Voodoo Shanghai, page 37
Bergen turned her attention on Stephan. “And aren’t you supposed to be catching a serial killer? You’d better get to it. We heard the explosion all the way across the swamp. Spilled a pot of special coffee I was brewing.”
Stephan frowned at her. “Let her go, Gran, we’re just here to talk.”
A broom, thick and wooded, living, with leaves and branches growing from the end, appeared in Bergen’s hand, seemingly from out of nowhere. She slammed the handle into the porch with a resounding crack. “Not until I get her word on a few things.”
Stephan had stopped, his brow furrowed. I wasn’t certain he could move either.
Bergen turned towards me. Her face was mature but unlined and youthful, eyes the same bright hazel as Stephan’s, and they were alive. The same way the broom, something that should be dead, was alive. Even her shorts and T-shirt had a life about them. Bergen, and everything she seemed to touch, was brimming with life—in a most definitely unnatural way.
I had completely, utterly underestimated her. I’d known she had to be more powerful than she’d let on, but I hadn’t come close…
“First things first, practitioner,” Bergen said, striding down the steps towards me.
“Do you swear you won’t call your sorcerer ghost, one Gideon Lawrence, once I release you?”
The question was simple enough…and raised a whole bunch more. I felt the vines loosen, allowing me to speak. As she knew his name, there was no point in denying our acquaintance. “Depends what you’re planning on doing to me.”
That got me a faint, terse smile. “Provided you’re innocent, we don’t intend to cause you any harm.”
“Why do I feel like this is a reverse witch trial?” The Otherside vines tightened once more, cutting me off.
“Yes or no, sorcerer’s apprentice?” Bergen warned. “And you won’t be able to lie—not while my vines have you. They make you speak the truth.”
I ran through the options in my head. There were none. “I won’t call him—but if he thinks I’m in danger, you’re on your own. Can’t stop him,” I managed.
“Fair enough.” The vines released slightly—enough that I could move my neck.
I glanced to where Stephan was standing, watching me and looking disappointed. More Otherside secrets—and I’d dragged mine, a powerful sorcerer’s ghost, straight to his family.
Bergen interrupted my thoughts. “Now, let’s get a second look at you. My, we’re full of surprises, now, aren’t we, practitioner? It’s always hard to tell who you can trust where Otherside is involved, and you, my dear, have more secrets than most of us.” She smiled. It wasn’t unfriendly, but it wasn’t kind either.
Surprises. It occurred to me that I was completely defenceless, rooted to the ground in the middle of what had to be an entire coven of witches…and Bergen knew who Gideon was.
Despite Bergen’s warning, I slid my Otherside sight into place, just for a moment, long enough to see that the witch vines weren’t just wrapping around me—they were also leading to Stephan. Shit.
Bergen wouldn’t use witchcraft on her own grandson, would she?
“Gran, she’s looking,” Stephan warned, and once again I felt the suffocating compulsion, though this time it came from Stephan, not Bergen. I stared at Stephan, open-mouthed. The vines weren’t wrapped around him—some of the vines were coming from him. Stephan had been the one to tell me he wasn’t a witch, and I’d bought it, all of it, even though I knew witches could conceal things on a scale greater than any practitioner. He’d seemed so resentful, so sincere, so unable to see Otherside…
The look on my face must have said it all. He shrugged, uncomfortably. “Sorry, Kincaid. Too many things didn’t add up.” He sounded apologetic, but he didn’t look away.
“You ass—” The vines tightened before I could finish.
Bergen tsked. “Plenty of time for that in a moment. The boy’s almost as good a liar as he is a witch.”
I waited until the vines let me speak once again. “Don’t tell me you’re the one behind the ghost traps, Bergen.”
“No,” she said, exchanging a glance with her grandson. “Are you?”
“What? No, of course not!”
Another guarded look between the two of them. Stephan was no longer standing by the sedan. He was walking slowly, warily, towards me.
“Then why is the ghost trap of your master’s making?” Bergen said.
“Woah—wait just one minute. Boss, not master, and sort of. It’s stolen—trust me, he’s pissed.”
