Kelly Keaton - The Wicked Within

THE CRUNCH OF OUR SHOES on asphalt, leaves, and debris was loud in the quiet of Coliseum Street. Violet, Henri, and I had little less than two hours before nightfall, two hours before the February chill would invade the sun-warmed bricks and pavements, when blurry halos would appear around the few working streetlamps, when the predators, both natural and supernatural, would wake and begin to hunt.

We had to hurry.

A barely-there breeze moved through the Garden District. I saw it more than felt it; the jagged strips of Spanish moss waved gently from the limbs of old oaks. All the way down the street, the low-reaching limbs and pale moss created a tunnel of swaying, ghostly dancers.

The GD was a semighost town, a ruinous, forgotten neighborhood populated by squatters, misfits, and other things that preferred to stay hidden. By day it was a beautiful, overgrown jungle, a strange mix of grandeur and decaysouthern opulence turned rotting splendor. But at night the GD was downright still, as though the entire neighborhood was holding its breath, hoping like hell itd make it to see another sunrise.

Lining the street were old mansions, some in ruins, some occupied, and some hollow and dark, watching and waiting, daring one to cross their eerie thresholds and lay claim.

To say I loved the GD was putting it mildly. As someone whod felt lost and abandoned most of her life, this place spoke to me. In a weird way, I related to those old houses and their wild, overgrown gardens. They were dark and neglectedexactly how Id been for so long. How I still felt at times, because, honestly, I had a hell of a lot of darkness left in me to deal with. Only now, I wasnt lost.

And I wasnt alone.

Id found my home and Id found my family.

When the city flooded fifteen years earlier, some of the water never receded from the lower half of the GD. In those areas, mansions rose out of black stagnant water. Statues, streetlamps, iron fences, and even the southern tip of Lafayette Cemetery had become fixtures of the shallow swamp. As we passed the cemetery, with its aboveground tombs and exposed bones, my stomach clenched. In one of those tombs Id inhaled the ground-up toe bone of the infamous clairvoyant, Alice Cromley, and was shown the day Athena cursed my ancestor, the beautiful and devout Medusa, with an unjust, unwarranted punishment.

The cemetery had played host to our first battle with Athena and her grotesque minions. And it was the place the goddess had shown me and my friends a vision of the gorgon Id one day become. It was a memory I wished time would erase, but so far, the memory hadnt even dimmed. The muted pain of what my future held had slithered beneath my scalp, splitting my skin as milky-white visions crept out, rising like weightless streamers around my face. The brush of their phantom skin, the hissing so close and intimate in my ears . . .

The memory had a knack for making my hands shake and my blood run cold. I let out a long, quiet exhale, shoving my hands into the front pocket of my hoodie and linking them together.

I wonder what shes gonna do when he grows too big to carry, Henri said as we continued toward Audubon Park and the Fly.

I smiled at the picture Violet made as she walked in front of us. Pascal, her small white alligator, clung to her shoulder, his head facing us and bobbing with each step. His mouth hung open in that frozen alligator way, and his eyes seemed glued on me. Violets Mardi Gras mask was pushed back onto her head. The white feathers on each side of the mask stuck backward like wings. She wore a black dress that came to her knees. Her socks were mismatched, one black with gray checks, the other solid black.

Dont know, I answered with a shrug. Leave him home with some raw fish and the remote control? Because with Violet that could totally be a reality. She was a strange little girl with huge dark eyes, pale skin, and a short black bob that she cut herself.

And . . . she had fangs.

In the years since Athena had slammed her wrath into New Orleans with twin hurricanes, the Novemnine of the citys oldest and most elite supernaturalshad bought the ruined city and its surrounding land from the US government. New 2 had become a sanctuary for all things paranormal, and an urban legend to those outside of its now privately owned borders.

But knowing all that, knowing my share of witches, demigods, and vampires, Violet was in a class by herself. A true mystery. No one knew what she was or why she had fangs. She never said. In fact, she didnt say much. But when she did, you paid attention.

That tiny kid with her love of all things Mardi Gras had stabbed Athena in the heart to save me. Violet had even lived through the horror of that same goddess trying to turn her into a gorgon, but the curse hadnt touched Violet, couldnt touch her, and when Id asked why, her answer had been a simple, It just didnt.

Eventually the swamp squeezed in on the debris-covered road. Brackish water spilled over in places, our shoes squishing on layers of soaked leaves and vegetation. A few cypress trees had grown up through the water, their knobby roots sticking out like rounded, black pyramids. Moss grew everywhere. It was beautiful to look at, but not something you wanted to touch, seeing as most of it was infested with chiggers and spider mites.

I could handle the swamp. Id done it before. The key was not to let my imagination wander. That meant shutting down the fear and staying focused on our destination. Simple, right? Deep breath in, another one out. No problem. I slowed my pace and scanned the ground, making damn sure there was nothing coiled or hidden along our path.

You know, Henri began, turning to wait for me to catch up, I bet theyre more scared of you than you are of them.

Yeah. That doesnt help at all. I didnt bother explaining the nature of my phobiatrue adrenaline-inducing, hyperventilating-causing, nausea-inspiring fear of snakes. It wasnt rational. It just . . . was.

A small smile played at the corners of his mouth. With his flannel shirt, his long red hair tied back, and all that scruff on the lower half of his face, Henri was close to sporting a mountain-man look. Figured Id give it a try, he said, falling into step beside me. You know youll have to shake your fear at some point, chre, if you live out here with us.

I dont live out here. I waved my arm at the swamp. Says the guy who eats rats and snakes.

I dont eat them, for chrissakes, just clear them out of buildings.

Henri was a shifter, an ability inherited from a distant, godly ancestor. Some people said demigods and shape shifters were one and the same, and the idea didnt seem far-fetched, not when you considered that in mythology many gods were able to transform into animals. Falcons, crows, stags, bulls, serpents, lions . . . Henri could shift into a beautiful red-tailed hawk. He earned money clearing vermin from buildings outside the French Quarter that the Novem wanted to reclaim.

He was good at what he did, being a predator and all. . . .

Well, I hope theyre paying you well, I muttered, because thats just about the grossest job ever.

Says the girl whos going to have a head full of snakes one day. The Novem could always pay me better, but it puts money in my pocket and food on the table, so dont knock it, seeing as how, you know, you eat said food.

I let out a sigh. Im working on the job thing. . . . Among other things.