Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from The Caster Chronicles. Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl do. I am just playing in their sandbox.
Chapter Twenty One
Turns out beignets were a must in New Orleans, and there was only one place to go.
Café Du Monde
The café was abuzz with patrons eating outside in the white chairs below the green and white awning. Pigeons flew from one empty table to another to try and get their fill of the fried foods, which Lila found out were the beignets. They were deep fried dough, sort of the equivalent of a doughnut with a lot of powdered sugar on top.
The three of them found a table outside, and Lila saw their menu: beignets, café au laits, coffee, or tea. Not an extensive menu by a long shot, but Leah beamed when the waiter to come and take their order: two plates of beignets and three café laits. Lila had no choice in the matter.
"You'll love these." Leah cooed.
Macon rolled his eyes. "She's addicted to them."
He glanced at Leah and his eyes averted hers as she took a sip of water when the water brought them some a moment ago. "Then again, she should enjoy them while she can."
Leah dropped her eyes. Lila thought why would he say such a thing, but it dawned on her. Leah saw Lila's frown before she smiled.
"I hold out hope, though. You're right Lila, we can change our fate." Leah smiled, but Macon held Leah's hand in his.
"Leah," Macon started. She gave him her best devil-may-care look, but her eyes told another story.
"I need to, brother. I'll go insane if I don't."
Lila gave them their own privacy as she watched a flock of pigeons swoop down onto the sidewalk and watched tourists look over the Mississippi. She saw Macon whisper into Leah's ear, and patted her shoulder in a soothing way as she closed her eyes for a moment. When she reopened them her entire body changed. She sat up straighter, put her elbows on the small table, and leaned forward.
"So," Leah drawled.
It seemed to Lila that the future had to wait, seeing as Leah inched up closer to her. Her high ponytail swung in the breeze.
"How did the two of you meet? You saw him on a bench reading Edgar Allan Poe."
Macon coughed and eyed Leah, who gave him the largest smile on the planet.
"Harper Lee, if you must know." Macon's said as Leah shook her head.
"Figures."
Lila raised her eyebrow and Leah shrugged her shoulders.
"It's one of his favorite books," Leah said.
"Really?" Lila said.
Macon nodded. "The day when I first met you and saw the copy of To Kill a Mockingbird on my car I knew I met someone special."
"There are millions of other books to make a person special," Lila added.
"But only one book has a Boo Radley…and one young woman whose copy happened to be on my car." His lips formed a smirk.
Lila covered her mouth with her hand and giggled, and Macon's face lit up. His eyes warm as they discussed the finer points of Atticus Finch and Scout. Leah had given her two cents every second or so. It seemed even his sister was a bit of a fan too. Like brother, like sister.
The beignets arrived, the smell of fried dough wafted into the air as the waiter put down the two plates with more powder sugar than even Russian tea cakes. He set down each of the café laits in front of Macon, Leah, and Lila. Picking it up, Lila smelled the coffee and had only to take a sip to know it was good. Macon took a sip of his café lait before he grabbed a beignet from the second plate. The powdered sugar on the left side of his mouth was the only remnant of his beignet.
"Go ahead try it," Leah waved a beignet in front of Lila, and even Macon smiled at her. Lila took a bite of the fried piece of dough and let her eyes close. Heaven. Fluffy. Fried. Heaven. Even better than the run-of-the-mill Dunkin Donuts, these were a treasure alright and picked up another. They sat there, no one of the wiser around them thinking they were three friends enjoying beignets and café laits when in reality they were far from it: a pair of doomed lovers and a sister and brother who awaited destiny.
#
The rest of the day had been particularly interesting. Leah went back home for homeschooling, and Macon took Lila to see all the sights. Evening descended into the Big Easy and they finished up dinner at a small, hidden restaurant that served everything from crawfish, alligator, catfish, and the best gumbo in the entire city. Or so Macon said, Lila thought.
Lila wanted to go down Bourbon Street, despite the debauchery during the night and the crowds. Macon had a different idea. He wanted to go back to Valentin Manor, but tomorrow they would head back to Duke. Lila had called Marian on a public pay phone during the afternoon to tell her when she would be back, and Marian expected a rather large report on what occurred. Still, what would Lila's visit to the Big Easy be without parading down the infamous Bourbon Street and hearing the live music?
"Please Macon, we don't have to stay for long." Macon eyed the sign and all the folks walking up and down it with drinks in their hands and the lights on the balconies. If he was worried about her safety she had pepper spray in her purse.
"Fine, stay close to me."
