagine.”
A shiver down her belly, between her thighs. “Tempting words, I confess,” Marie breathed at last.
“Words have power, Marie. Cut a man’s arm off and he’ll use the other to steal. But cut off the tongue? He’ll be left without a proper sword to defend himself,” Jon said with an impish smile.
“Sword?” Marie’s eyebrows drew together in mock confusion. “You speak as if this is a battle and not a dance.”
“A battle, no.” He stilled, their dance done. “But war?” He leaned in close, lips brushing her ear. “War I will have, and war I will win.”
A scream tore through the sky. Another. And another.
Marie turned, shocked to see men and women on the ground, writhing in agony, blood and black bile spurting from their mouths.
A gentleman standing next to Marie dropped his goblet, splattering wine down his front.
He clutched at his throat, clawing at his own skin as if it were a collar, eyes bulging.
Marie whirled to Jon, who was watching the man as if trying to work out a particularly vexing puzzle. “Jon! What have you done?”