Nancy K. Duplechain - Dark Trilogy 02 - Dark Carnival (10 page)

After the Aquarium, the kids wanted to visit Cee
Cee.  Before we got to her place, they had spotted a line of horse-drawn
carriages.  We took a ride through the Quarter—laughing at Jon’s and Lyla’s
expressions when the horse pulling us had an attack of flatulence—and continued
on to Cee Cee’s for an excellent, early dinner.  They left by seven o’clock.  I
was upset with myself for forgetting to give Lyla the music box I had bought
her.

Late the next morning, I
met Miles at the convent to do some more training.  Noah and Nadia were there,
sitting outside in the visitor’s area with Miles who motioned me over to sit
with them.

“I suppose we can start,”
said Miles.  “Ruby, it seems, has better things to do.”  He sounded very
displeased with her.

“What do you think is the
next step?” asked Nadia.

“That depends on Noah.”  Miles
looked at him.  “Are you up for a little reconnaissance work?”

Noah flashed a devilish
smile.  “Sure.”

“You’re
not
telling
him to go to the Grigori House by himself!” said Nadia with the first flash of
anger I’d ever seen in her eyes.

“No,” said Miles.  “I’m
asking
him.  Whether or not he goes is his choice.”

“I’ll do it,” said Noah.

“I’m with Nadia,” I said.
 “That sounds too dangerous.”

“They won’t even know I’m
there.  I’ll go tonight when it’s dark.  I don’t need light to see, and I can
blend in with the shadows.”

“I don’t like it,” said
Nadia.

“Then it’s agreed that
you’ll go,” said Miles, ignoring Nadia’s protest.  “As for you two, I’d like
you to try out one more store in Metairie this afternoon after Leigh’s
training.  After that, stop by the Museum of Art.  They have a mask exhibit.  When
you get there, ask for Charles.  He’s the manager.”

I did much better with
the sick that came in to be healed.  I was getting a little stronger and didn’t
even need Miles’ help when I cured someone of the flu.  It had happened so
quickly, the heat coming from my core being and into my hands.  Before I knew
it, the woman facing me said she felt much better.  Miles had smiled at me for
the first time in a long time.  I also cured a migraine headache, but that was
all I could handle, as I started to feel drained.  Miles took over the rest
and, by the time we were done, the sun was far in the Western sky.

Late that afternoon,
Nadia and I left the convent in her car to once again search for the mask, this
time at an antique store in nearby Metairie.  It seemed hopeless to find the
Masque
de L’âme Noire
at this point.  Sure enough, we were out of luck there as
well.  That just left the New Orleans Museum of Art in City Park.  Before we
left Metairie, we stopped for an early dinner, as neither one of us had lunch
that day.

During dinner, Nadia’s
phone rang.  She took it out of her purse, checked the ID and then answered.  “Hey,”
she said.  “No, didn’t find anything … We’re having dinner right now then we’re
going to the museum.  Yes, we can meet you there.  Why?  What’s up? … Oh okay,
I suppose.  It’s not that much trouble … Okay.  See you soon.  Bye.”

She hung up and put her
phone back in her purse.  “That was Noah.  Cee Cee changed the lock on her door
today.  Something about you being freaked out the other night?”

“Oh, that,” I said,
embarrassed.  “I didn’t mean for her to go through all that trouble.”

“It’s okay,” she smiled.  “Better
safe than sorry.  Believe me, Cee Cee doesn’t mind.  Anyway, she won’t be there
when you get back.  She’s going to be up late with a client.  She didn’t want
to leave the key out anywhere, so she gave a copy to Miles to give to you.  Noah
was there, doing prep work or something for his mission tonight, so he said
he’d do it since he was going to be near the park this evening.  He’ll meet up
with us there.”

By the time we made it
back into the city, it was well after dark and had begun to rain.  We parked
near the café where Noah told Nadia to meet him.  He was under the covered
seating area, at one of the tables with a view of a large columned pavilion in
the park.  Nadia opened her door first and popped open an umbrella.  She
started to come around to my side, but I waved her away, choosing to make a run
for it since we were parked right in front of the café.  We joined Noah at the
table.

“Coffee?” he offered,
taking a sip from a paper cup and gesturing to the café doors behind him.