They walked down the street and no one gave them a second glance. Just a young woman and her boyfriend who were walking down the street listening to the music, and probably wanting to indulge in the sin of the night. Macon's head whipped from right to left in a dizzying fashion. He gripped her hand when a man, with dark skin and cornrows of hair stood by a back alley and watched them with a raised eyebrow. He had a large wooden staff he was leaning on.
"Don't look at him." Macon's voice was harsh in Lila's left ear.
"Are you serious? He's leaning against the wall minding his own business." Lila never thought Macon was the one for backwards thinking.
"No, but he's dangerous. There's more to the world than just Caster Magic, there is voodoo here and not all of it is the good kind." Macon crept closer to her and tightened his hand around her hip. A comforting gesture that felt as good as it eased her anxiety. There was no monster in him, despite what he thought. They were coming to the end of the road when Macon stopped.
A woman stood in front of them. Her dark skin glowed under the clear sky, and Lila saw the wrinkles in her eyes and her hair tied back into a bun. She wore her Sunday best a long green and yellow dress with a wide brimmed hat. The frown lines of her face prominent and her feet were shoulder length apart and her hands on her hips.
"Melchizedek," she said. Her eyes went from Macon and snapped to Lila.
"Amarie, what…what are you doing here?"
He was at a lost. Interesting, Lila thought. She never saw Macon at a lost for any reason.
"You should be askin' yourself the same question. Runnin' away like your dog."
Amarie's eyes narrowed as she pointed to Lila.
"Who's she?"
"Amarie," Macon said. He let go of Lila's waist and had put his hands in front of him in a placating gesture to calm Amarie down, and watched Lila out of the corner of his eyes.
"A friend."
Amarie shook her head.
"Don't you go lyin' to me, Melchizedek. I can see it in your eyes and hers. Remember I know these things. The greats told me somethin' was stirring and it always leads back to you and your kin."
Lila stood there and had enough of this Amarie's accusatory nonsense. She pushed herself in front of Macon whose eyes widened and Lila pointed her finger at Amarie.
"His name is Macon. I don't know who you think you are, but can you just let us be on our way?"
The woman snorted and Macon pulled Lila back to him. Amarie's eyes steeled at Macon's gesture and were unmoving as she stepped towards Lila, but away from Macon.
Macon's voice drifted into Lila's ear. "This is Amarie Troudeau she's a local seer who spends some time in Gatlin when she's not at the home of her ancestors. She's trustworthy, but doesn't like my kind. I don't blame her."
"Do you even know what kind of trouble you're in?" Amarie clasped her bag in her hands and looked like an unmoving Marry Poppins.
"Yes," Macon said his eyes saddened by some weight Lila could not see.
Lila knew what her relationship to Macon meant, but she was no more scared than the first time she rode a bike.
She wrapped Macon's hand into her own and leaned into him. Macon awkwardly put his hand around her waist and Lila leaned into him, feeling the beating of his heart against her back. His breaths were tickling the back side of her neck. Amarie frowned for a moment and then looked up at Lila with new eyes. They softened for a moment, before they narrowed again.
"You're poking a hole in the sky Melchizedek, but my affairs lie elsewhere tonight. You should be in ten kinds of sorry for what you had left me to do."
Macon shook his head and his eyes closed before they reopened. The people around them paid no attention to what they were doing, and there was a bit of a breeze but it hadn't been there before. Before Amarie left him she had Macon get down on his knees and she whispered something into his ear. He grimaced and his eyes were tortured, but he nodded his head and said his farewells to her. She walked off to the end of the street and Macon's knuckles were as white as clam sauce.
"Let's go home."
Lila didn't argue as he grabbed her hand and left without going into one concert hall to listen to a live band.
A/N:
A thousand and one apologies my friends, I have been very busy in real life for the past couple of months.
I graduated from college in January with a BA in political science. Yippee! I found out I'm not going to a graduate school like I planned. Boo.
So, I've been working on an application to teach English abroad in the subsequent months, and, of course, having problems with the application to get the requirements completed. I've been writing stories outside FanFiction, reading, and working on other things in the meantime.
I've kind of fallen out of a Caster Chronicles mood for a bit with everything going on, but I am trying to rectify that now.
I had a hard time getting back in because I really do not like this chapter half as much as I did back when I first wrote it in the summer. I've been moaning about revising this chapter for months, so I just want to get it out to you guys so I can move on. I'm going to do the best I can to get more regular updates now that school is of no concern, for now.
Please do not be afraid to leave a review and thank you to all the new followers, favorites, and reviews since the last time I posted. I am incredibly sorry for the long wait, but I do want to finish this before I teach abroad (if that actually ends up happening). It's going to be awhile before this is finished, but I promise to finish it. It's going to happen.
Much obliged,
Dark Horse Writer