Page 31 of Curse in the Quarter (Bourbon Street Shadows #1)
B astien spread the parchment fragments across the mahogany table like puzzle pieces of his own damnation.
Each yellowed edge held Charlotte’s careful script, her methodical documentation of their forbidden love.
Three days he’d stared at these pages, unable to translate the coded passages that had once been intimate secrets between them.
The irony cut deep—he who had lived every moment she’d described now found himself paralyzed by the prospect of hearing those memories spoken aloud.
The Archive room held its familiar quiet, broken only by the distant hum of the building’s old heating system and the occasional creak of settling wood.
Afternoon light slanted through tall windows, illuminating the dust that danced perpetually in academic spaces where knowledge waited to be discovered.
But today felt different. Today, the very air seemed charged with anticipation.
Delphine’s footsteps echoed in the corridor before she appeared in the doorway, two steaming cups balanced in her hands.
She’d changed from her morning attire into a cream sweater and dark trousers, her hair pulled back in a practical bun with rebellious strands framing her face.
Bastien noticed how much she resembled Charlotte in this light, this setting.
“Any luck with those fragments?” she asked, settling her research bag on the adjacent table. “You mentioned yesterday that the handwriting was proving difficult to decipher.”
“Some progress,” he replied, gesturing to the scattered pages. “The script is consistent with mid-eighteenth-century French, but there are sections that seem to be written in a personal code. Academic terminology mixed with what appears to be emotional notation.”
“The handwriting style is . . . complex.” He watched her settle into the chair across from him, noted how she pulled her cardigan closer around her shoulders despite the room’s warmth. “Academic, but with personal notations that seem to follow no standard cipher.”
She leaned forward, studying the scattered pages without touching them. “Mid-eighteenth-century, you said? The letter formations look French in origin, though there’s something else. A kind of intimacy in the script that suggests these weren’t meant for general consumption.”
“Exactly my assessment.” The lie flowed smoothly. He’d had over a century to perfect the art of misdirection. “I acquired them from an estate sale in the Loire Valley. The previous owner had accumulated quite an extensive collection of occult materials, but these seemed different. More personal.”
“Most spiritualist documentation from that period was either complete charlatanism or hopeful speculation.” She adjusted her position, and Bastien caught the faint scent of her perfume—something with notes of jasmine that made his chest tighten with memory.
“But whoever wrote these approaches the subject with genuine scientific methodology. Almost as though they were documenting real phenomena. But also with the familiarity as if it were for someone specific.”
Bastien's breathing grew shallow. He remembered that night with perfect clarity—their first real communication, when Charlotte had finally learned to quiet her mind enough to sense his presence directly.
She'd been sitting at her writing desk, having grown frustrated with the parlor games and table-rapping that passed for spirit contact among her social circle.
The first fragment trembled slightly as she lifted it, and Bastien’s breath caught.
How many times had he watched those same fingers—different body, same soul—handle these very pages?
Charlotte had written most of these entries late at night, by candlelight, while he watched from whatever form he could manage in those early days of their connection.
“The handwriting becomes more confident as it progresses,” Delphine observed, turning to another page.
“Listen to this: 'Third attempt at establishing consistent communication.
I have discovered that conventional methods—candles, crystals, protective circles—serve only to create barriers between us.
The connection strengthens when I approach it as I would any other form of correspondence.
Direct, honest, without artificial mystification. '”
“Correspondence,” Bastien said quietly. The word lodged in his throat like a stone.
“Yes, it's a fascinating approach. She's treating supernatural contact as though it were letter-writing with someone in a distant country.” Delphine selected another fragment, this one containing Charlotte's first description of guardian tether notation.
“The technical language becomes more sophisticated here: 'The entity responds most readily when I address him not as a spirit manifestation, but as an individual with his own thoughts and feelings.