“We don’t have long,”
said Nadia, “the museum’s about to close.”

“So’s the café.”  Noah
put down his coffee and unzipped one of the side pockets of his jacket and
pulled out a small silver key and handed it to me.  “Make sure to keep that in
a safe place,” he said, as I put it in the smallest pocket of my jeans.

We left Noah to finish
his coffee and huddled under the umbrella, across the street and into the
sculpture garden.  It was a shame that, of all the times I had visited New
Orleans, I had never been to the museum or the sculpture garden.  We strode
down a winding footpath, lined with beautiful shrubbery that wound around
magnolias and pines with Spanish moss, and over a small bridge that crossed
over a reflecting lagoon that was slowly swelling with rain.  I made a mental
note to come back and see it during the daytime.

We passed magnificent and
unusual works of art, including an upside down hanging man which Nadia informed
me was actually a bell.  I saw a muscular, nude male sculpture titled
Heroic
Man
.  Not far from him was an interesting work called
Window and Ladder:
Too Late for Help
; it was, simply, a ladder leading up to a window in mid
air.

We made it to the other
end of the garden and crossed a circular driveway to the museum, a large, white
building with four tall ionic columns atop the wide steps that led to the
entrance.  Once inside the lobby, the first thing I noticed was a colossal
woman suspended over the grand entrance of the museum.  She was adorned with
various creatures of the sea that seemed to be a part of her very being.  It
was made to look like she was rising from the waters, proud and defiant.  A
pamphlet near the entrance told me her name was
Thalassa
and that she
was named for the Greek goddess of the sea.

There were few visitors
in the museum.  The new Renoir exhibit, it seemed, was not enough allure for
most people to huddle through the cold rain.  Aside from Nadia and myself,
there were maybe twelve other visitors and a group of four of them were
leaving.  The rest, we saw, were near the end of the exhibit, near the exit.

Nadia closed her umbrella
and leaned it against the wall near the entrance.  The museum ticket taker, a
man of about thirty, greeted us warmly.

“Hello, are y’all here
for the Renoir exhibit?  Because we’re about to close for the night,” he said
with an apologetic tone.

Nadia approached the
ticket counter with a heavenly smile.  “We’re here to see Charles.  My name is
Nadia.  I’m an associate of Miles Knighten.  Charles is expecting us.”

The young man—Terry,
according to his name tag—perked up at the mention of Miles.  “Oh, well I’ll be
sure to tell him that you’re here.  One moment, please.”  He excused himself to
a desk behind the counter.  He picked up a phone receiver and pressed a couple
of buttons.  “Charles, Miss Nadia and her friend are here to see you,” he said
into the receiver.  “Okay.  I’ll let them know.”  He hung up and returned to
the counter.  “He’ll be right out.”

“Thank you so much,” said
Nadia.

“Oh, you’re welcome.  And,
if you talk to Miles soon, please tell him thank you for his donation to the
New Orleans Pride exhibit.  It means so much to us!”

“I’ll be sure to do that.
 Thank you, Terry.”

Terry went back to
closing up for the night.  
Soon, a tall, slender man with glasses and salt-and-pepper hair came out from
the other side of the lobby and gave us a friendly greeting.  We introduced
ourselves.  After a little small talk about Miles and the high regards Charles
held for him, he led us through a white column-lined hallway to the antique
mask exhibit in the special exhibition gallery on the first floor.

“Please take your time,”
he told us.  “The museum is closing, but I’m usually here for about another
hour.  Terry will be here for about another thirty minutes.  If you’ll excuse
me, I have to get back to some paperwork.”

“Of course.  We
understand.  Thank you again,” said Nadia.

Charles left us in a vast
room with darkly colored walls and track lighting.  Numerous antique masks hung
from the walls and sectional dividers.  Thirty-one masks, the most delicate and
priceless, were locked in glass display cases spread throughout the gallery.

Nadia sighed.  “Why don’t
you take that side of the room over there,” she said, “I’ll take this side.”

Rows upon rows of
colorful masks in every shape and variety—feathered, painted, jeweled—were
displayed before me.  They started at the top, near the ceiling, and finished
at waist level.  I carefully scanned the back wall, keeping my eyes out for the
full-faced black mask with gold accents.  Not seeing it on this wall, I moved
onto the next one.

