Blood and Salt (6 page)

TRADITION

ASSAULTED BY A GANG
of warm, soft bodies, Rhys and I were quickly separated by a flurry of hugs, tears of joy, and bursts of exaltation. Before I even knew what was happening I was corralled behind a flimsy screen.

“Well, she's a Larkin, all right.” A sprightly woman with dark brown spiral curls came in close to study my face. “Just look at those eyes.”

“No need to be shy,” a burly woman said as she stripped off my blood-smeared blouse. “Can't go to your wreathing ceremony looking like that.”

“We're happy you're home.” A woman glanced up at me shyly through light blond eyelashes as she crushed a soft gold substance in a pestle with gardenia-and-orange-blossom-scented oil. “You must be so proud of your mother and father.”

“Off we go.” Someone peeled off my camisole.

“Wait . . . ,” I sputtered as I clasped my arms around my bare chest.

Two younger girls crept behind the screen, giggling like hyenas as they pried off my boots and socks.

“Okay, if you can just hold on a min—”

“This is a happy day indeed.” A small birdlike woman with brown frizzy hair reached in and ripped the bandage off my collarbone.

“Hey!” I yelled, but they weren't paying any attention to me.

“Is it really her?” A young girl approached, a spray of freckles across her nose and cheeks, trying to see around the ample rumps surrounding me.

“Ooh, look at this fancy clasp,” another woman said as she unbuttoned my skirt.

“What the fuck?” I screamed as my skirt dropped around my ankles.

The room went deathly silent. They all looked at me in shock—like I'd just given them a universal slap.

I peeked my head around the screen to find Rhys biting the inside of his cheek, desperately trying not to laugh. I was on my own.

I stood there in my underwear, covering up the best I could with my hands, trying to figure out what to do next, when Beth sidled up to me with a tense smile. “It's part of the ceremony, Ash. Tradition,” she whispered.

Why was she helping me? Did she know what Rhys and I were up to? She was a seer, which meant she could see the
future. Granted, she was a broken seer, but it seemed like I should keep an eye on her anyway.

“What she
means
is she's excited,” Beth announced to the crowd. “Right, Ash?” She nudged me in the ribs. “That's the word they use for excitement where she comes from.”

“Yeah.” I managed a shaky smile. “I'm . . . excited.”

All the tension disappeared from Beth's face, and the women picked up right where they left off.

Stripped of all my clothes, I was bullied into a copper tub full of warm water and rose petals. Not the roses you'd find in a cheesy honeymoon suite. These were real roses—wild roses—the kind that gave off the scent of some forgotten time.

I didn't even like changing clothes for gym. Being bathed by a creepy cult was not on my favorite-things-to-do list.

The same woman who removed my bandage reached forward to untie the ribbon from my neck; I seized her hand. “The ribbon stays.”

“Let the girl be, Agnes,” a soft voice beckoned.

I released Agnes from my vise grip. She backed away from the tub looking more than a little terrified. I had no idea what made me react so strongly.

“Your ribbon's lovely.” The woman with the kind voice settled next to me on a wooden stool. She had a shock of long white hair, and the skin around her cornflower-blue eyes looked like weathered parchment. “I'm Lucy, but my friends call me Lou.”

I pulled my knees in tight to my chest, half intrigued, half
horrified by the scene playing out before me. The women looked fairly normal, considering how isolated they were from the rest of the world. Maybe a century or so behind the times, fashion-wise, but they seemed healthy and happy. There were three distinct looks. Some had thick black hair and olive skin. Others were sturdily built megawatt blondes, and then there were redheads with spindly limbs and wide smiles.

“Ash,” Rhys called out meekly. “If everything's okay, I might just wait outside.” I peeked through the crowd of women to see my brother inching his way against the far wall, trying to make his escape. Beth caught his arm and swung him back into the thick of it.

“Ladies, this is Rhys Larkin and, yes, he's unintended.”

The room erupted into a fit of cackles and catcalls. The look of horror he shot my way as they pawed him was priceless.

“May I?” Lou asked as she held up a pitcher of water.

