The Visitor (12 page)

I remained silent, my stomach in knots as I resisted the inclination to press my hands to my ears, once more blocking out what I didn't want to hear. What I couldn't bear to comprehend.

“Think of it as a vocation similar to your grandmother Tilly's,” he said. “She was a midwife, yes? Only you aren't meant to help souls enter this world. Your job is to help them leave.”

“That's a very frightening prospect,” I said on a ragged whisper.

“To the contrary,” he said kindly. “Some would consider it a high and noble calling. It's what the shamans refer to as a midwife to the dead.”

Twenty

A
fter I left the Institute, I parked downtown and walked over to the Unitarian Churchyard, one of my favorite cemeteries in Charleston. A glimpse through the rear gate might lead a first-time caller to conclude the graveyard was abandoned or badly neglected, but the paths were meticulously kept, allowing visitors to wander at will through the deliberately overgrown shrubbery and wildflowers.

The heavy oaks provided a welcome respite from the heat of the street and I took my time reacquainting myself with the centuries-old headstones and ironwork. Some of the secluded corners reminded me of Rosehill Cemetery, especially this time of day with the heady scent of flowers hanging on humid air. Now and then I could hear a strand of organ music from inside the church, normally a perfect accompaniment to meditation and reflection, but my mind was much too chaotic to settle. Today, nirvana was not to be found among the primroses.

As I strolled along the shady trails, I couldn't stop thinking about Dr. Shaw's speculation regarding my birth and my destiny. Death walker. Midwife to the dead. No matter the term, I didn't want to consider the possibility that I might have such a calling. What a nightmarish thing to even contemplate.

And yet had I not tried to find some rhyme or reason for the ghosts in my life? Some higher purpose for this terrible gift that could justify the loneliness and isolation of my existence?

“Set aside the grimness of the terminology and imagery and allow yourself to explore the possibilities,” Dr. Shaw had advised. “Remember what I said about your grandmother's calling. This is not so different.”

But it was different, and all I could picture was a dark-shrouded skeleton ferrying the dead across the River Styx.

“A death walker might best be described as a conductor of souls. A shepherd of the dead, if you will. According to shamanism, someone born with this gift has an inner light that guides the lost to them. A spiritual magnet that attracts the lingering life force released into the universe when someone passes. Perhaps that's why you've always felt so at home in cemeteries and why you've chosen to spend so much of your life in and around them. Graveyards aren't just repositories of decaying flesh and bone, but of the unbound energy of death. All you need do is open yourself up to this force.”

“But what if I don't want anything to do with that kind of power?” I'd asked. “What if all I want is to be left alone to lead a normal life?”

“A true calling should never be ignored, my dear. It invites disruption and makes for an unsettled life.”

Easy to say if one hadn't an inkling of the parasitic nature of ghosts or the evil that lay in wait on the other side. Guiding the dead through the veil might well be a noble endeavor, but it would require someone with far greater courage than I.

A couple of tourists had stopped on the path and they spoke in hushed, excited tones as they pointed to a grave. I thought at first they might have spotted a small animal scurrying through the underbrush, but then I detected a low drone that grew louder as I approached. When I passed them on the path, I heard one say to the other, “Have you ever seen anything like it?”

I glanced in the direction where their gazes were pinned. A swarm of honeybees had gathered on one of the headstones, covering the surface so thoroughly that on first glance the monument appeared to be moving. It was a very disconcerting illusion, and I stood there awestruck until I realized the incessant buzzing reminded me a little too much of the drone of ghost voices in my head. I nodded to the pair and hurried away.

I walked on, deeper and deeper into the green coolness of the cemetery. Where one path crossed another, I saw a shadow on the pavers as someone came up behind me. Ever cautious, I glanced over my shoulder.

A young man had stopped a few feet away to gaze down at a headstone. He stood in deep shade and I could see only his profile, but I recognized his slight form and the silvery-gold curls falling down over his forehead.