“Does he kill people often with Otherside?” Stephan asked. “What’s he doing at our swamp?”
They’d discovered the ghost trap was of Gideon’s making. Now here I was—his apprentice or, as Bergen seemed to think, accomplice.
I shook my head. “For fuck’s sake, does everyone call me to a crime scene now because they think I’m a suspect? Seriously?” I sighed and forced myself to calm down. “Look, I see your logic. Katy calls for me, I show up, you find out the trap is Gideon’s—I get it. Only problem is, it’s not me. I was lured here. And the trap isn’t just stolen—it’s been altered. Between you and me, I think that pisses Gideon off more than the theft. He has rules about killing people with Otherside. I’m being set up.”
Seconds ticked by, Bergen studying me as the vines rooted me in place. Just when I thought I had finally reached the end of the line, the vines let me go.
“Well, she’s telling the truth.”
“Same,” said Stephan.
As soon as I was free, I pulled up my Otherside sight and searched the two of them. The faintest lines ran over them. I rubbed my neck.
“Sorry about that, Kincaid Strange,” Bergen said. “But we had to be certain. Truth vines were really the only way. After the explosion today and what Stephan told me you said about the ghost trap, well, I had to be certain. Preferably before your sorcerer showed up. I’ve done what I can to keep him out of my swamp, but he’s a powerful one.”
“How did you find out about Gideon?”
Bergen stepped off the deli porch and headed for me, shaking her thick grey-blond hair, looking weary for the first time. “You’d better come inside, Kincaid Strange,” she said. “For that’s one of the things we need to discuss.”
Like hell was I following them inside. “You can tell me just fine here.”
Bergen gave me a withering look. “Oh, you mistake me. You need to see her.”
* * *
The familial resemblance to Bergen and Stephan was obvious. She had Bergen’s thick blond hair and height, and the hawk-like features of Stephan. Her eyes were too ghost grey to tell whether they’d been the same hazel shade, but I suspected they’d match. She was young, too—barely out of her teens, dressed in an early twentieth-century calico print dress. She sat in the centre of the room, on one of the tables, cross-legged, rocking herself.
“Lawrence, Lawrence, Lawrence,” the ghost whispered in threes—over and over again, just as Katy had. “Lawrence, Lawrence, Lawrence.”
Well, despite my indignation, I could see where the confusion came from. “Who is she?”
“An ancestor of mine,” Bergen said. “Not a witch, but she was one of the first ghosts taken. She’s no longer bound, but that’s all she says,” Bergen said. “She showed up half an hour ago.”
“Right after our latest altercation with Dane,” Stephan said.
I shook my head, examining the ghost girl. “Someone released her.” I crouched down in front of her while Stephan and Bergen had a quiet word. “Where did you hear the name Lawrence?” I asked her.
That got her attention. She ceased repeating Gideon’s name over and over and shook her head. “From him. You’re his problem.”
I held my breath. Part of me knew I should wait for Bergen and Stephan, but what if she stopped talking—or, worse, was re-bound and pulled away?
“Whose problem am I? The soothsayer’s?”
She shook her head, sending her ghost-grey hair cascading. “Gideon Lawrence’s.” She glanced furtively around the room, as if only now noting her surroundings, looking like a frightened animal. She found Bergen and Stephan and focused on them while she spoke. “I haven’t long. I’m to deliver a message to you, Kincaid Strange.” She turned her eyes back on me. “A bargain, one they’re not to know about.”
“What is it?” I asked, my mouth dry, knowing I should call out to the witches, but unwilling to risk it.
“Leave. Leave now. Leave the swamp, leave the witches, and leave Gideon Lawrence, and you can keep your life.”
“Who told you—” I stumbled. Bergen hadn’t told me the ghost’s name. “Who sent the message?”
But the ghost only shook her head, and focused back on her descendants. “You can’t trust them, you know. They mean well, but his parents are among the missing ghosts. If you don’t do what my master asks, he’ll bargain with them next. They won’t say no. He’s doing this for Gideon. To help him see what a problem you are, since he can’t help himself—”
Her hands flew to her throat as she began to choke, eyes wide.
