The Dolls Read online

  “A normal life?” Peregrine repeats. “I can’t think of anything more pointless. Not when you have powers like ours.”

  She grabs her bag from the ground, stomping off before Chloe can respond. After a moment, Chloe scrambles after her.

  I stand still for a good five minutes to make absolutely sure Peregrine, Chloe, and Pascal are gone. Then I give in to the weakness in my knees and slowly slide down the tomb until I’m sitting in the dirt. I can’t understand why they’d mention Aunt Bea and me.

  I knew the Dolls were odd, but is it possible they actually believe they have some sort of magical powers? Though as much as I want to dismiss what I just saw as some sort of sorority ritual, I can’t deny the way the air got deathly still the instant they began their ceremony, or how a breeze picked up as soon as they began to dance.

  I struggle to my feet and creep into the clearing, which is bathed in lemon meringue moonlight. It appears to be a well-defined crossroads. Three of the four corners are grave plots, filled with shadowy, aboveground tombs and mausoleums of all shapes and sizes. The fourth corner, where I saw them bury the dolls, sits entirely empty, except for the handful of herbs Peregrine threw to the ground. I bend to look at them and am startled to realize they’re an ashy, burned black. I could have sworn they were alive when she let them go.

  I take a deep breath and begin digging with my left hand; my right is still throbbing from grabbing the parlor door. Side by side in the hole lie two dolls, each with a name written across it, a lock of hair glued to it, and a feather pinned to it. The one that says Justin Cooper has a pale pink feather, and the one that says Beau Fontenot sports a bright red feather. The dolls have crudely sewn x’s where their mouths and eyes should be. Like the real-life Justin, the miniature version has brown hair and is wearing pants and a shirt that vaguely resemble the Pointe Laveau uniform. Beau is sporting a purple letter jacket.

  I can’t possibly piece together everything I just saw while squatting in the middle of a cemetery, so I shove the Justin doll in my pocket and push the dirt back over the other doll. I stand up, my legs shaking, and make a run for it toward my house, no longer caring if I make noise.

  11

  A few minutes before seven the next morning, I sit down across from Aunt Bea, who looks wide-awake and cheerful after her successful opening. “Morning, hon,” she says through a mouthful of Cheerios. She’s reading the New York Times on her iPad, just like she does every day at the breakfast table. She looks up at me and the smile falls from her face. “What’s wrong?”

  I take a deep breath. “Aunt Bea, there’s some seriously strange shit going on in this town, and I want to know what it is.” I do my best to look threatening.

  She sets her iPad down. I can tell she’s trying to appear casual as she says, “What would make you say that, Eveny?”

  “Drew said something about satanic rituals in town, and I thought he was just being dramatic until I saw Peregrine, Chloe, and Pascal perform a ceremony in the cemetery last night.”

  She blinks a few times. “What were you doing in the cemetery?”

  “You’re missing the point.”

  “Okay.” She looks at the table. “Well, first of all, I can assure you that nothing like satanism is going on here. That’s just idle gossip.”

  “Oh come on. This town is cut off from the outside world by a big, creepy gate! Everything’s in bloom, even though it’s January! But you drive a half mile away across the bayou, and it’s winter again.” I’m ticking things off on my fingers as I go. “I’ve been having bad dreams about the parlor, and last night I burned my hand trying to open the door. And now, the daughters of Mom’s best friends, who look and dress like supermodel gabillionaires, are sneaking around in cemeteries at night, casting spells on people! You’re going to tell me nothing’s going on?”

  “Charms,” my aunt murmurs. “Not spells.” As she takes a bite of her Cheerios, her hand is shaking so hard I can hear her spoon clattering against her teeth. “Why are you so sure I’ll know the answers, anyhow?”

  “Because I heard them mention you—and me. Not to mention the fact that you’ve been walking around since we got here saying cryptic things about how I have so much more in common with these girls than I realize. What, am I supposed to be out there with them, dancing around with snakes and burying voodoo dolls?”

