Page 100 of Curse in the Quarter
She let out a breath he hadn’t realized she’d been holding. “You make it sound simple.”
“It isn’t,” he said. “But simple isn’t the same as easy.”
They reached Jackson Square; the cathedral’s spires cut clean lines against a deepening violet sky. A painter closed his easel; the canvas, half-finished, already knew what it wanted to be. Delphine slowed to watch. Bastien watched her. The way she leaned in when she was curious, the way she gathered space with her attention. He had loved that posture across more names than the city could catalogue.
“Tell me something true,” she said, still studying the painting. “Not big. Just… true.”
He thought of all the true things he could not yet say. He chose one that would not betray either of them. “You’re not alone in this.”
She turned then, measuring him. “Because you’ve… seen something like it?”
“Because I’ve seen people become themselves,” he said. “And I know what it looks like when they’re brave enough to keep going.”
For a heartbeat he thought she might ask the nextquestion—the dangerous one, the one that would tug at threads he’d promised himself he would let her find on her own. Instead she looked past him to the river, where a breeze carried the faintest scent of rain.
“Sometimes I wake up with the feeling that I made a promise,” she said, voice low. “And if I could just remember the words, everything would click into place.”
He forced his hands to remain easy at his sides. “If it matters, the promise remembers you.”
She blinked, absorbing that, then smiled as if her bones recognized the cadence. “That’s your poet voice.”
“I don’t have a poet voice.”
“You do.” She bumped his shoulder with hers, light and deliberate. “You bring it out when you want me to stop spiraling.”
“Is it working?”
“A little.”
They cut back toward the river. The levee beyond the Quarter was a shade darker now, sketched in lamplight and shadow. He could almost overlay another evening—the curve of a different hand in his, the clean certainty of a vow made without knowing its cost. He let the overlay pass. This was not then. This was this.
At the corner, two tourists argued amicably about where to find the best beignets; Delphine pointed them toward the answer and accepted their cheerful thanks. When they moved on, she looked up at him, expression open in a way that made something in his chest settle.
He was simply being the kind of man worth choosing, and Delphine had been choosing him freely. The difference felt revolutionary.
They fell into step again, the hum of the Quarter wrapping around them. She told him about a new exhibit theArchive was preparing—rare maps that charted not just geography but the shifting borders of political ambition—and he let her voice do what it always did: make the world feel steadier. At her car, she unlocked the door but didn’t get in right away, leaning lightly on the frame as they lingered in the pool of lamplight.
“Tomorrow,” she said, her tone a mix of certainty and invitation.
“I’ll be there,” he promised.
Her smile deepened, something unspoken flickering in her eyes. “Don’t be late.”
“I wouldn’t dare.”
A few more seconds of quiet, and then she slid into the driver’s seat, giving a small wave before pulling into the night.
Walking back to his car, Bastien found himself noticing details that had been invisible during months of crisis and magical chaos. The way lamplight caught in wrought iron balconies, the sound of jazz drifting from open doorways, the particular rhythm of a city that had survived everything history could devise and emerged stronger for it. New Orleans felt alive around him in a way it hadn't since before Delia's death, as if the city itself was celebrating this small victory of love over circumstance.
His phone buzzed as he reached his car, the screen lighting up with a text from an unknown number. Bastien glanced at it, expecting spam or a wrong number, then frowned as he read the message:
Unknown:
A Marie Laveau grimoire surfaced at Rousseau Auction House. Bidding tomorrow night. Cannot fall into civilian hands. Meet me tonight to discuss terms. - A Concerned Collector
The timing was irritating. He had been looking forward to spending the evening planning tomorrow's date, to savoring the satisfaction of finally moving forward instead of perpetually looking backward. Marie Laveau artifacts appeared on the supernatural black market with depressing regularity, most of them fakes designed to separate wealthy collectors from their money. But occasionally something genuine surfaced, and when it did, the consequences could be catastrophic if it fell into the wrong hands.
Bastien typed back:
