Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 105939 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105939 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
“That's beautiful,” Bastien said from the doorway, though he'd been listening for several minutes without announcing himself.
She looked over her shoulder with a smile that could have powered the Quarter's gas lamps. “It's not a real song. Just something that comes to me when I'm thinking.” Her fingers returned to the keys, picking out the same haunting melody she hummed while working. “Strange, isn't it? How music can feel familiar even when you've never heard it before?”
“Perhaps some songs exist before we discover them.”
“Like they're waiting for the right person to find them?” She patted the bench beside her. “Sit with me. This song is too beautiful to play alone.”
The warmth of her shoulder against his, the unconscious melody rising from her throat between phrases, creating a soundtrack for perfect contentment—moments when the future felt infinite and love felt stronger than death itself.
“Sorry,” Delphine said, catching herself mid-phrase. “Bad habit. I tend to hum when I’m thinking.”
“That melody,” he managed, his voice rougher than intended. “Where did you learn it?”
She looked puzzled. “I don’t know. I’ve always known it, I suppose. My grandmother used to say I hummed it even as a baby.” Her expression grew thoughtful. “It’s strange, actually. I can’t remember anyone teaching it to me, but it feels . . . familiar. Like something I’ve always carried.”
The soul remnant. The piece of Charlotte’s and then Delia’s essence that had survived death and reincarnation, carrying fragments of memory across lifetimes. She didn’t consciously remember their connection, but some part of her recognized the melody that had bound them together.
“Here we are,” Delphine said, stopping beside a section marked “Early 20th Century; Local Incidents.” She pulled several boxes from the shelves with practiced efficiency. “Everything we have on the 1906 fire and related events. Fair warning—it gets strange quickly.”
They settled at adjacent chairs around a mahogany research table. As she opened the first box, revealing manila folders stuffed with photocopied documents, the locket’s warmth spread from his chest down his left arm.
“Official cause of the fire was faulty gas lighting,” Delphine explained, pulling out a police report. “But witness statements describe flames that burned blue-white, explosions that preceded any apparent ignition source, and patterns of destruction that don’t match normal fire behavior.”
She spread photographs across the table—grainy black-and-white images of the destroyed theater district. Bastien recognized the locations despite the devastation. The corner where he’d bought flowers for Delia’s birthday. The cobblestone street where they’d walked on their last evening together.
“Multiple witnesses reported seeing people in the flames who couldn’t be accounted for in casualty lists,” Delphine continued. “Some described figures that appeared to be dancing or conducting some kind of ceremony even as the buildings burned around them.”
“Ritual magic,” Bastien said quietly.
“That’s one theory. Though officially, such explanations aren’t considered credible.” She gave him a sharp look. “I assume, given your profession, you’re more open-minded about alternative possibilities?”
“I’ve learned that ‘impossible’ is often just another word for ‘poorly understood.’”
“Good answer.” She smiled—the first genuine warmth he’d seen from her—and the expression transformed her face completely. For just a moment, she looked like Delia laughing at one of his dry observations, and the resemblance was so perfect it stole his breath.
She opened another folder, revealing genealogical charts. “Now, here’s where things get really interesting. The Lacroix family.”
The name seemed to burn itself into his vision. Charlotte Lacroix, born 1742, died 1763. Below her name, a family tree traced her bloodline forward through the centuries, showing marriages, births, and deaths in neat lines of black ink.
“The Lacroix family were prominent in colonial New Orleans,” Delphine explained, her finger tracing the genealogical connections. “They owned property throughout the Quarter, were patrons of the arts, heavily involved in local politics. But they also had a reputation for unusual interests.”
“Unusual how?”
“Occult studies. Mystical practices. They maintained one of the largest private libraries of esoteric texts in North America.” She turned the page, revealing more detailed records. “Charlotte Lacroix, in particular, seems to have been deeply involved in what contemporary sources describe as ‘experimental natural philosophy.’”
Her finger lingered on Charlotte’s name, and the locket flared so hot against Bastien’s chest that sweat broke out along his hairline. She couldn’t know what she was touching—the incarnate echo of the woman who had loved him, who had bound her soul to his across lifetimes, who had died trying to preserve their connection through death itself.
“The family line continues through Charlotte’s younger sister, Marie,” Delphine continued, oblivious to his reaction. “Intermarriage with other prominent Creole families—the Moreaus, the Thibodauxs, the Boudreauxs. Standard genealogy for old New Orleans bloodlines.”
She traced the family tree forward through the centuries, her finger following the branching lines that led to present-day families still living in the Quarter, still carrying fragments of Charlotte’s bloodline.
“What’s particularly interesting,” Delphine said, opening another folder, “is that unexplained incidents seem to cluster around members of these family lines. House fires that burn in impossible patterns. Objects that move without explanation. People who report dreams of individuals they’ve never met.”