  “They’re not voodoo dolls,” she says right away. When I continue to look at her, she sighs and says, “Look, before we get into an explanation, I need you to tell me that you won’t get sucked into all of this before you’ve had a chance to understand what it’s all about.”

  “I’m not making you any promises until you start being honest with me,” I shoot back.

  “Well, I guess that’s fair.” She studies her cereal for a moment. “Okay. To start with, I’m guessing that what you saw in the cemetery was a zandara ceremony.”

  “A what ceremony?”

  “Zandara. It’s a kind of magic only practiced here in Carrefour.”

  She stands up from the table and takes her bowl to the sink. I stare at her in disbelief as she washes her leftover cereal down the drain then turns on the disposal. When the rumbling is over, the silence feels dead and all-encompassing.

  “Aunt Bea?” I prompt.

  “I don’t even know where to begin.”

  “How about at the beginning?”

  She nods slowly, and when she speaks again, her voice is firm and steady. “At one time our ancestors were very powerful practitioners of voodoo. But in 1863, they, along with Peregrine’s and Chloe’s ancestors, struck their own deal with the fates because they felt voodoo was getting too commercialized. The final straw was when your great-great-great-great-grandmother learned that a Confederate general was purchasing potions and using them to defeat Union soldiers in battle.

  “Our ancestors didn’t want any part of that,” she continues, “so they sought out a powerful spirit named Eloi Oke, who agreed to serve as a gatekeeper between this world and the world of the spirits, and—”

  “That’s the name I heard them say in the cemetery,” I interrupt.

  She nods. “He agreed to help in exchange for letting him and some of his friends possess them once a year on Mardi Gras so that they could experience life in human form again. A small price to pay for the power he opens them to.”

  “Oh yes, being possessed by a ghost,” I mutter. “Such a small price to pay.”

  Aunt Bea ignores me. “So zandara developed as a way to trade for what the queens wanted through communication with different spirits. All the magic centers around living things that grow from the soil, because they’re a direct link between life and death. Zandara queens just need to find a spirit who’s willing to help them channel the power of those plants once Eloi Oike opens the gate to the nether.”

  It feels like my head is spinning as I try to keep up. “What’s the nether?”

  “The world between life and death, where some spirits are stranded for a while. It’s people who did something wrong in their lives and can’t move on to a peaceful death. They long for human comforts because they’re closer to the human world than most spirits. That’s how queens barter with them, by providing those things through occasional possession ceremonies.”

  “And you’re saying zandara only exists here in Carrefour?”

  “It’s where the queens decided to make their home, for their own protection.” Aunt Bea’s expression grows serious. “Just before the turn of the last century in New Orleans, seven French immigrants who believed the magical arts were evil founded a group called Main de Lumière. They zeroed in on zandara and began a ‘Crusade of Light.’ ”

  Aunt Bea draws a deep breath before going on. “They started murdering practitioners who were part of your great-great-great-grandmother Eléonore’s group, claiming they were cleansing the world of evil.

  “In early 1903, a Main de Lumière soldier killed Eléonore’s younger daughter, who was three years old at the time.” I gasp as Aun
t Bea continues. “If he’d killed her firstborn, as he believed he was doing, he would have destroyed zandara forever. You see, only the firstborn daughter of each of the three queens inherits power, generation after generation, so that the balance of power will never change. Killing a future queen would have ended that family’s magical bloodline.

  “Eléonore and the other zandara practitioners had to leave New Orleans immediately if they were to escape Main de Lumière’s bloodlust,” Aunt Bea continues. “They chose the land we’re on now because it was out in the middle of nowhere. Crossroads are very powerful in zandara—symbolic of the intersection between this world and the nether—so the queens built a crossroads in the cemetery and performed the founding ceremony of Carrefour there, imbuing the town with power and protection.