“Leah?” Bergen called. She and Stephan pushed me aside to reach the ghost. But it was too late. My stomach sank as the telltale bindings flared around her neck and she began to fade.
“I thought you said she wasn’t bound?”
“She wasn’t—I was certain of it.” Bergen and Stephan both raised their hands, the same witchy Otherside vines dancing at their fingertips.
But too late. The ghost vanished without a word. Her resignation to her fate stuck with me. Sent to deliver a message, used as a tool…
I felt Bergen grab my shoulders. “What did she say to you?”
I shook my head. The soothsayer knew Gideon. What’s more, if the ghost was to be believed, Stephan’s parents would be used as leverage next. “Nothing—or nothing I could make heads or tails of.” The lie tasted foul in my mouth, but I didn’t see any other way.
The soothsayer knew Gideon. What’s more, he wanted me out of the way. But because he was convinced I was somehow bad for Gideon, or because I had surprised him by escaping the ghost trap? Warning or not, I wasn’t leaving, though I did need to speak to Gideon as soon as possible—alone.
“Right through our hands.” Bergen spat on the wood floor. “And we’re no closer to knowing who’s behind this. First our ghosts, and then the ghost trap, and now Stephan tells me they’re after practitioners. Turning us into witch ghosts is likely next.” Bergen shuddered. “That suburban nightmare of a poltergeist left a ghost trap in town,” she said after a moment.
“What?” Stephan said. “When? Why didn’t you—”
“Last night,” she said, and turned her steely gaze back on me. “I’m at my wits’ end with that singing poltergeist. I’ve tried kicking him out of the swamp more times than I can count, but something has bound him to it as surely as any of our ghosts. Trying only embeds him further, makes him more powerful. And there’s a strangeness about it now, an unfamiliar taste that was never in the swamp before. It stinks of soothsaying and sorcery. Why I suspected you and your master.”
I sighed. “He’s not—”
Bergen ignored me. “You can tell him my intentions were never to test you,” she said in part apology. “The first time I made Stephan bring you here, I only wanted a good look, thinking it odd the girl’s ghost asked for you. After a little light reading, I thought you might be able to find our ghosts. I don’t like to waste opportunities—it’s not our way.” She paused. “I spotted all the handiwork you’re sporting, and told Stephan to keep an eye on you. Then we sensed the sorcerer’s ghost poking around our swamp, and then the trap showed up last night, and Leah repeating your master’s name, over and over…” She shrugged. “You understand, I had to be sure it wasn’t you. To Stephan’s credit, he didn’t think so, but…”
Did I understand? No, not really, but saying that wouldn’t help things along.
“This soothsayer almost had the entire paranormal community at each other’s throats,” I said. And keeping all of us on the defence.
“Celeste’s missing ghosts? Aye, they may have had a hand in that as well. Celeste and I don’t get along so well, never have. We both like to get our own way—runs in the family. She’s a great-great-aunt of mine.”
Now that Bergen mentioned it, they did have an uncannily similar gruffness.
Bergen arched her eyebrow. “She didn’t mention that, did she? Never mind. I ignored Celeste and I was wrong to, though no sense in apologizing. No one holds a grudge like the dead, and that woman…” Bergen shuddered.
I was not getting between a witch and a zombie queen. No way, no how.
Bergen got up and headed into the kitchen, returning with three steaming cups of coffee. Stephan took his while I eyed mine. There were bindings all over it.
“You have my word all they do is cut the acidity and save your stomach from ulcers. Like your sorcerer, my word is one of my currencies.”
I thought about refusing the cup, but I needed the coffee. Besides, I was already at the witch’s mercy.
“The soothsayer keeps luring us in and throwing Dane at us. We need to go on the offensive,” I said.
“Set our own trap? I’m all ears,” Bergen said, taking a seat at her table.
Great question. How did we lure Dane and the soothsayer out? What would tempt a soothsayer bent on acquiring valuable ghosts? Besides dead practitioners—or Gideon?
It hit me: the swamp. They wouldn’t be able to resist taking control of the swamp.
