Blood Like Magic, page 40
I follow them out, lock the door behind us, and start to send a message to Mom to let her know we’re going ahead.
“Oh my God, Vo, you better not be telling on us!” Keisha says, staring at my phone.
“I’m just letting her know!”
“Let her know once we’re already there, ’cause then we can say it’s too late to go back. If you tell her now, we won’t have an excuse for why we can’t wait when she messages you back.”
“Can I at least message them to say I figured out my task? They might be worried about Eden.”
“Fine! But nothing about us going. They’re not answering their messages anyway, so they probably won’t see until later.”
“Then why can’t I just say we’re leaving now?”
“Voya!”
“Fine,” I say, and send a quick message to the adults to let them know that they don’t have to worry, that I know how I’m going to save Eden. Like with everyone else, I avoid mentioning that I still have to choose between which first love to destroy. They wouldn’t understand. It wouldn’t even be a choice to them, but it’s not that simple for me.
The four of us make our way to the train station. On Caribana parade day, the hassle of getting downtown in the van is too much for even Auntie to handle. We tried it one year, and she got so furious that she melted the steering wheel down.
Granny gave her hell for that.
Now, we take the GO train a couple of stops over to Exhibition Station, where the parade will come through at its fullest force. It would usually be a happy occasion, all of us gathering with other people in a celebration of our culture. This year is different.
Alex and Keisha are delighted, stopping to take photos with people in their costumes like feed celebrities. Completely unburdened by trusting in me knowing how to complete my task without shedding any blood.
Keis is more reserved. She knows that I’m hiding something, and it’s got her on edge. Her shoulders are stiff even as she hums the pop song I got stuck in her head under her breath. It’s like the atmosphere in the crowd. There’s a nervous energy rippling through them. Like even they know how important today is.
“What’s up with everyone?” I mutter. The feeling going around is making me paranoid, and I’m searching for more visions of blood and death, but none have come so far. Maybe now that the deadline is here, there’s no more point to them. No reason to rush me into my decision because I’ll have to make it today, no matter what.
Alex looks around at the crowds as we get onto the train platform. “We don’t have the Davises’ protection this year. Even non-witches can get used to the feeling of magic in the air. It isn’t here now. They can sense the difference even if they don’t consciously know. Didn’t you notice that it’s been like this for a couple of years? Since the last time things went wrong with the rite.”
I guess I hadn’t noticed. Maybe because I had never been this on-edge before. I wring my hands until my knuckles crack. The ritual to protect Caribana. The one the Davises have been doing for years that I ruined when I broke the circle. I had been thinking of my failure and its direct consequences for me and Johan. I forgot about the intention of the ritual.
The last time the circle was broken, three people died.
I swallow so hard that it hurts my throat going down.
Keis nudges me in the shoulder. “It’ll be okay.”
“If something does happen, that’s life,” Keisha drawls. “We can’t protect each other from everything.”
If something does happen, it’ll be my fault.
During the train ride, I let everyone’s conversations rush over me, staring out at the scenery as it goes by. The familiar train yards and back views of neighborhood homes and kids playing in parks. For some of us, this is a special day of celebration, and for others, it’s just an ordinary Saturday. For me, it’s the day that everything changes.
The train reaches Exhibition Station, and we flood off it. As we walk toward the entrance, the pumping beat of soca music thrums through my body. At Caribana, you don’t just hear the music; it spreads through your limbs and warms your blood and spikes your adrenaline. I’m bobbing my head before I realize it, and Keis is bouncing on her toes. Keisha and Alex are carrying on—outright wining up on each other and laughing, rushing ahead of me and Keis.
I dig out my phone and send a quick message to Mom to let her know we’re at the parade. The crowd we walk with is awash in color. Even though not everyone is participating in the parade, there’s still the odd person with glitter on their face. Some of them have flags worn as bandannas or tucked into their back pockets. I spy Trinidadian, Jamaican, Montserratian, and Canadian flags, and a whole lot more I don’t recognize.
“We forgot our flags,” I say. We have a few Trini ones packed away somewhere.
“There will be a million people selling them once we get inside,” Keis says.
And of course, when we get through the ticket booth, the first thing we see is a lineup of three vendors set up with huge flag displays from cloth flags to giant portable holos.
“You want a holo belt buckle that says ‘Trini Pride’?” Keis points to the offensive object.
I grimace.
She laughs. It’s an open and free sound.
I’ve heard her laugh so many times. If I destroy her future, would that happen anymore?
Something must show in my expression because she stares at me. “What’s going on? You said you know how to save Eden, and you’re not going to kill anyone. How?”
“I would rather not talk about—”
“Cut the spam, Vo. Alex and Keisha are happy as hell with the news, but you look like someone is still going to die today.”
I crack my fingers, one knuckle at a time.
Keis’s eyes narrow, and she stops dead on the sidewalk. “What are you going to do?”
“I just have to make a choice. That’s all.”
Her expression clears because she must know that me and choices don’t go together well. “You still don’t know what you’re going to choose.”