My first instinct was to confront Micah Durant and demand to know why he had followed me to the cemetery, but suddenly I was seized by the strangest sensation. It was as if I had the power to peer past his angelic facade all the way down into his soul, and the blackness of his essence shocked me.

He turned then, a half smile playing at the corners of his mouth as he started toward me. Neither of us spoke even when he drew even with me on the path. I opened my mouth, to say what I wasn't quite certain, but he put a finger to his lips to silence me as his other hand moved to the side of my neck.

A scream rose to my throat. I thought surely he meant to assault me, but when he drew his hand away, I saw that a honeybee clung to one of his knuckles. Bringing the insect to eye level, he examined it closely as he rotated his hand. Incredibly, the bee shifted so that man and insect remained face-to-face. They stayed that way for the longest time before the honeybee finally flew away.

And then Micah Durant turned without having uttered a word and strode down the walkway toward the King Street gate.

Twenty-One

“T
hey say everyone has a double,” Devlin said a little while later as he peered through the viewer.

I'd arrived home to find him once again waiting on my front steps. He was a welcome sight after that odd encounter at the churchyard. And as always, he smelled divine. I resisted the urge to press my nose to his neck while he studied the stereogram.

After a few moments of scrutiny, he glanced up. “Is she a relative?”

“I don't know. She's almost certainly the woman named Rose that Nelda Toombs mentioned yesterday at Oak Grove. Nelda said we bore an uncanny resemblance and she seemed convinced that Rose and I were somehow connected. But what I'd really like to know is how that card ended up in my cellar.”

From past experiences, I knew that searching for a practical answer in my impractical world was often a futile endeavor. Better just to accept that some things could never be explained. But that didn't stop me from longing for a rational explanation of recent events. If anyone could uncover the logic in any situation it was Devlin. His disdain for the supernatural wouldn't allow him to consider the alternative. So I let him unwittingly play the role of devil's advocate, hoping that he could open my mind to other less disturbing possibilities.

“Are you certain it couldn't have fallen out of a box of your belongings?” he asked. “Maybe the card got mixed in with some of your things when you moved out of your parents' house.”

“That was years ago and I've moved around quite a bit since then. I think I would have found the card before now. Besides, I don't ever recall seeing any stereograms or viewers in the house, let alone any images of a look-alike. When I was little I used to spend hours and hours poring through family photograph albums. If I'd seen that picture or that woman, I'm certain I would have remembered.”

“Not necessarily. The resemblance wouldn't have been so noticeable when you were a child.”

I let myself cling to his reasoning for a moment. “I guess that's possible. Anything's possible.” As I knew only too well.

“Have you shown the card to anyone in your family?”

“Not yet, but I'm driving over to Trinity to talk to Papa tomorrow. If I'm related to this woman—Rose—he'd be the one to know.”

“That sounds like a reasonable plan,” Devlin said. “Are you still worried that the stereoscope is somehow connected to the break-in?”

“I can't imagine why Owen Dowling or anyone else would go to so much trouble for an old viewer. But I also don't see how the timing can be coincidental. My house was broken into only a matter of hours after I took the stereoscope into his shop. And then the very next day, Louvenia Durant and her sister showed up at Oak Grove Cemetery. The whole situation is extremely unnerving, especially seeing my face in an image that must have been taken decades before I was born.” Almost as unsettling as seeing my face on a ghost.

Devlin considered the card for a moment longer before turning his attention back to me. “The resemblance really is uncanny. I can understand why you'd find it spooky. Do you know what happened to her?”

“To Rose? Only that she was the last person to be buried in Kroll Cemetery and her grave is isolated from the others.”

“She didn't die with the colonists?”

“I don't think so. Nelda never mentioned how she passed. If Papa can't tell me what I need to know, I'll start digging through the county records.”

“You're really getting caught up in all this, aren't you?”

