Page 64 of Death Card

On the path to our left, a dark-skinned Black woman walks toward us. Her black dreads, streaked with gray, hang down her back. She wears simple brown sandals on her feet and loose woven pants with a white sleeveless top. I imagined a woman near Gran’s age, but this woman looks to be closer to her midfifties.

She pauses a few feet away and places her hands on her hips. Her mouth is drawn in a frown, but she doesn’t speak.

“Sabine?” Orion asks. “Do you know who we are?”

I scramble to grab the envelope with the letter Aunt Roberta gave me, but Sabine stops me.

“Of course I do.” Her voice is scratchy, like she smokes tenpacks a day. “I’d recognize the Broussard babies any day. Y’all both walk around with your mama’s face. Your daddy’s genes didn’t put up a fight.”

Her words crack loose a smile from both of us.

“Now, what the hell are y’all doin’ way out here? I know Zeke didn’t send you to bring me back.” She narrows her eyes. “Actually, I’m sure he’d have both your scalps if he knew where you were.”

She knows Gramps well. He sure would kill us if he ever found out we came to see her.

“You’re right,” I say. Her gaze snaps to me. I fight not to squirm. “We need to ask you about a topic he’s not too willing to discuss.”

“And that would be?”

Orion and I both speak at the same time: “Demons.”

“Oh Lord.” Sabine shuts her eyes and mutters something under her breath. She turns on her heel and walks back the way she came. “Come on,” she calls over her shoulder. “I need a drink.”

29

The inside ofSabine’s house is old but not unclean. The cracked floors are swept, the tables and counters are clear of dust, and the windows are intact and free of grime. Maybe I judged this place too harshly when we first arrived. I don’t know anything about these people and why they’ve chosen to live out in the wilderness of the bayou. Sabine carries herself with a quiet confidence. This is her life, her home.

She gestures for us to take a seat at the kitchen table. There’s no overhead light, but candles flicker from nearly every corner of the room. Instead of a refrigerator, she has a giant icebox beside the counter. The hinges groan as she lifts the lid and removes a can of beer. The carbonation hisses as she cracks open the top and swigs down the entire can in a giant gulp, crushing it on the counter beneath her fist.

She’s not what I expected for a former professor with two PhDs. I Googled her before we came and found a host of academic papers she published, all at least a decade old. It seems that she abandoned academia around the same time Gran banished her from the coven.

Orion mouths,Impressive, and I kick him beneath the table. He kicks me back but gentler.

“All right.” Sabine leans against the counter and studies us. “Why do you, of all people, want to know about demons?”

Orion gestures in my direction. “You’ve got the floor,” he says.

I start from the beginning, telling Sabine about little Marian and working my way to the rest of the deaths. Orion stiffens when I mention Chris, but I press on. I tell her about the Hightowers, my run-ins with Aria, and the book on demons I found in their shop. Sabine’s expression remains neutral through it all until I describe the symbol that appears on the victims’ bodies.

She removes a sheet of paper and a pencil from a drawer. After scrawling a looping shape across the paper, she slaps it down on the table. I can’t suppress the shiver that runs through my body at the sight of the familiar symbol.

“That’s the one,” I murmur. “The compendium listed the demon’s name as Gazannol—”

“Hush!” She mimes zipping her lips shut. “If someone has truly summoned it onto this plane, you’ll boost its power every time you utter its name.”

I slap my hand over my mouth in horror. This is why we needed her.

Sabine’s eyes soften for a moment. “You didn’t know. Adelaide and Ezekiel did a fair job of wiping out all knowledge of demonology from that coven.” She rises from her seat and begins to fill a cast-iron pot with water from a huge jug.

“Why is that?” Orion asks.

She stiffens and turns to face us. “They didn’t tell you?”

I sit up straight. “Tell us what?”

“Oh Lord.” Sabine abandons the pot and takes a seat at the table with us. “It happened toward the end of your grandmaRose’s reign. A young witch in the coven died with a demon’s mark branded onto her chest. No one ever could prove that the Hightower witches were behind it, but they’re the only coven we know who’s dealt with dark magic.”

A light bulb flares to life inside my head. “Wait, Gramps told me that Gran tried to confront the Hightowers, and when she did, that’s when they disappeared.”