Corentin glanced at Taylor, looking for the same recognition.
Taylor shrugged. “It’s worth a shot.”
Corentin nodded to Gabrielle. “Help,” he said and pulled his hands away from his bleeding thigh. He watched her face. “Help.
Pelh?
You understand?
Pelh?
” He spoke in Curse Word for her comfort.
Gabrielle smiled and rubbed her hands together. Orange sparks scattered from her fingers, followed by flicks of ethereal flames.
Corentin reached out for Taylor, and they linked hands. “This will likely suck.”
Taylor shushed him. “You said so yourself—there’s a lot you can survive.”
“Yeah,” Ringo said with a grin. “Don’t be such a cupcake.”
Corentin braced himself and lay back on the chaise. Gabrielle parted her glowing hands and flicked her wrists to adjust her sleeve cuffs. She inched her hands over Corentin’s wound, and the licks of magic reached out for his bloody flesh. Corentin hissed and forced himself to suck in deep breaths.
“You okay?” Taylor asked; he couldn’t hide the concern.
“Oh yeah, that burns,” Corentin said between deep breaths.
“I’m here, okay?” Taylor assured him.
Corentin gritted his teeth and squinted from the obvious pain. He raised his thumb in approval. “Got it.”
Taylor settled his attention on Aliss. “Now you’re going to answer my questions. An Enchant girl, Lacey Palmer, claims to know you.”
Aliss crossed her arms, seeming to grow distant. “Yes, she’s our undercover agent.”
Corentin grunted. “If by undercover you mean stoned out of her mind on Dust.”
Aliss brushed her bangs from her forehead. “She knew the risk. Her mission is to get closer to Zane Chopin, a Dust dealer. We believe he has connections to an individual they call Hook.”
“Hook?” Taylor and Corentin said in unison.
“This Zane guy wouldn’t happen to have an obsession with clocks, would he?” Ringo asked.
“They call him the Crocodile,” Aliss said with a nod.
Taylor and Corentin exchanged glances. “We might have run into him,” Taylor said, “at Fort St. Philip.”
“The witches’ prison,” Aliss said, then tapped her chin. “Princess Valentine accompanied you to Fort St. Philip, correct?”
Taylor hesitated and gave a slight shake of the head. “How did you know?”
“Lacey had suspicions about him. She believed Princess Valentine was involved.” Aliss nodded with a smile, as if ruminating to herself. “She had planted herself at Jackson Square.”
“She was onto us the entire time?” Taylor asked.
Aliss nodded. “She is quite clever. Even when drugged, no one would believe her about the babblings of the Library.”
Taylor frowned. “So, we were pawns in your little operation to catch Ray? All the while we’re trying to get to the bottom of this mess?”
“Oh, of course not,” Aliss said and smiled. “You three happened to be in a fortunate place at the time.”
Corentin gnashed his teeth. “Do you listen to yourself?”
Taylor stepped forward as a direct challenge to Aliss, but Zee whimpered in response, making him stop short. “What do you want with us? I told you, we retired from all of this. We saved the world and all of the Enchants once already. Once is enough.”
Aliss crossed her arms and tapped her foot. “And it was that act of saving the world, as you say, that threw everything off. You two have upset the balance quite a bit.” She cast a dominating stare at Taylor, and Zee whimpered again. “Thanks to you setting Idi’s plan into motion, Snow White has become our top priority.”
“Well, get in line.” Taylor scowled.
“Oh, Princess Hatfield, you don’t seem to understand that you and Mr. Deveraux are a part of that case. We’ve been watching you for quite a long time. Mr. Devereaux especially piqued our interest some time ago.”
“Because he’s with me and not a prince.” Taylor slipped out of his coat, thankful to finally be warm.
“Taylor,” Corentin said. There was a warning in his tone.
Taylor glanced over to Corentin as the last bits of his skin sealed back together under Gabrielle’s powers. “You okay?”
Corentin glared at Aliss instead. “I’ve been down this road enough this week already,” he grumbled, and Gabrielle backed away. She seemed to admire her healing skills. Corentin’s new skin steamed from her power.
“Ah,” Aliss brightened and watched Corentin. He frowned darkly. “He doesn’t know.”
Taylor’s heart set off at a slamming pace. “Know what?”
“Did you read it?” Aliss asked Corentin, seeming to dismiss Taylor.