“Yes, I suppose I am.” I shrugged and tried to play down my growing obsession. “There's nothing like a good mystery to get the blood flowing. Searching through archives is one of the most gratifying aspects of my job. Tracking down that one piece of the puzzle that makes everything fall into place.”

“The thrill of the hunt,” he murmured as he moved over in front of me. Eyes glinting, he ran a knuckle down the fading mark on my cheek, and I couldn't help shivering as I remembered his troubling promise.
When I find the man responsible for that bruise on your face, I'll make him very, very sorry.

In that instant with his magnetic gaze upon me, I sensed something dark inside Devlin. A discordant energy that I didn't yet understand. I put my hand to his chest, outlining the silver medallion through his shirt. Something very strange happened then. My mind emptied and images came flooding in.

The sensation wasn't a premonition or a hallucination or even my imagination. It was a memory, I realized.
Devlin's
memory. Without even meaning to, I'd somehow slipped into his past.

Twenty-Two

H
e was no longer looking down at me, but at his companion, Mariama. Behind him a dozen or more silhouettes circled a fire, their voices and laughter rising over the music that played in the background. I recognized the song. It was one that had been popular at least fifteen years ago.

Devlin himself looked younger. There were no worry lines around his mouth and eyes. No silver in his hair from his trip to the other side. No dark circles, hollow cheeks or lingering emaciation from being haunted. Instead, he looked predatory and possessive, every bit the young, privileged male.

He moved toward Mariama, eyes hooded from intoxication and gleaming with lust. It occurred to me then that I wasn't viewing the scene from Devlin's perspective or even from Mariama's. I was an onlooker inside his memory, an observer to an event that had happened a long time ago.

“You really get off on this stuff, don't you?” he teased.

Mariama flung her arms wide as she threw back her head in exhilaration. “You have no idea! It's the most intoxicating sensation in the world! When the power is fully unleashed, it feels like lava flowing through my veins, lightning in my fingertips.” She drew a long, rapturous breath. “But it's not just inside me, it's everywhere. In the trees, the sky, the ground. Even the air. Can't you smell it?”

Devlin lifted his face. “That's ozone. A storm's coming.”

She gave a throaty laugh and passed him a bottle. “That's
magic
.”

“If you say so.” He lifted the whiskey and drank deeply.

“I know you feel it, too,” she said. “I can see the throb of your pulse. Your heart is racing.”

“That's not magic. That's you.”

She slid her hand up to the medallion around his neck, entwining the silver chain around her fingers. “So much power in this totem. So much history in this emblem. You've no idea.”

“Trust me, I know the history of the Order of the Coffin and the Claw,” he said with an acerbic edge. “My grandfather made certain of it.”

“He hasn't told you everything. He can't. Not yet.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Like the Devlins and the Goodwines, the roots of the Order go all the way back to the beginning of Charleston. My ancestors came over on slave ships. One of them was a powerful
tagati
, a witch doctor who bartered his magic to the most prominent men in the city, men like
your
ancestors, in exchange for his freedom.”

“Are you saying my family was in league with yours?”

“Until the Devlin conscience got the better of them, and then they and the
tagati
became mortal enemies. Some would say the Order was born from their blood feud.”

“Fascinating.” Devlin was back to being amused. “Does that make us mortal enemies, then?”

Mariama was silent for a moment. “You take these things far too lightly. What we are about to do is serious. Irrevocable. Are you sure you want to go through with it?”

“Sure. Why not?” he said with an easy grin.

“Very well. Clear your mind so that our thoughts become one. A single consciousness.” As Mariama spoke, she withdrew a small dagger from her pocket and, taking Devlin's hand in hers, carved a crescent in his palm.

He swore.

“The cut has to be deep to bind us.” She sliced her own palm without a flinch. “Now we join hands.” She laced her fingers through his. “We become one mind, one body, one soul. I'm in your blood now, a part of you. Nothing can ever tear us apart. Not time, not history, not even death. From this day forward, I will be with you always. No matter what happens, I will never leave you.”