She doesn’t need to read my mind to know that. My cousin briefly presses her palms to her eyes before pulling them away and nodding sharply. “You can do it.”
I laugh. “That would be great if I knew what I was going to do.”
“I know you. You’ll get through this.” She pulls a grim smile. “As cheesy as it is, we have each other. You have the entire family behind you. What you’re doing is going to save Eden without taking any lives. That’s what matters.”
I try to fill myself up with the warm feeling from her words, but it falls flat. Would she be saying the same thing if she knew the choice that I had to make?
I swallow and jerk my head in the direction of Keisha and Alex. “We should catch up.”
Keis leads the way and I shuffle along behind her. When we catch up with my cousins, the air is thick with the smell of spices and pepper. Vendors drop fresh dough into fryers to make pholourie and roll thick paratha roti skins around chunks of curried chicken and potato. Most of them have bottles of bright-colored sodas imported from the Caribbean, and there are people shouting their orders with accented English.
The King and Queen show was only a taste of what the parade brings. The soca music is so loud that my body vibrates as giant floats roll down the street. A full steel pan band on wheels passes by, playing while they dance along to the music. The mas camp bands follow along behind them. Feather headpieces more than a foot tall are perched on the heads of people dancing down the street in sequined bikinis and shorts, covered in body glitter. Whistles scream in the air as people blow them to the music, and my nose is full of the smell of vaporizer clouds and island spices.
“There they are!” Keisha screams, and points.
I follow her finger, and sure enough, there’s Emerald leading the charge in their now award-winning human-powered float. She’s in her shiny blue-and-silver outfit with an overdramatic smoky eye. My chest lifts to see the sequin work on her costume that I helped with.
You’d think she would be tired from the booty shaking she did last night, but she charges down the street with renewed energy. A few paces behind her, Johan is wining up, sparkling and dewy as if he never took the whipping he did a couple days ago, in the King version of the float. He’s bare-chested, dancing away in booty shorts that might be shorter than his daughter’s. When he turns to the other side of the crowd, he reveals the thick crisscrossing scars across his back.
I grimace and clutch at my chest. A flash of heat goes through my scars as I look at his.
“Let’s take a picture fast,” Alex shouts. “Before we jump in!”
My cousins and I squish together under Alex’s phone while the AI takes dozens of photos of us. I force myself to smile and mean it. I don’t want to look back on them and see a version of myself too preoccupied to enjoy a moment with my family.
“Okay, let’s go!” Keisha drags Alex toward the metal barrier so they can run out into the parade and join up with the mas band.
Keis scans the parade. “Shouldn’t the adults be with them? Maybe they’re at the house?”
I mean to respond to Keis, but the scent of smoke and sugarcane shoots through my nostrils. I turn my head and there they are. The ancestors. Those in the crowd with magic in their blood bow their heads to them. The others are oblivious to their presence.
The ancestors walk sure-footed in the outfits of their time. There are some in dashikis and others in the outfits of tribes so old most others have forgotten them.
Auntie Elaine isn’t here. Not every ancestor appears at Caribana.
But Mama Jova is.
She’s obvious for her nakedness, the thinness of her frame, and the scars that mark her body. And she’s the only ancestor not smiling and dancing along with her descendants. Alone in a crowd.
The moment I see her, I know the choice that I’ll make. In some ways, I’ve known since last night. And the entire day since has just been me convincing myself that I didn’t know because I didn’t want to make it.
It’s time.
“I have to go,” I say to Keis.
She’s distracted—someone is calling her, but she can’t seem to hear over the noise of the parade. “Wait, hold on!” she says to them.
I leave her and walk over to Mama Jova, slipping between the parade barricades, and making my way across to her. She stands tall and proud as always, her eyes meeting mine.
“I’m here to make a request.” I try to pull myself up straight.
“Make it.” She appraises me with critical eyes, as if she knows what I’ve come to ask but doesn’t think I’ll actually do it.
From the start of this, Mama Jova has wanted me to take control of my future and choices. And this whole time I’ve believed that I would make the wrong choice. That’s how it’s been with everything in my life. Every decision was another chance to mess up.
I don’t know if this is the right one either. But it doesn’t matter.
It’s my choice, and I have to make it.
So I do.
Today is Caribana, the one day of the year we can see the ancestors… and the one day of the year we can ask them for a wish.
I speak that wish with tears in my eyes and a trembling voice.
Mama doesn’t smile. She only stares at me. “You’re sure?”
“Yes,” I say, and this time, it’s without any hesitation.
“Then it’s done.”
I don’t feel relief. There’s no joy in this. “Does this mean I pass? I did what you wanted. I destroyed my first love.”
“You pass.” Mama turns her head to look over my shoulder in the direction of the train station. There, far back from the parade, are the adults with Mom and Granny leading the pack, trying to push through the crowd. I squint at them through tear-soaked eyes.
“Ava interfered,” Mama Jova says. “She and the rest of your brood.”
“What do you mean they interfered?” I say, turning back to her.
