Page 32 of Curse in the Quarter (Bourbon Street Shadows #1)

“Did you see how the practitioners moved?” she asked, rising from her writing desk with grace that made his non-corporeal heart ache. “Not random gestures, but a specific pattern. Almost like a dance.”

She began to demonstrate, her green silk gown rustling as she traced the ritual’s choreography in their parlor.

But where the original ceremony had been performed with solemn reverence and religious fervor, Charlotte brought curiosity and delight, transforming sacred movements into something beautiful and entirely her own.

“Come,” she said, extending her hand toward where she somehow knew he stood, though he cast no shadow and disturbed no air. “Show me how the guardian moves in response.”

And though he had no physical form, though he existed in the spaces between life and death, Bastien found himself able to follow her lead.

Their souls danced together in the firelight, reverence and defiance intertwined—reverence for the power they’d witnessed, defiance of every law that declared such connection impossible.

Charlotte laughed as she felt his presence move with hers, the sound bright and unafraid. “Yes, exactly like that. We’re writing our own ritual, aren’t we? Our own way of being together despite everything that says we cannot be.”

The firelight caught the auburn in her hair as she spun, and for a moment she was radiant with joy and possibility.

In that instant, Bastien forgot he was dead, forgot the impossibility of their situation, forgot everything except the woman who danced with ghosts and made it look like the most natural thing in the world .

“Bastien?”

Delphine’s voice pulled him back to the present with jarring abruptness. She was staring at him with concern, one hand pressed against her chest where Charlotte had once worn his portrait in a silver locket.

“You looked distant for a moment. These documents—they’re quite affecting, aren’t they?”

“Yes.” The word came out rougher than intended. “The intimacy of the writing. The obvious depth of feeling.”

She studied his face for a long moment, and he wondered what she saw there. Did some part of her recognize the grief that lived in his eyes? The weight of loving someone across lifetimes while watching them forget him again and again?

“The woman who wrote these,” Delphine said slowly, “she was documenting a love affair, wasn’t she? Not just academic observation, but an actual relationship with . . . whatever this entity was.”

“That’s my interpretation as well.”

She returned to the pages, but Bastien could see the change in her entire being.

The careful academic distance had dissolved into something more personal, more recognizing.

Her fingers traced the edges of Charlotte’s script as though she’d held these same pages before, and her breathing had taken on the rhythm of someone reading a letter meant specifically for them.

“Day forty-two,” she read, her voice now soft with something approaching reverence.

“'I have concluded that traditional methods of otherworldly communication are inadequate for our particular connection.

The entity—I can no longer think of him as merely that, for he has become as real to me as any living person—does not respond to séances or mediums. Instead, our bond strengthens through direct emotional resonance.

When I write of him, when I think of him with intention and focus, he draws near. '”

Bastien remembered that discovery with perfect clarity.

Charlotte had spent weeks trying conventional approaches to strengthen their connection—candles and incantations, automatic writing, even consulting with the various mediums and spiritualists who populated Paris’s occult underground.

Nothing had worked until she’d realized that their bond required no external apparatus, no ritual framework.

Love itself was the medium through which they communicated.

“The evolution of understanding is remarkable,” Delphine murmured, reaching for another fragment. “She’s learning to approach this relationship on its own terms rather than forcing it into existing frameworks.”

“An unconventional approach for the period.”

“Unconventional for any period.” She looked up at him with something approaching awe.

“This woman was pioneering an entirely new form of connection.

Listen to this entry: 'Day fifty-eight. Last night I achieved something I barely dare record.

During our communion—for I can think of no other word for what passes between us—I felt not just his presence but his emotions.

His longing, which mirrors my own. His frustration with the barriers that separate us.

And beneath it all, a love so profound it seems to anchor him to this plane of existence. '”

Her voice had grown husky with emotion, as though she were reading poetry rather than clinical observation. The professional mask had completely fallen away, replaced by something vulnerable and recognizing.

“'I understand now that he chooses to remain not from inability to pass on, but from devotion.

He stays for me, as I would stay for him were our positions reversed.

This knowledge should frighten me, but instead it fills me with a peace I have never known.

To be loved with such intensity that death itself becomes negotiable—surely this is the greatest gift any soul can receive. '”

Bastien’s hands clenched beneath the table, his knuckles white with the effort of remaining still.

She was reading their love story, their tragedy, without understanding that every word described her own past. That the woman who’d written these entries shared her soul, her fierce intelligence, her capacity for love that transcended reason and mortality alike.

“The intimacy is palpable,” Delphine whispered, setting the fragment down with trembling fingers. “Whoever wrote this wasn’t just documenting phenomena. She was documenting the evolution of the most profound relationship of her life.”

“Yes,” he said quietly. “She loved him.”

Delphine continued reading, and Bastien found himself pulled back to the autumn of 1763, when Charlotte had begun to understand the true nature of their connection.

Charlotte stood at her father's parlor window, watching the elaborate ritual taking place in the garden of the adjacent estate.

The wealthy Marquis de Montclair was hosting one of his infamous gatherings—a ceremony that blended high society entertainment with genuine occult practice.

Charlotte had been excluded, of course, both for her youth and her father's disapproval of such activities.

“Can you see them clearly?” she whispered to the empty air, knowing Bastien would hear her.

Through his perspective that existed beyond life and death, he could observe the ceremony in detail—the practitioners moving in precise patterns around a raised altar, their voices weaving together in harmonies that made reality shimmer.

He described everything to Charlotte: the silver chalices, the arrangement of candles, the way the lead practitioner drew symbols in the air that glowed briefly before fading.

When the ceremony concluded and the guests dispersed, Charlotte turned from the window with eyes bright with curiosity and defiance. “Show me,” she said. “Show me how they moved.”

“Charlotte—”

“Please. I want to understand what we witnessed. I want to honor it properly.”

So he guided her through the steps as he remembered them, and Charlotte began to dance.

Not the elaborate court dances of her social training, but something older and more meaningful.

Her movements held both reverence for the power they'd observed and defiance of the conventions that would keep her from participating.

“Like this?” she asked, spinning slowly in the center of the parlor.

“Exactly like that.”

She laughed, breathless with the thrill of shared secret knowledge. “We're creating our own ritual, aren't we? Our own way of touching something sacred.”

And though he had no physical form, though he existed in the spaces between life and death, Bastien found himself dancing with her.

Their souls moved together in the candlelit parlor, reverence and defiance intertwined—reverence for the mysteries they'd witnessed, defiance of every law that said such connection was impossible.

“Bastien?”

Delphine's voice pulled him back to the present. She was studying his face with concern, one hand resting on the page she'd been reading.

“And he loved her back,” Bastien said quietly. “You can see it in how she writes about him. The reverence, the certainty of reciprocation.”

“Yes.” She lifted another page, and he noticed her movements had become almost ritualistic, as though handling sacred texts.

“Day sixty-seven: 'I believe I have achieved a breakthrough.

Last night, during our communion, I experienced something beyond description.

For one moment—perhaps no longer than a heartbeat—I felt existence from his perspective.

The strange weightlessness of his state, the way love and memory anchor him to this plane when all other ties have been severed. '”

Her voice broke slightly on the last words, and she pressed her free hand to her throat as though something had lodged there.

“Are you certain you’re all right?” Bastien leaned forward, genuinely concerned despite knowing the cause of her distress. “We could continue this another time.”

“No, I’m fine. It’s just . . .” She paused, searching for words.

“There’s something about these passages that feels familiar.

Not the content exactly, but the emotions behind them.

The way she describes the connection, the certainty of being known completely by someone else.

It’s as though I’ve felt those things myself. ”