Nothing.

Nadia had just finished
her second wall.  She moved onto the dividers on her end, while I did the same
on mine.  She sighed and then checked the displayed masks in the glass cases.  Again,
nothing.

“Where could it be?” she
whispered to herself.

“Maybe one of the other
museums in town …” I offered.

She shook her head.  “Just
seems hopeless sometimes.  Let’s go.  We can call Miles when we get back to St.
Geneviève’s. ”

Nadia thanked Terry on
the way out.  He said he was sorry that we didn’t find what we were looking
for.  She asked if it was okay to cut through the sculpture garden to get back
to the parking lot.  He said that would be fine because security was still
locking things up on the other side of the park.

We huddled together under
the umbrella, hurrying across the circular driveway, through the entrance into
the sculpture garden and across the little bridge over the lagoon.  The exit
onto the street across from the parking lot looked to be about thirty yards
away.  The sculptures we passed now seemed like sinister silhouettes against
the vague light from the sparse park lamps.  I could swear my eyes were playing
tricks on me because the sculptures seemed to move with the shadows that glided
over them when the wind swayed the branches of the trees.

The parking lot was about
twenty yards away.  I could see Nadia’s car, the only one left in the lot.  She
glanced over her shoulder and then back to the front.  She began to walk a
little faster.  I started to turn back to glance in that direction, but she
quickly grabbed my hand.  “Don’t look.  Just keep walking,” she whispered.  By
impulse, I started to look again.  “Leigh, please.”  I kept my eyes forward and
sped up my walking as we neared the deserted parking lot.

“What is it?” I whispered
back.  She didn’t answer me, but reached into her pocket and pulled out her car
keys with a slightly shaking hand.  And I heard something else just then—the
sopping thud of footsteps in wet grass in the distance.  I couldn’t help but
look.  Behind us, about twenty yards out, in the tangling shadows of the trees,
was a long, billowy sculpture of a man.  It wasn’t my imagination as I saw the
sculpture take a step toward us.  I had just enough time to see his silver eyes
reflect the faint light of the moon when I felt Nadia jerk my arm to pull me
along faster.

“Who is that?” I asked,
glancing back over my shoulder, unable to take my eyes away.

“Never mind.  Keep
moving.”  Nadia took her hand from mine and let me have the umbrella as she
went to the driver’s side of the car.  Still looking over my shoulder, I
tripped over the raised cement bar marking the parking space.  I fell face-forward
onto the sidewalk, letting go of the umbrella and scraping the palms of my
hands.

“Ow!  Damnit!” I said,
trying to choke back the pain.

“Leigh!  Get up!”  I
picked up my head and saw Nadia, panicked, racing toward me.  I flipped over
and looked back at the shadowy man who was running in our direction.  Before I
could get up, I saw him leap into the air and black wings suddenly fan out from
behind him.  As his long, thin body passed under the light of a street lamp, I
noticed his entire being looked as if it was made of black obsidian, just like
some of the other sculptures, but with thick varicose veins pulsating
underneath and the piercing silver eyes that stared down on us.

His large, dark wings
flayed out and downward.  He was going to land on top of me, but Nadia kicked
him in the head as he was coming down.  He roared in pain, falling back onto
the wet pavement.  Nadia again tried to help me up.  I scrambled to my feet,
but he rebounded quickly.  As soon as I was up, he knocked me down, snarling at
me and laughing in my face.  Nadia helped me push him off.  I was able to get
up, but he grabbed her and started dragging her by the wrists, flying low near
the ground, headed for the shadows of the trees in the sculpture garden.  She
screamed and struggled, and I ran to them, across the narrow street, into the
garden, sloshing through the sopping grass.  As I caught up, I tackled the
winged man.  He let go of Nadia and went after me, pulling me by the hair.

I screamed out in pain
and Nadia jumped on his back and started scratching at his eyes.  He let me go and
instantly and reached around, pulled her off his back and wrapped his wings
around her, trapping her against him so she couldn’t move.  With his free hand,
he picked up a nearby rock and smashed it against my head.

A sharp pain.

Darkness.

Dizziness.