She tilts her head to the side and examines me. I let her. After everything, this probing stare is simple to bear. “You keep changing. Each day, you become a different sort of girl than I thought you were.”
“What sort of girl did you think I was?”
“One so afraid to fail that she would never make a choice. You didn’t seem to be one who could take charge of her future.”
“And that’s why you gave me this task?”
“That’s part of it.” Mama presses her lips into a firm line. “There are still hard choices to be made, and the next time, you won’t have a month to decide. Do you remember what I said about magic?”
“That it’s blood and intent?”
“Why do you think I keep saying that to you?”
My first instinct is to say that I don’t know, but really, I just haven’t had time to think about it because I’ve been so preoccupied with my task.
“I have faith that you’ll come to understand. It isn’t complicated to be a witch, Voya. That was my mistake. It’s actually incredibly simple when you understand what magic is. And that understanding is the difference between what makes a witch good, and what makes a witch great.” She reaches out and caresses my cheek. “You could be a great witch.”
Everything rushes out of me. I thought Mama Jova must hate me. For my weakness, if anything. But here she is now, saying that she thinks I could be great. Like her.
She rolls her shoulders back and frowns. “It’s only too bad your family couldn’t see your potential in time.”
I frown. “What does that mea—”
A series of gunshots slice through the air and whistle through my eardrums. Screams ring out, and the crowd rushes forward, bodies shoving around me until I fall to my knees. My wounds burn as people keep running past me, stomping on my hands and knocking into me as soca music blares overtop.
I search for Mama in the mass of people, but she’s gone.
Someone gets ahold of my top and yanks me off the ground and out of the crowd. It’s only when he drops me on my feet that I can look up and identify my savior as Johan.
“What’s happening?” I splutter. “Where is everyone?”
“Cops got a call about someone here having a gun. Of course, he didn’t. Not that the cop listened to that.” Johan’s eyes are hard and dig into me. “You see what happens when you break a circle, girl? There are consequences! I told you that.”
“I don’t—but who—the shots…” My words run over each other, and I can’t get anything out straight.
“There are people bleeding in the street because you messed with my ritual. Remember that!” Johan stands and shakes his head at me.
I won’t let him shame me. Keisha’s words spill from my mouth. “We can’t protect each other from everything.”
“Whatever helps you sleep at night,” he hisses. “Go home.” He stalks away from me into the crowd.
I pull myself up and do as he says, not because he said it, but because there’s no way I’ll be able to find anyone in this mess. And I already know exactly where to find Keis, and it isn’t here.
Searching for the rest of my family ends up being impossible. It’s chaos. People are running everywhere, and police are flooding into the space. My mouth dries out, and sweat drips down my back.
Home.
Granny always told us that if anything dangerous happened, we should do everything in our power to get back to the house, where we would be safe. It’ll be okay. Everyone will be at home.
The GO trains have been stopped, so I order a car instead. Thank the ancestors for that contest money. During the ride, I pull out my phone to fire off messages to my cousins and check on them, but instead stop at the dozen messages from Mom sent in the past five minutes:
Don’t finish your task! Don’t do it!
Each one is a variation of that message over and over. I frown and message her back to ask what she means. Why would she not want me to complete my task? I even call, but she doesn’t pick up. I try Granny and the rest of the adults, but none of them answer their phones or messages.
I gnaw on my lip. Maybe they’re just caught up in the crowds. They have to be okay. They’re going to be at home. They might already be there. Though a voice in the back of my head asks, if they’re home safe, why wouldn’t they message me? I jiggle my leg and will the car to go faster than its law-abiding programming.
When I step up to the front door of the house, there are no sounds from within. No loud conversations about what happened. And no Mom anxiously pacing in front of the house, looking for me. I check my phone again, and there are no alerts. Not a single message. I swore I saw them running through the crowd. There’s no way Mom or Granny wouldn’t have sent a message to make sure that I’m okay.
Something is wrong.
I push open the door and stand there.
On the steps leading upstairs, Keis sits with her phone in her hand. She looks up when I enter. Her eyes are puffy and strained. She tilts the phone toward me. “I tried to send you a message. It won’t let me.”
I expect a reaction from Keis, but nothing. With the task completed, she should have her magic back and be able to read my mind. She’s choosing not to.
“Mom sent me messages, but she hasn’t been responding otherwise. None of the adults have.” I look around. “Where is everyone?”
“Gone.”
“Gone?”
Keis swallows. “Some men showed up. Tried to drag me out of the house. Every time they reached the door, I disappeared from their arms and reappeared in the house, so they gave up.” She widens her eyes at me. “Disappearing, Voya. There one moment and gone the next. That’s not normal. That’s not just something that happens to me every day.”
The heat of her gaze feels as intense as her mom’s flames.
“They left this, by the way. The men who came.” She flicks a card across the floor to me.
I pick it up.
You are cordially invited to join Mr. Justin Tremblay for a family gathering at NuGene headquarters at your earliest convenience. The earlier, he advises, the better.
“He took them.” The gunshots. Johan said that someone called the cops. Justin could have done it and used the diversion to grab my family.