“Bergen—the strangeness of the swamp. It feels alive.” She gave me an odd look and I searched for the right words. “I think I’ve felt it since Seattle—as if it’s seeking me out. It’s almost as if it’s talking to me. It feels hungry, famished, jealous.”
“And sick,” Stephan offered from the doorway. The two of them exchanged another glance. It was Stephan who shrugged. He hedged his answer as he sipped his coffee. “It’s not alive,” he said. “It doesn’t think or feel anything, but it reacts. It’s an ecosystem, like a forest, but—”
“Dead?” I filled in. In a weird way, it made sense. A reflection of the afterlife of a forest.
“The soothsayer has been eating at my defences for weeks. That and stealing the ghosts has damaged the balance, made my swamp sick. That’s what you’ve sensed,” Bergen said.
I looked up at the two of them. “If the soothsayer wants it so damn much, I say we use the swamp as bait. Bergen, can you drop the defences? Or pretend to? Just enough so the soothsayer thinks he’s won?”
“Maybe,” she said. “For a short time. But what about the poltergeist? I can’t keep a soothsayer at bay and handle a poltergeist.”
I shrugged. “Dane hates me, and I imagine he feels similarly towards Stephan. I’m sure we can keep Dane entertained.” I crossed my fingers that once the soothsayer was out of commission, Dane would become manageable. Regardless, I doubted Gideon would protest the risk if it meant catching the soothsayer that was misusing his traps.
“If the poltergeist is distracted, I might have a way to tie up the soothsayer,” Bergen said, nodding thoughtfully. “But first we need to find him. He’s well hidden. The only practitioners I can sense in the swamp are you three.”
“Gideon may be able to help.” Bergen looked dubious, so I added, “It can’t hurt to ask. We can use all the help we can get.”
“Provided your sorcerer can be trusted.”
“You can trust he wants whoever misused his traps more than fighting with a coven of witches.”
Bergen chewed her lip and searched the far wall.
“I think we have to consider it, Gran,” Stephan said. “At this point, I’m willing to try.”
“All right, Kincaid. Tell the sorcerer’s ghost to come see me. Maybe we can drag this soothsayer out of my swamp—preferably kicking and screaming.”
Yeah, Gideon probably preferred something like that as well.
I pulled out my compact and held it up. Carefully, I traced Gideon’s name into the glass along with a quick message.
With witches—they need to talk to you.
I waited, but there was nothing.
Frowning, I tried Nate. No response.
I looked up at Bergen and Stephan, shaking my head. “I can’t get hold of either of them. The swamp’s been interfering ever since I arrived. Back at the hotel, I should be able to contact him. I’ll send him here, I promise.”
“Make it fast, Kincaid,” Bergen said, getting up from her chair and collecting the empty coffee cups. “If we’re going to set our own lure, I want it sooner rather than later. Before the soothsayer smells the wind changing. In the meantime, what do we do about the other two? The celebrity and his assistant?” Bergen said.
“I think we involve them—better bait, more firepower,” Stephan said. “I don’t see how they could be behind it.”
“I’ll leave it to you,” Bergen said to her grandson.
We started for the door, but Bergen gripped my arm, stopping me. Stephan, already on his phone, gave his grandmother a wary glance.
“Go,” she said to Stephan. “I just need to talk to Kincaid—about her sorcerer.”
With one last glance between his gran and me, he nodded. “I’m just outside,” he said before leaving.
I waited until the door had shut. “You don’t want to talk about Gideon.”
“But I wanted to talk to you alone, without Stephan’s ears.” She reached up a weathered hand and tapped my chest. I felt the power in the gesture, her strange Otherside coursing through me. I was ready to reach for my own, when she said, “There are strange things about you, Kincaid Strange.”
I tried to shrug it off despite the blood rushing through my head. “At least the name is appropriate.”
“Oh, I don’t just mean the sorcerer’s workings, though there are plenty of those.” She peered intently at me with her brilliant hazel witch eyes. “You have much more of it now—the Otherside. It’s easier, isn’t it?” she said, not unkindly, but with certainty.
