Page 36 of Curse in the Quarter
The casual reference confirmed his fears. Whatever entity had claimed previous victims now possessed the anchor point organizing all mystical networks.
“Let her go.”
“Go where? This is her destiny, culmination of experiments begun centuries ago.” She gestured toward glowing documents. “Charlotte’s work approaches completion. Your cooperation would make transition pleasant for everyone.”
The locket against his chest burned with intensity threatening to sear through fabric. But he could sense Delphine still there—consciousness fighting for control beneath cosmic possession.
Whatever authority had claimed her wasn’t absolute.
And he had promises to keep.
The ritual fragments from Voss’s market had revealed more than spell components—they’d shown him exactly what Charlotte had really created. Not just consciousness preservation, but weapons against entities viewing individual souls as harvestable resources.
Time to discover if love preserved across lifetimes could prove stronger than cosmic authority seeking to reshape it according to their design.
The war for Delphine’s soul was about to begin.
He stepped in close, bracketing the table with his arms, and cupped her temples in his hands. Her skin was warm,but there was something cold beneath it—like a second heartbeat, out of rhythm with her own.
Bastien closed his eyes and whispered the old words, low and deliberate. The syllables curled through the air, heavy with the weight of oaths he’d sworn long before she’d been born. Power slid down his arms and into her, threads of shadow unraveling as he pulled them free.
For a moment she resisted—itresisted—but then the shimmer in her eyes shattered, scattering like dust caught in a sudden wind. The pressure in the room broke, the charged hum fading into stillness.
Delphine swayed, her breath hitching as her gaze found his. He was still close—too close—his thumbs brushing the edges of her cheekbones, her pulse steadying under his fingers.
She blinked up at him, confusion flickering. “What just happened?”
He didn’t move, not yet. “You were . . .not yourself.” His voice was quiet, roughened at the edges. “It’s gone now.”
Delphine glanced down at the scattered documents, as if searching for footing in something familiar. He didn’t miss the way her hands trembled before she tucked them into her lap.
He should have said more. Should have told her exactly what had taken hold of her, what it meant. But the words tangled on his tongue, caught between the sharp taste of fear and the memory of her pulse steadying under his touch.
So instead, he stepped back, forcing space between them.
“Get some rest, ma chérie,” he said, though the command was as much for himself as for her. It slipped out before he could stop it, the syllables tasting far too familiar in his mouth. Her head lifted, eyes catching his like she’dfelt the shift, and the slightest hint of a smile formed on her lips.
She nodded her agreement, eyes still searching his face, but didn’t press further.
Bastien left the Archive with the echo of her warmth clinging to his hands and the knowledge that he would not be sleeping tonight.
Ten
The keepsake locket had burned against Bastien's chest since midnight.
Not literal fire—worse. Spiritual heat that seared through fabric and flesh, metal pulsing with violent recognition that left him gasping against the wall in his study. Every breath brought fresh waves of burning as the artifact responded to forces he couldn't identify, couldn't control, and couldn't escape.
Something had changed.
Something fundamental.
At four in the morning, when the pain threatened to drive him to his knees, Bastien made the call he'd been avoiding for twenty-five years.
“Maman? I need to see you. Now.”
Twenty minutes later, he stood outside her shop, watching warm light spill through windows despite the ungodly hour. Her shop on Rampart Street glowed with warm light despite the hour, as if she'd been expecting him. Wind chimes made from bones and bottle glass announcedhis arrival as he pushed through the door, breathing familiar scents of sage, graveyard dirt, and wisdom that belonged to practitioners whose knowledge ran deeper than most people's faith.
Maman Brigitte waited behind her reading table, coffee already brewed, her dark eyes carrying the patient expression of someone who'd been watching a slow catastrophe build toward inevitable culmination.