Corentin glanced at Taylor and then back to her. Was he considering his answer? Now that he was put on the spot, he couldn’t keep the truth from Taylor anymore.
“What is she talking about?” Taylor asked.
“Taylor.” Corentin’s tone wanted to stop the conversation.
Taylor refused to back down. “Tell me.”
“Did you read it?” Aliss repeated. She tilted her head, waiting for an answer.
“I did.” Corentin’s words only led to more confusion for Taylor.
“Read what?” Taylor’s voice trembled. He wondered if he wanted to know.
Corentin furrowed his brows at Aliss, and they spent a long moment in silence. “A journal,” he said. “It was FedExed to me in Sullivan.”
“A previous one?” Taylor asked. “Where did you get it?”
Corentin cast a sideways glance to Gabrielle and Aliss. “My journals have a way of finding me.”
Taylor crossed his arms. “What did it say?”
Corentin didn’t answer. Instead, he rubbed his newly healed thigh. He smiled at Gabrielle. “Good,” he told her before translating. “
Doog. Uoy did doog.
”
“You’re dodging the question,” Taylor said, tapping his foot. “What did it say?”
Corentin looked at Aliss. She stood, tall and proud. He said nothing.
She smiled. “It’s time he knew.”
May 9
In the Deepest Bayous….
TAYLOR HOPPED
out of the truck onto the crunchy, frozen grass. Pebbles crackled under his feet. He pulled his coat tighter around himself and then patted his gloved hands together. It had long ago become futile to keep them warm, but at least he could fight the numbness.
The bayou slithered through the cypress trees, the currents vanishing into the cattails and curtains of spanish moss. Only the locals knew how far the swamps reached and where they led, if they led anywhere at all. The cattails splintered under his touch and scattered in thick shards like glass.
Taylor sucked in a gasp at a water moccasin at his feet. But the snake had been frozen solid as it devoured a mouse. Overhead, icicles swayed like wind chimes, and they tinkled out a nonsense tune.
Ringo kept close to Taylor, his wings fluttering with their own oddly happy tune. “You know what would have been super helpful? If you had the power of summer. That would be amazing, right?”
Taylor didn’t answer. He nibbled his lip as Corentin took the lead into the brush. Out of the many faded memories, it was like Corentin knew exactly where to go. It wasn’t a memory; it was a hunter’s instinct.
Corentin stopped at the shoreline, silently watching and waiting for something to appear.
Taylor furrowed his brows in concern. Had it been like this a couple of years back when Corentin had found Taylor on the Jersey shore? Watching the gray waves, waiting for his life to click together? Waiting to stop being so lonely? Waiting to realize Corentin was on his side?
He hadn’t let Corentin in then. He hadn’t been ready to admit he needed him; unsure he was ready for the kind of life they’d ended up leading. He had lain there as Corentin grinned with him pinned to the beach—had been ready to kiss Corentin, but then panicked. He had pushed Corentin away, not because he didn’t want to kiss, but because at the time it wouldn’t have meant anything. He had to wait for it to mean something. He had to be sure.
Now, as Corentin stared over the bayou, and the icy swamp water cracked with troubling snaps and grinds, Taylor wasn’t sure if Corentin had ever let him in.
Aliss hung back at the truck, and she nodded for Taylor to go on ahead of her. Hesitantly, he obeyed and headed to Corentin’s side.
They stood in silence, neither looking at the other. Both of them watched the snow flurries drift over the flat, frozen water. The wind pushed against the cypress trees just enough that branches snapped and shattered against the cold ground. Like cinder blocks on concrete, the natural beauty of the bayou smashed into nothing.
But there was wonder here too. The light filtered through the thick sheets of ice encasing the spanish moss and cast prismatic webs of light over the grounds. The pattern painted over Taylor and Corentin as they stood together. For the moment they could forget why they came.
“It’s… beautiful…,” Taylor whispered. He reached for Corentin’s hand, but Corentin stepped away. Ashamed, Taylor put his hand to his chest.
Corentin put his hands in his pockets and pressed his lips together in a pensive line. There was no telling where he was right now. As far as Taylor knew, he wasn’t even mentally in the same place as his physical body. Would he say anything at all?
Taylor’s stomach clenched.
Please
, he wanted to say,
please say something
.
The silence persisted.
Taylor shivered from the creeping anxiety prickling through his nerves.
“Many friends died here,” Corentin said in a detached tone, as if he were stating a fact on a chart.
“I’m sorry,” Taylor said and tried to swallow against the cold in his throat. “I’m learning a lot about you here. I thought I knew all there was.”
“I know.” Corentin wouldn’t look at him, and his tone enforced the distance between them. “I’ve kept things from you. I shouldn’t and I know that.” He sighed a long, tired breath. “You’ve made such an effort to let me in, yet I’ve barely extended the courtesy.”
Taylor smiled. “Well, we can start now.” He looked at Corentin, but Corentin was still a million miles away. “We’ve been through so much together, and I’m with you for all eternity it seems like. No matter what forms we take.” He rubbed his hands together and puffed a hot breath into them. He chuckled. “Maybe I’ll come back as a pretty girl next time.”
Corentin snorted. “Storyteller, I hope not.”
Taylor blinked and cracked a slow grin. That seemed to get through to him. “Really?” He ran his top teeth over his bottom lip. “I was sure your next incarnation would be all about the hot chicks.”
“I like you like you are,” Corentin firmly.
Taylor blushed. “It’s been a while since we’ve been like this.”
“In over our heads with no possible way out?” Corentin scratched his chin.
“I have fond memories of that.”
“Sure you do.” Corentin didn’t smile. He listened as more branches snapped and shattered.
Taylor chewed the raw patch of skin on his lip.
“I’m….” Ringo pointed to a cypress branch over their heads. “Just gonna go take a chill over there while you kids get sorted. ’Kay?”
The silence returned.
Ringo didn’t need to be told twice and fluttered away.
“Are you the Axeman? Is it true?” Taylor reached out, and Corentin permitted him to take his hand. “You can tell me. I love you, you know I do. We’ll get through this.”
Corentin finally looked at him, and Taylor shivered. His dark eyes seemed to swallow Taylor into the depths of his emptiness. His mouth pressed in a grim line, holding back words, yet fighting to say them.
Time had not been kind to Corentin. The crow’s feet drew jagged lines from the corners of his eyes, and his cheeks had become hollow. How did Taylor not notice before? Corentin was old. In the moment, he let himself become old. Corentin let his guard down and let Taylor see who he really was under all the Creole charm and rapier wit.
He let Taylor see the tired old killer who had long ago lost his way.
“I am.”
His words came with such a calmness, they stabbed Taylor sharper than any dagger ever could.
Taylor breathed a steadying sigh. “Okay.” It was all he could say. He took another slow breath to keep his heart from hammering. “Okay.”
Together they looked out over the bayou.
Taylor swallowed and took a guess. “They weren’t your friends who died out here, were they?”
“No.”
Taylor forced down the bile bubbling up his throat. “Okay.”
Corentin pointed to a distant patch of cattails. “Over there? I disposed of a baker’s wife. She owed a witch their firstborn and she wouldn’t pay up.” He pointed to the left at a tight-packed row of cypress trees. “Those trees there? I lashed a prince to the roots and left him for the gators to deal with.” He pointed to the shore across from them. “There? I sank a kindly princess to the bottom of the bayou. No one ever found her.”
Taylor lurched forward as his stomach acid refused to go down. He gagged as he swallowed.
“Over there?” Corentin pointed to what looked like a gator nest. “I tracked down the asshole who tried to kill me. I took his sister. I mailed her back to him in pieces.”
Taylor slapped his hand over his mouth as his anxiety punched him in the gut. He stumbled and then caught himself on a cypress root. With one more gurgling cough, he expelled pure stomach acid.
Corentin didn’t move.
After three heaves, Taylor clung to the tree root, waiting for the world to stop being so bright. He refused to swallow; instead, he repeatedly spit. He looked up overhead to Ringo and shook his head. The sorrow on Ringo’s face said it all.
Taylor could weather any storm with Corentin, but this time….
“But you’re not that guy anymore,” Taylor croaked.
“Tell him about Goslynn,” Aliss said from behind them, her voice sharp like a hot razor. “It sounds better coming from you.”
Taylor’s skin tingled with the remnants of nausea. “G-G-Goslynn?” Taylor didn’t want to know the answer, but Aliss was determined to torture it out of Corentin.
Corentin looked out over the bayou, and the silence returned.
“Tell him, Devereaux,” Aliss commanded.
“She was a friend.” Corentin turned to Taylor, and Taylor couldn’t hide his worried expression. Corentin smiled brokenly. “She was going to fix me. Break my curse.”