He possesses distinct preferences, demonstrates humor, and shows what I can only describe as protective concern for my wellbeing. '”
The keepsake locket burned against Bastien's ribs. Charlotte had written those words after their sixth conversation, when she'd realized he was more than a spiritual curiosity—that he was a man who happened to exist beyond the boundaries of life and death.
Delphine began to read aloud, her voice taking on the measured cadence of academic translation.
“Day seventeen of the ninth month. The connection strengthens with each passing evening. Tonight I observed the ritual of guardian tether notation, though I dared not participate directly. The practitioners speak of binding souls across death’s threshold, of love that transcends the boundaries of flesh. ”
Bastien remembered the weight of the quill in Charlotte’s hand, the way she paused between phrases to glance toward where she somehow sensed his presence. She’d been documenting not just phenomena, but the gradual recognition that what existed between them defied every natural law.
“The terminology is remarkably sophisticated,” Delphine continued, setting down the first fragment to reach for another.
“Listen to this scientific approach: 'Fifth attempt at establishing ethereal contact.
Subject demonstrates sensitivity to otherworldly emanations between the hours of midnight and three.
Physical manifestations include temperature fluctuations and what can only be described as a resonance of recognition. '”
“Resonance of recognition.” The phrase lodged in Bastien’s throat like a physical object.
Charlotte’s term for the moment when their souls touched, when mortality became irrelevant and only connection remained.
She’d coined it during their second week of contact, struggling to find language for something that existed beyond words.
Delphine glanced up from the page, her brown eyes bright with intellectual curiosity. “You seem familiar with that terminology.”
“It appears in other occult texts from the period.” Another lie, smooth as silk and twice as dangerous. “The concept of otherworldly recognition was popular among spiritualists of the era. They believed certain souls could identify their . . . counterparts across different planes of existence.”
The irony of explaining Charlotte’s own words back to her reincarnation made his coffee taste bitter. But Delphine nodded, apparently satisfied with his explanation, and continued reading.
“The methodology becomes more personal as it progresses,” she observed, lifting another fragment. “The writer’s emotional investment is evident. She’s no longer just observing—she’s participating.”
Bastien forced his expression to remain neutral as she began to read again, though every word felt like a blade drawn across old wounds.
“The entity responds most strongly to proximity. When I place my hand upon this binding ledger where his essence seems most concentrated, I feel . . .” Her voice faltered slightly.
She flexed her fingers, frowning at some sensation he couldn’t see but recognized completely.
“I feel as though my very soul recognizes a missing piece of itself. The temperature of my palm increases, sometimes to the point of discomfort.”
As she spoke, Delphine’s left hand had unconsciously moved to rest against the table’s surface, her fingers splayed as though seeking contact with something just beyond reach. Her breathing grew shallow, and the professional distance she’d maintained began to show hairline cracks.
“Are you all right?” Bastien asked, though he knew exactly what was happening. Her body was remembering what her mind had forgotten, responding to Charlotte’s written documentation of their bond.
“Static from the old heating system,” she murmured, though her voice carried uncertainty. She shook her head as if to clear it and lifted another page. “This is fascinating. The progression of understanding is remarkable.”
But Bastien could see the change in her posture, the way her movements had become more fluid, more familiar. The soul memory surfacing through centuries of careful separation, responding to the echo of its own documented experience.
“Listen to this,” she continued, her voice taking on a more intimate quality.
“'I have begun to suspect that what others call haunting is in fact a form of attraction between souls. Two spirits, separated by death’s arbitrary boundary, drawn together by bonds that mortality cannot sever.
The connection requires no medium, no ritual framework. Love itself becomes the bridge.'”
The memory struck Bastien without warning, vivid as lightning and twice as dangerous.
The parlor was warm with firelight and the lingering scent of Charlotte’s evening tea.
She’d spent the day observing another of the secret ceremonies they’d discovered in the abandoned chapel, taking careful notes throughout the ritual with the same meticulous attention she brought to her natural history studies.