Page 94 of Wild Thorns

"You again, chère," she said. Her voice was rich, layered with an accent that sounded like Louisiana and felt like something older. "What keeps bringin’ you here?"

I stared at her. The question made no sense. The whole thing made no sense. I was dreaming. I had to be dreaming, because a moment ago I'd been drowning in darkness and now I was standing in a stranger's kitchen smelling coffee and watching her sort bones like she was organizing paperclips.

"Do you know me?" The words came out before I could stop them.

She tilted her head, studying me the way you'd study a puzzle that wasn't quite behaving correctly. Her hands never stopped moving, fingers finding herbs and beads by touch alone.

"Should I know you?"

I opened my mouth. Closed it. Nothing about this followed any logic I understood. Dreams weren't supposed to ask questions back. Dreams weren't supposed to look at you with that kind of knowing patience, like they had all the time in the world and you were the one who needed to catch up.

"I don't..." I started. "I don't know how I got here."

"Mmm." She made a sound that was neither agreement nor disagreement. Her hands paused on a bundle of something that looked like sage. "Most folks don't, first time, but this is no you first time, is it? Takes practice, knowing which doors you mean to walk through." Her eyes flicked down to my hands, then back to my face. "What's that you got there, chère?"

I looked down.

My right hand was closed in a fist, knuckles white, clutching something. I hadn't realized I was holding anything.

I opened my fingers.

Tara's charm sat in my palm.

The little bundle of thread, wood, and herbs, bound with intention, that she'd pressed into my hand before she left Atlanta heading to Nashville, making me promise to keep it close. Protection, she'd said, in that half-joking way she had when she talked about anything related to her grandmother's traditions. Humor me.

I'd kept it in my pocket. Always.

But that wasn't what made my breath catch.

The darkness was still on me.

It clung to my skin like oil, visible now in the bright kitchen light. There were shadows, too, swirling at my feet and hands like something living. But my entire body was wrapped in the oil-slick darkness, drowning in it.

Every part except my right hand.

Where the charm sat, my skin was clean. Bare. The slick coating couldn't touch it, couldn't cross whatever invisible line the little bundle of thread and herbs had drawn. It curled at the edges of my palm like water hitting rock, churning but unable to advance.

"Hmm," the old woman said. Her voice had changed. Sharper. More interested. "I know this work, I do."

"What is it?" I heard the panic climb my throat. "What's on me? What is this?"

"One be blood, one be a curse, chère." she said, "You be carryin’ it for a long time. I can see it, sure enough. Been seeing folks carry all kinds of shadow my whole life." She picked up one of the small bones, turned it between her fingers. "Some of 'em know what they carryin’. Most don't."

"I don't understand."

"Course you don't. Understanding comes after, chère. First comes the claiming, but you done good. You run." She tossed a handful of bones across the table. Her dark eyes met mine, held them. "But you fear you destiny."

Her body jerked upright as if a puppet on strings. Her eyes rolled back until there was nothing but white. The voice that filled the room was old, powerful, and not of this world.

Truths denied, cypress crowns

Blooded lines, hallowed ground

Darkest queen, a path reclaimed

Darkness, Death, and the Prince of Pain

She blinked and her eyes were once again the dark, warm brown from before.