  “Over the years, the queens and their descendants have let in a few thousand carefully screened outsiders to ward off suspicion,” she says. “If they had kept Carrefour to only themselves and their sosyete—the small group of trusted insiders they practiced their magic with—a town so tiny would have looked suspicious. But allowing the town to grow slowly in a very controlled manner has let Carrefour look from the outside like a typical small bayou town. Most of the families here have no idea that magic is keeping Carrefour afloat, so for a long time, the town existed without raising Main de Lumière’s suspicions.”

  “Wait, Main de Lumière still exists?”

  “Unfortunately.” Aunt Bea’s expression is grave. “In fact, I think it’s possible they found you in New York. The way you described the man you thought was following you—pale face, blond hair, slinking around in the shadows—it fits what we know of Main de Lumière soldiers.”

  “And they’re after me because . . . ?”

  “As this generation’s direct descendant to Eléonore, you’re the next in line to the throne.”

  My mouth goes dry. “I’m a . . . zandara queen?” I manage.

  She looks down for a long time before answering. “I wanted to protect you as long as I could, because I think your mother might still be alive if it wasn’t for zandara. And because I wanted you to have better values than this town would have given you. You’re different from Peregrine and Chloe, Eveny. They may be your sister queens, but that doesn’t mean you have to become one of them.”

  “This isn’t possible.” I shake my head. “I’ve never felt powerful or magical or capable of anything close to what you’re talking about.”

  Aunt Bea frowns. “A queen comes into her abilities on her seventeenth birthday, which means that you wouldn’t have begun feeling anything magical until last week.”

  I stare at her in disbelief. I’m not sure what to ask first, so I settle for the simplest question. “Okay, I can see why we had to leave New York if you thought some Main de Lumière guy had found me, but we could have hid somewhere cool and far away like London or Paris or the Siberian tundra. Why come back to Carrefour?”

  “You’re safest here. The whole town is under a protective charm. Unless someone is in possession of a key, which is passed down through generations and bestowed on new families only by the queens, they can’t enter. It’s like there’s an invisible barbed wire fence all around us.

  “In fact,” she adds, “we believe Main de Lumière has finally found Carrefour after all these years because, without your mom to complete the triumvirate, the protective charms have weakened. Peregrine’s and Chloe’s mothers have been able to continue performing the annual Mardi Gras Possession ceremony, so they’ve accrued some favors from the spirits, but their power has greatly diminished and so has the protection around the town because there aren’t three queens.”

  “But now that I’m back . . . ,” I say in a hollow voice.

  “You, Peregrine, and Chloe are all seventeen. That means you’re queens now and can begin casting together, restoring the full power of a triumvirate to Carrefour. But,” she continues, her face darkening, “I don’t trust them, Eveny, and I don’t trust their mothers. They’ve used their magic selfishly and carelessly, drawing power in ways that are strictly forbidden. The town is dying because of it.”

  “So what am I supposed to do?” I ask desperately.

  “I don’t know, I really don’t.” She leans in to kiss me on the forehead and adds, “Remember, there are only a handful of people in town who know about this. You must keep all of it a secret, or you’ll put us in terrible danger.” She checks her watch and grimaces. “I’m sorry, but I have to go. We can talk more later.”

  She walks out of the room before I can get another word out.

  A moment later, I hear the front door open and slam closed, then the sound of her car’s engine being revved in the driveway. By the time I make it to the front window to look outside, she’s already gone, leaving me alone with a thousand questions I don’t have the answers to.

  I stay home from school that day because I can’t go off to Pointe Laveau and pretend that things are normal after everything I’ve just learned. Besides, my brain feels as muddled as if I’d just downed a half dozen lunchtime gin and tonics in the Hickories. I go out to the garden to try to talk to Boniface, but he’s not in his cottage, and I can’t find him anywhere on the grounds. I search the house for books or notes that might be related to zandara, but I come up empty on that front too.

  I consider calling Peregrine or Chloe, but I realize I have no idea what I’d say. There isn’t exactly an approved script for the hey-I-saw-you-performing-a-creepy-ceremony-and-now-I-know-you’re-a-queen conversation I’d need to have with them. I pull the Justin doll out and stare at it for a while as if it might be able to provide some answers, but its x’s for eyes begin to creep me out, so I shove it back in my desk drawer.