Reluctantly, I tilted my head back and let her pour the water over my hair.

“I remember when I prepared your mother for this very occasion seventeen years ago,” she said. “You look so much like her.”

Just the mention of her brought up so many feelings—fear, hope, but above all, love. “When can I see her?” I asked, trying to bury my emotions, but the quiver in my voice betrayed me.

“Soon.” Lou smiled, her eyes twinkling. “This must be overwhelming for you,” she said as she worked tea tree oil into my hair. “Especially since you're a conduit.”

I inhaled sharply. “What do you know about that?”

“I can sense auras. I definitely feel another presence with you, but Spencer already told us what you are.”

“Who's Spencer?” I asked, sitting up straight, sloshing water over the side of the tub.

“Spencer Mendoza. He's the spiritual leader of the community—Katia's eyes and ears.” Lou snapped her fingers, motioning to the water on the floor.

Beth, who was talking to my brother, fetched a rag and maneuvered through the gathering.

“Sorry about that . . .” I winced, peering down at the puddle.

“No bother,” she said with a shrug as she mopped up the floor.

Lou leaned forward and whispered, “They say being a conduit is a curse, but you control it very well.”

Not well enough, I thought to myself. “My mother helped me.”

“I can see that,” Beth chimed in with a reassuring smile.

I ran my fingers over the last tattoo, wondering if it really was a curse. There was no pain when I touched it. I looked down to see that it had completely healed. And then I remembered my mother had pricked her finger with the bone needle when she was working on me. How she'd pressed her finger against my wound. As Katia's vessel, maybe she was already immortal. Could she have healed me like Katia healed Alonso? She'd never been sick a day in her life, never been to the hospital, and she always looked so young.

Maybe that's the reason the protection marks weren't working anymore. Maybe her blood healed me before it could take effect—maybe it messed everything up.

As they scrubbed the grime of the outside world from my body, they told me stories about Katia. They spoke of her wisdom and kindness and the horrible injustice of Coronado killing Alonso and then forcing Katia to make him her immortal mate. But the biggest tragedy was when Coronado killed Katia's seventeen-year-old daughter, Marie.

“To make matters worse,” Lou said as she leaned in close, “they say Marie was in love with Coronado. She was just a young woman, but first love is often the hardest. Can you imagine? Marie thought Coronado hung the moon, and then he killed her. Like his signet, a crow, wings outstretched, a star in one claw, a moon in the other, Coronado is a trickster. He's capable of all kinds of treachery and black magic.”

A shiver of recognition rushed through me when I remembered my mother's studio filled with those black birds. Was Coronado looking for her?

Lou placed her hand on my shoulder, startling me. “It might seem like a bunch of hooey to you that we're going ahead with the wreathing ceremony this year when there's no need, but it's tradition. We didn't even know until a few days ago that Nina and Thomas were the chosen vessels. Katia kept it a secret all this time to protect them from Coronado. But now the chosen vessels are coming home to walk the corn once again,” she said with a childlike grin.

“What does that mean, ‘walk the corn'?” I asked, peeling a rose petal off my shoulder.

“At the wreathing ceremony, the Larkin girl chooses a Mendoza boy—the boy of her heart. Then, at high noon on the summer solstice, Katia leads the couple into the corn, to a barren sacred circle of earth—the spiritual heart of Quivira. There, Katia tests the girl's blood, hoping to find her vessel—the perfect match, so she can be free of her bond to Coronado and be reunited with Alonso.”

“But what will happen
this
year? To my mom, and my . . . dad.” Just saying the word
dad
out loud made my heart ache in a way I hadn't expected.

“Nina and Thomas will walk the corn—for the last time. Katia will take them to the sacred circle. As Katia's soul enters the vessel, she'll shed her body, like a cocoon. When that happens, Coronado will be forced out of his own body. Without a vessel of his own, his soul will be forced to wander the earth alone, always searching, always longing. The Great Spirit will deliver Alonso's soul into the Mendoza vessel and they'll live happily ever after.”