“Never is a long time,” he said.

“For us it's but the blink of an eye.”

She smiled over her shoulder then, peering through the shadows until her gaze lit upon me.

That wasn't possible, of course. If this were really Devlin's memory, she couldn't know I was there. I told myself it had to be a daydream or my own fanciful projection. But I could smell the ozone of her magic. I could feel the presence of something dark and powerful behind me.

Slowly I turned to search the woods.

A tall figure stood in the shadows watching me. My heart started to race as Darius Goodwine moved into the light to confront me.

I hadn't seen him since the night we'd struck a bargain for Devlin's life. How was it we were facing off now in Devlin's memory when I hadn't known either of them in the distant past?

“Why are you here?” I asked.

A cryptic smile flashed. “The better question is, why are
you
here?”

“I don't know. I don't even know how I got here.”

“Of course you do. You have a powerful gift, one that is constantly changing and evolving as your connection to the dead world grows stronger. You're not the same person as when we first met, nor will you be the same when our paths cross again. But one thing hasn't changed. You continue to align yourself with the one man who could be your undoing.”

I frowned. “Devlin would never hurt me.”

“Not now, perhaps. But who knows what the futures holds?” Darius cocked his head, studying me. “Do you think you're the only one wrestling with a legacy? Do you think you're the only one being guided by destiny?”

“What do you mean?”

“Once John Devlin's grandfather is gone, there will be demands put upon him. Expectations that even you can't imagine.”

“Tell me.”

“Not yet. Not until you're ready. But watch your back, Graveyard Queen. You have no idea who John Devlin really is.”

“Wait!” I cried as he began to fade back into the shadows. But he was already gone and when I turned, Devlin and Mariama had also vanished, leaving me to my own memories and a troubling premonition that my future with Devlin had been doomed from the moment we met.

* * *

I shook myself out of the memory, the daydream...whatever it had been. The eerie sensation had lasted only a split second, but during that moment, I'd unconsciously taken Devlin's hand. Now I turned his palm up, searching, finding and then tracing the tiny moon-shaped scar with my thumb.

He recoiled in shock, backing away from me as he stared at his palm in revulsion. Then, shoving both hands into his pockets, he paced to the windows and stood staring out into the garden.

Neither of us said anything for the longest time. It was strange how close we'd been one moment and now it seemed that miles and centuries of history separated us. I studied his rigid form, badly shaken by what I'd seen. By what I'd heard.

“John...” I said on a breath.

He turned with shuttered eyes.

I had no idea what I'd been about to say to him. Maybe I meant to ask him about his family's history and the expectations that came with his legacy as a Devlin. Maybe I wanted him to reassure me that nothing from his past or mine could tear us apart. Instead, I shifted my focus to the tiny indentation just beneath his bottom lip. I'd wondered about that scar for so long. Maybe if I emptied my mind...

No
, I told myself firmly. No more playing around with a power I didn't yet understand.

“You're looking at me very strangely.” His voice sounded strained, foreign. Did he have an inkling of what had just transpired? I didn't understand it myself and I still wasn't entirely convinced I hadn't imagined the whole thing. “What is it?” he asked.

“I have some photographs I want to show you.”

“Of what?”

“Kroll Cemetery.” I turned to the desk so that he couldn't see my trembling fingers as I tore open the package that Dr. Shaw's assistant had left on the porch. The packet had been waiting for me when I got home from the churchyard, but I'd delayed my examination of the images until I'd shown Devlin the stereogram.

Now I eagerly glommed on to the distraction because I didn't want to think about Mariama's assertion that she would never leave Devlin or Darius's warning that Devlin could be my undoing. I didn't want to dwell on my evolving gift or the history of the Order of the Coffin and the Claw or the possibility that Devlin and I might never find our happy ending.