  By mid-afternoon, I’m still going crazy over Aunt Bea’s crazy revelations when the doorbell rings. I squeeze my eyes shut and hope that whoever it is goes away, but the bell rings again and again. Finally, I hurl myself out of bed and slouch down the stairs. By the time I get to the front hallway, the doorbell has sounded a sixth time, and I’m ready to punch whoever I find standing there.

  But when I yank open the front door and see Peregrine and Chloe, my jaw falls. I’m not ready for this yet.

  “Why hello, Eveny!” Peregrine trills. She’s still wearing her Pointe Laveau uniform, which she has paired with black, thigh-high perforated leather boots and blood-red lipstick. Her smooth black stone with the jagged edge hangs just above the ornate hook and eye of a black fur capelet. She’s carrying a huge quilted leather Chanel bag. “We certainly hope we didn’t wake you. We were concerned when we didn’t see you in school!”

  “You were?” I ask skeptically.

  “Of course, sweetie!” Chloe chimes in. She’s dressed nearly as outrageously in platform ankle boots and a long sable coat that I swear I saw in Vogue this month. Her black stone necklace shines against her smooth, tan skin. “Are you all right? Do you need anything?”

  I’m not surprised to see that their smiles don’t reach their eyes.

  “So?” Peregrine prompts after a moment. “Why did you miss school?”

  I debate what to say but settle on the truth. “I saw you last night, in the cemetery.”

  The color drains from Chloe’s face, and Peregrine’s expression hardens.

  “What is it you think you saw, exactly?” Peregrine asks carefully.

  “I saw you practicing zandara,” I tell her.

  Their mouths open into identical o’s of surprise.

  “You know what zandara is?” Chloe asks. “We figured your aunt hadn’t told you yet.”

  “She hadn’t,” I say. “Until this morning.”

  They look at each other and then back at me. “Remarkable,” Peregrine breathes. Then she shoots me a dazzling smile. “What I mean to say is, perfect. Chloe and I have been studying for years, so there’s no one better to learn from than us.

  “But first things first,” she adds, leaning forward. “Now that you know the truth, let’s go have some fun.”

&n
bsp; 12

  Five minutes later, I’m folded uncomfortably into the back of Peregrine’s cherry-red Aston Martin DB Mark III hatchback, after she has sworn up and down that she’s left her creepy snake at home. She guns the engine and roars down the hill toward the center of town while Chloe turns around in the passenger seat and stares at me.

  “What?” I finally ask.

  “It’s just amazing, that’s all,” she says. “To grow up with no idea about any of this. I can’t even imagine what you must be thinking!”

  “I don’t know what to think.”

  “Well, I’m sure you have questions,” she says excitedly. “Ask us anything!”

  “Okay.” I hesitate. “How do we cast spells, for example?”

  Peregrine rolls her eyes at me in the rearview mirror. “They’re not spells, Eveny. You are not a character in Bewitched. They’re called charms.”

  “Ignore her,” Chloe says. “There are a few things to know: First, all charms have to start with asking Eloi Oke to open the gate so that we can talk to the spirits. Second, they all have to involve herbs or flowers, because we channel our power from them. Third, they always have to be specific. Like you can’t say, ‘Make all the boys fall in love with me.’ Instead you’d have to ask for your own beauty enhancements, or ask for the love of a specific guy. Or both.”

  “Assuming you’re completely lame and believe the best use of your immense power is to make boys love you,” Peregrine says with a snort.

  Chloe turns red. “Peregrine thinks that only losers fall in love,” she tells me.

  “No, I believe that only losers use their powers for something so entirely pointless.” Peregrine glances at me in the rearview mirror again. “But while we’re on the topic of losers and powers, Eveny, why don’t we have you do a little charm with us today? Our strength is much greater when there are three of us, so really, this should be no big deal. It’s just to open the gates of Carrefour for one teeny, tiny night so that we can have a fraternity party.”