I couldn't help thinking of the dead girl, the wound on the palm of her hand. “What happened to all the Larkin girls and Mendoza boys who went to the sacred circle before my mother and father?”

Lou's fingers stiffened in my hair. A look of regret seemed to pass over her face. “People don't speak from beyond the corn,” she said in a hushed tone.

The woman with frizzy brown curls came near and Lou's whole demeanor changed. “The unchosen Larkin girl and the Mendoza boy leave the safety of the corn to live their lives in the outside world. But
this
year is special.” She leaned back, resuming her scrubbing duties. “After the ritual is complete, we'll be one big happy family. Forever.”

I couldn't help thinking I was missing something. Why was this such a big deal to them? What were they getting out of it?

An explosion of giggles pulled my attention to the center of the room, where girls of every age were scrambling around trying to get ready—brushing one another's hair, doing last-minute mending. I think that's what made it so unsettling; it was all so ordinary, like they were getting ready for a school dance, not preparing for a cult ceremony.

“What exactly do I have to do at this wreathing thing?” I asked as Lou began to work my tangles out with a wide-toothed wooden comb.

“Girls, bring the basket, please.”

Lou made room for Beth and another girl to step forward and kneel in front of the tub; they were carrying a large basket brimming with dark green leaves from the cornstalks.

“This is Lauren Mendoza, and you know our Beth.” I liked the way she said
our Beth
like she belonged to everyone. There was something so endearing and goofy about this girl.

Beth extended the basket to me. “Please, take a leaf.” I noticed a scar on her inner wrist—an unmistakable
C
branded
into her delicate skin. I looked around for the same mark on the other girls, but only Beth had one.

“The girls will show you how to make the wreath,” Lou said as she dried my hair with a cloth.

The other girl, Lauren, was stunning—olive skin, long dark hair parted in the center, showing off her widow's peak. The last bit of light streaming through the window seemed to bend to her face as if it wanted to be there. But there was no warmth in her; she gave off the acrid scent of mourning.

“Take three leaves and braid them together, one after the other,” Beth said.

I tried to do it, but my wet fingertips slipped and fumbled.

Beth was patient and encouraging, but Lauren countered that with a lot of heavy sighing and eye rolling.

“When the ceremony starts,” Beth said, “we'll cover your eyes with a sash and I'll lead you to the line of eligibles. The Larkin women have a heightened sense of smell. Under different circumstances you'd use your senses to recognize your soul mate.” Beth leaned in as if she were going to tell me some deep dark secret. “Katia chose for you. Number nine.”

Lauren accidentally crushed one of the leaves in her hand. Beth gave her a wide-eyed look of horror.

“I'm sorry.” Lauren whispered so quietly, I wondered who the apology was for.

I went back to work on the wreath, but it felt like the leaves were wrestling against me.

Beth kept glancing back at my brother, who was being
doted on by a girl with two long coppery braids. She had taken it upon herself to clean and re-bandage Rhys's skinned knee. He looked like he was going to pass out.

“Who's that?” I asked as I leaned forward in the tub, trying to get a better view.

Beth turned back to me, her cheeks flushed with embarrassment. “Oh, that's my half cousin Betsy Grimsby. She's unintended, too.”

Clearly, Beth had a little crush on my brother. “So, tell me about number nine,” I said, trying to distract her.

“You're still not braiding the leaves right.” Lauren glared at me through her shiny black lashes.

“Then why don't you do it for me.” I pushed my shoddy work toward her.

“Believe me, I would if I could . . . but I can't.” She forced it back into my hands.

I had no idea what I'd done to piss her off, but she made me anxious. And I hated being this bad at anything.

“We
can't
help,” Beth patted my arm. “It has to be your own creation. It's tradition. You're doing really well for your first time.” She could barely say it with a straight face. “I mean . . . it's more symbolic than anything.”

I looked down at the limp massacred leaves in my hands and laughed. “Poor number nine.”

Aside from Lauren's sour mood, the atmosphere was jovial. Everyone seemed excited and full of life. It was contagious. I
had to remind myself that these people were total freaks who wanted to steal my mother's body.