“Where did you get them?” he asked as he moved up beside me.

“Dr. Shaw had them sent over. He told me that Kroll Cemetery is thought to be a puzzle because of all the keys and seemingly random numbers engraved on the headstones. Now I can see why.” I sifted through a few of the pictures. “The symbols are unlike anything I've ever seen.”

Devlin picked up one of the photographs, turning it toward the windows for a closer scrutiny. While he studied the image, I studied his profile as something distressing occurred to me. Had he been thinking about Mariama earlier when we'd been so close, or had I entered a memory that was deeply buried in his subconscious?

If his dead wife had been on his mind, why?
Why now?

“I'm not sure there's anything mysterious about the numbers,” he said.

“What?”

“The numbers on the headstones. Most of the bodies were decomposed beyond recognition. The remains were probably numbered in the order in which they were found.”

With an effort, I tore my focus from the past and tried to concentrate on the here and now. On the mystery of Kroll Cemetery. “That makes sense, I guess, but I can't help thinking those numbers are a code or a message. They have significance. They're another piece of the puzzle.”

“If it's a code, someone would surely have figured it out by now,” Devlin said.

“Not necessarily. The cemetery is located on private property. How many people have even been allowed inside those walls?” Spreading the remainder of the photographs across the desk, I stared down at the final image, the headstone of the last person to be buried in Kroll Cemetery.
Amelia Rose Gray
.

Seeing her full name—my full name—on the headstone rattled me.

Devlin put a hand on my arm. “Are you okay?”

It was all I could do not to move away from him. Maybe it was just nerves, but I felt an unpleasant sensation where the scar in his palm touched my bare skin. I looked up, probing his face, scrutinizing those tiny new worry lines around his mouth and eyes, but his expression revealed nothing more than concern for me.

“I'm fine,” I said.

He tilted his dark head, observing me carefully. “I don't think you're fine. You look upset.”

“Maybe a little. First I find a photograph of a woman who looks enough like me to be my twin and now a headstone with nothing but my name on it. No date of birth or death. Nothing. It's almost as if that grave has been there waiting for me all these years.”

“That's nonsense,” Devlin said with a scowl. “The headstone doesn't have anything to do with you. The woman buried in that grave has been dead for decades.”

“Laid to rest in a cemetery of suicides.”

Was the cause of Rose's death the reason she couldn't move on? Did her cryptic message have something to do with the tragedy at Kroll Colony? After all these years, had she found a way to reveal the truth through me?

So many questions...

“Maybe she just wanted to be near Ezra Kroll,” Devlin said. “Did you notice that her headstone is different from the others? No number or key symbol.”

“You can just make out something at the top of the marker,” I said. “See? Right there.” I pointed to some faint etchings in a shaded area of the stone.

“Doesn't look like much to me,” Devlin said.

I gathered up the photographs and placed them in a neat stack on my desk. “These images only tell part of the story. I'm more convinced than ever that I need to see that graveyard in person.”

Devlin looked worried. “I'm not sure that's a good idea. The cemetery is remote. No houses or roads for miles.”

“All I know is that I'm drawn to it,” I said. “There's so much about my background I still don't understand. So much of my family's history that remains unknown to me. I'm not like you. You can trace your roots back centuries. You know exactly where you came from and who your people are.”

“That's not always a good thing,” he said obliquely.

“Still, can you blame me for being curious?”

“No, but try to keep some perspective. Just because you never knew about Rose doesn't mean there's some great mystery behind her death.”

“I really hope that's true.” But the signs and visitations told me otherwise. I could no more ignore Rose's clues than I could stem the tide of ghosts that came through the veil at twilight.

She had sought me out for a reason. Not to latch on to my warmth and energy or because she wanted to be human again. She needed me to find a key. Unless and until I could give her what she wanted, she wouldn't go quietly back into the afterlife.

And the logical place to start my search was in Kroll Cemetery.