Harlequin Nocturne March 2016 Box Set Read online

  “Like you do the fairies. Maybe you just haven’t seen them yet. Are they said to be dangerous?”

  “No. Their worst trick is to throw stones or rocks at people as a joke. Supposedly, they’re only a couple of feet tall and dwell in the deepest recesses of the bayou.”

  “They don’t sound so bad. Anything else?”

  Tombi hesitated.

  “Go on,” she prodded. “Nothing could be stranger than the half-man, half-deer creature.”

  “Just in case you’re ever roaming the woods and decide to take a dip in the waters to cool off, be sure not to swim anywhere there’s a white patch, because that’s where the Okwa Naholo live.”

  “Underwater creatures?”

  “Yep. The translation is ‘white people of the water’ because they have light flesh like the skins of trout.”

  Annie tingled inside. “Mermaids?”

  He gave a crooked smile. “Exactly. And if you invade their territory, they’ll capture you and turn you into beings like themselves.”

  “Pretty cool, actually. Not getting captured—but the idea that mermaids exist. Most little girls dream of being one. I think they represent the epitome of feminine power and beauty.”

  Tombi shrugged. “It’s another one of the tales I’m skeptical about.” He leaned back in his chair. “Anything you believe I should know about hoodoo?”

  “Not really. We try to bend the natural laws for healing and to bring us luck in love and money.” She laughed self-consciously. “Not that my life is an example of either.”

  Tombi regarded her soberly. “Your luck could change.”

  Annie’s heart hopscotched along her rib cage. Did that mean he loved her? Secretly, she believed her fortune had changed. Despite the setbacks, she knew what it was like to love a good man. A man worth fighting for. A man worth risking her heart, her pride, her life.

  Pop. A large ember from the fire flamed and jumped in the air, breaking the moment.

  “I still can’t believe we didn’t get the flute,” Annie complained.

  “More than likely, it never existed.”

  She couldn’t believe it. There was some reason Ms. Belle and the hawk had arrived at the moment she read about the legend. Some reason that Tia had visualized the grimoire while in a coma.

  “All that was in the book was that the flute helped contain Nalusa and where to find it. Is there more to the legend than what I read?”

  “It’s said our ancestors used it whenever Nalusa grew too strong and disrupted the balance of light and shadow. If that happened, the tribe would gather for a full-moon ritual and play the flute. Nalusa would be drawn to the music, but could only appear in his visible, half-human form and not sneak up on them like a snake.”

  Annie shuddered, wondering if that version of Nalusa was less scary than the snake. “What does he look like in this half-human form?”

  “He’s named after his half-human form. In Choctaw, Nalusa Falaya literally means a ‘long black being.’ It was said he resembled a man but had tiny eyes and long, pointed ears.”

  She couldn’t picture it. “I’m thinking of snake eyes and donkey ears, and the two don’t seem to go together.”

  “Is it any harder to imagine than the religious tradition of a pitchfork-carrying devil with a red body, hoofed feet and horns for ears?”

  He had a point.

  “But why would your ancestors want to draw Nalusa to them—no matter what shape-shifting form he chooses? Personally, I don’t ever want to see him again.”

  “According to legend, while he’s exposed in human form, he’s vulnerable. The legend also says that only in this form can we force him back into his resting place and bind his power.”

  She remembered the tightness in her chest as they approached the tree, the lingering miasma of evil. Some of his malevolent energy had marked his former prison. “He was trapped inside the hollowed oak, right? I felt a heaviness there, the way misery feels when it crushes you inside.”

  “That’s his mark. He feeds on human grief and misery. It’s what makes you vulnerable to his will. It weakens your fight and warps your thinking.”

  “Like it has the betrayer in your group,” she said softly. And who among his circle had suffered the most?

  Tallulah.

  She’d been grief-stricken over Bo’s death. And the mourning had left her susceptible to Nalusa’s voice whispering in her mind, murmuring dissent as poisonous as his venom injected in a blood vein. Couldn’t Tombi see the obvious? But Annie kept her mouth shut. Blood’s thicker than water. He’d known her a week; he’d known his twin since the womb.

  Time to pay Tallulah a visit. Maybe invite her over for dinner and slip a little hoodoo concoction in her drink. Once her guard was down, Annie would listen in on her aura. Not something she was looking forward to. Annie imagined the noise from her damaged aura would be akin to nails scraping chalkboard—times a million. And how could she ever break the news to Tombi?

  His mouth pressed into a grim line. “Whoever it turns out to be, I’ll have no sympathy. A warrior’s mind and body never breaks.”

  “Not everyone has your strength.”

  “I would expect any of the hunters to confide in me if they were in danger of succumbing to the shadows.”

  He was in for a huge disappointment. “Could be they are too ashamed. Or maybe the darkness in their minds crept up on them so gradually they didn’t realize the danger until it was too late.”

  “He should know better.”

  Or she should know better. But Annie wasn’t brave enough to speak the words aloud. Tombi had been angry before when she’d suggested Hanan—how much more upset would he be if she suggested his sister? His twin, no less.

  “Enough talk of Nalusa,” he cut in, his voice as rough as oak bark. “We’ve done all we can do for tonight. Tomorrow will be here soon enough with its worries and duties.”

  Annie reached out a hand and touched his knee. “And whatever comes, I’m here to help. Anything you need me to do.”

  His mouth twisted. “If there’s any way possible, I’ll shield you from seeing Nalusa again.”

  “Don’t even think it. You need me with you, and you know it.”

  Tombi stood and stretched. “We won’t speak of it anymore tonight.” He took her hand and lifted Annie to her feet. “We’ve better things to do.”

  She couldn’t agree with him more. Tombi might skirt expressing his feelings for her, but his body had a language all its own. And his body said he loved her, too, even if his lips never formed the words.

  CHAPTER 14

  The dark of the moon settled into the night, smothering the bayou like thick fog. Annie lit every candle she’d gathered from her grandma’s cottage, until Tombi’s cabin glowed as if a thousand stars were contained within its rough-hewn walls.

  The past two weeks had been filled with training sessions as Tombi, true to his word, initiated her more deeply into blocking external stimuli as well as containing the amount of energy she released into the world.

  Too bad she and her grandma didn’t call on the questionable, seamier side of hoodoo, since amoral spirits were more accessible at the New Moon. She’d been so tempted last week during the dark-moon phase. She could use some extra supernatural help—if the old tales were true that she’d overheard in whispered conversations behind closed doors.

  Don’t go there, Grandma Tia had warned a hundred times, wagging a finger. The ends never justify the means. You start dabbling in that mess, you might get sucked into their evil forever.

  As a child, whenever Annie had heard those warnings, she’d pictured a giant hand rising up from the swamp and curling its fingers toward her, beckoning her to come and sink into the murky depths from which it supernaturally emerged. A quicksand of destruction for the unwary.