VenCo(93)

She couldn’t recall the exact prayer Ricky had said, so she used the one she knew from going to church with Stella as a child. “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name . . .”

Three times she whispered it, forgetting she was standing in the shadow of a cemetery, forgetting even that she was in New Orleans, just focusing on the wood in her palm and the spoon that should be in her pocket and the dangerous man who had stolen it away. And then the words came.

“O Sophia, Wisdom herself, come forth. O Sophia, Wisdom herself, come forth. O Sophia, Wisdom herself, come forth.” She heard them in Ricky’s voice but spoke them in her own. “Thief, allow us passage to gather the stolen goods. Thief. Thief. Thief. Guide us to the property taken against the commandments. Thou art not above consequences. This consequence is me.”

She opened her eyes. The sun had waned, and the street looked softer, as if outlined in chalk, the air heavy with pollen and dusk. She opened her hand. The wood slivers were damp from her perspiration. She bent down and put one sliver under her right shoe, another in its laces, and the last in the top of her right sock.

“By the wood taken from the building you stole from, we shall find your path. We will come. We will recover. God the Father. God the Son. God the Spirit. Sophia and her daughters, all the gods of heaven will see. Lead us to the taken goods. Thief. Thief. Thief. Guide us to the goods.”

Then she clapped her hands together. Ricky hadn’t done that, but she needed some kind of ending to the opening ritual so she could get to the next part, the interior work of becoming the vehicle that would carry her where she needed to go.



Meena tried Lucky again.

Wendy was pacing in the dining room. “Maybe her phone is dead? Maybe she’s already on the road home and can’t answer?”

“Maybe she defied orders, went on the hunt, and is lying dead in a ditch somewhere just like Ricky.” Meena was angry. Really, she was worried, but anger was easier for her.

She slammed the phone down on the table and sighed. “What are the others doing?”

“Still dreaming,” Wendy said. “Should we tell them to stop? Or do you think there’s still hope?”

“I have no idea anymore.” She tapped her fingernails on the back of the chair she was leaning against. “In either case, I guess it’s a good distraction. I’d love to be sleeping the day away too.”

Lettie ran into the room, with Freya right on her heels. “Freya has something!” she shouted.

“Jesus, Lettie,” Freya said. “It could be nothing.” She examined the piece of paper in her hand. “I mean, it looks like nothing. Or a snake maybe? Or a river?”

Morticia came in holding Everett’s hand and guided him to a chair, placing his colouring book in front of him. The rest of the witches gathered round as Freya smoothed out the sheet of paper on the table.

“I have no idea which way this goes, but this is how it looked in my head.”

Meena squinted at the squiggly lines drawn in black ink. “Tell us a little more about the dream.”

Freya looked up at the ceiling, trying to recall exactly. “I was walking, but I didn’t know where. It was hot and there were . . . birds—no, bugs, loud bugs. And then I was looking for something, like checking bushes and peeking over fences.”

“What kind of bushes?” Wendy asked. “Might give us a clue as to where you were.”

“Ummmm, they were thick. Low, like residential. And they had flowers. Yeah, I could smell them. They were pink and some yellow, and more on the fences like vines.”

“Somewhere lush. It could have been New Orleans,” Meena said. “Go on.”

“And then I looked up and there were wooden poles in the sky . . . no, crosses . . .”

“Churches?” Morticia suggested.

“Smaller. Graves maybe. Like headstones. And then all of a sudden I was moving fast, except I wasn’t moving. Hard to explain. It was like being in a 3-D theatre when you’re supposed to be moving through space real fast and the stars are whipping past you.” She moved her hands past her face to demonstrate.

“And the whole time I was like, ‘Keep track, Freya. You need to remember.’ And then I woke up so fast I literally sat up straight in bed.”

Lettie nodded. “It’s true, she did. Scared the shit outta me.”

“And then there was just like this pattern.” Freya leaned forward and tapped the page. “This pattern was kind of burned into the backs of my eyes. When I closed them, I could see it, like I’d stared too long at a neon light. I drew it like that, with my eyes closed.”

They all studied the page.

“Okay, so you had a starting point. It sounds like New Orleans. And since that’s where Lucky and the spoon were—”

Lettie interrupted. “Were? Are they on the way back? Did she get it?”

“Just . . . We don’t know. Let’s not get distracted right now.” Meena had to figure this out. “Since it’s safe to assume you started off in New Orleans and moved here, let’s see if this matches anything we know about the surrounding areas.”

Wendy went to the sideboard and grabbed her laptop. She opened it and called up a map. “Okay, the café is in the Garden District, right near Lafayette Cemetery—that would explain the graves.” She zoomed outward. “Here’s the city, all the way to Metairie. Anything look familiar? Or similar?”