Page 46 of Curse in the Quarter (Bourbon Street Shadows #1)

M aman Brigitte’s house sat in the shadow of St. Louis Cathedral, its narrow facade indistinguishable from a dozen other Creole cottages crowding the Quarter's back streets.

Bastien led Delphine through the courtyard gate, past herbs that glowed faintly in the darkness and wind chimes that sang without breeze.

The scent of protective wards hung heavy in the air—sage and iron, salt and something sharper that bent light around the edges of his vision.

“Your grandmother lives here?” Delphine asked, her voice hoarse from smoke inhalation. The Archive fire had left them both marked with ash and exhaustion, but her eyes remained sharp, cataloging every detail of their surroundings.

“Maman has lived in New Orleans longer than most people remember,” Bastien said, sidestepping the question of actual family connections. “She's one of the few who knows how to ward against what we're dealing with.”

The cottage's interior defied its modest exterior.

Rooms flowed into each other with dream logic, hallways that should have led to dead ends opening onto spaces that couldn't possibly fit within the building's footprint.

Candles floated without holders, casting shadows that moved independently of their flames.

Books arranged themselves on shelves according to principles covered between the pages, not alphabetical order.

Delphine stopped in the main parlor, turning slowly to take in the impossible architecture. “This isn't normal.”

“No,” Bastien agreed. “It isn't.”

Maman emerged from the kitchen carrying a tray of tea that steamed with more than heat. Her silver hair was bound in intricate braids threaded with small bones and feathers, and her dark eyes held depths that spoke of centuries rather than decades.

“So,” she said, setting the tray on a table that adjusted its height to accommodate the cups, “you finally brought her home.”

Delphine's gaze snapped between them. “Brought me home? I've never been here before in my life.”

“Haven't you?” Maman's smile was knowing. “Memory can be a stubborn thing, child. Sometimes it takes time to remember what the soul never forgot.”

Bastien shot Maman a warning look. They'd agreed to reveal the existence of the otherworldly, not the personal connections that bound them across lifetimes. Delphine wasn't ready for the full truth, might never be ready for it.

“Sit,” Maman said, gesturing toward a chair that moved to meet Delphine halfway. “You've had a difficult evening.”

Delphine perched on the edge of the seat, every line of her body radiating tension. “The fire at the Archive. Those symbols that burned without destroying anything. The way you—” She turned to Bastien, accusation sharp in her voice. “The way you made them stop. That wasn't normal either. ”

Bastien poured himself tea, buying time to choose his words carefully. “There are things in this world that exist outside what most people consider possible. Forces that shape reality in ways science hasn't yet learned to measure.”

“Magic.” The word fell between them like a stone dropped into still water.

“Among other things.” He met her eyes, bracing for the disbelief, the fear, the inevitable retreat that would follow. “New Orleans sits at the intersection of multiple realities. What you have witnessed is part of a much larger conflict between worlds that shouldn't touch but sometimes do.”

Delphine was quiet for a long moment, and her hands wrapped around her cup as if drawing warmth from more than the tea. When she finally spoke, her voice carried the careful control of someone processing information that challenged everything they thought they knew.

“The genealogy research. The family connections I've been tracking. They're not coincidences, are they?”

“No,” Bastien said quietly. “They're not.”

“And you've known all along. Known what I was researching . . . what it meant.” Her voice sharpened. “Known and let me stumble around in the dark while people got hurt.”

The accusation hit harder because it carried truth. He had known, had watched her piece together fragments of a pattern that stretched back centuries, had allowed her to remain ignorant of the dangers growing around her.

“I was trying to protect you,” he said.

“By lying to me?”

“By keeping you away from forces that could destroy you.” Bastien set down his cup with deliberate care. “There are things involved in this that you can't imagine. Powers that feed on knowledge, that grow stronger when more people understand their true nature.”

Delphine's laugh held no humor. “So instead of trusting me with the truth, you decided I was safer living in ignorance? While whatever this is escalated around me?”

“I understand you're angry,” he said carefully. “You have every right to be. But the forces we're dealing with are ancient and dangerous. They've been building toward something for months, using the genealogical connections you've been mapping as a kind of network.”

“What kind of network?”

Bastien glanced at Maman, who nodded almost imperceptibly.

“The people affected by the incidents you've been tracking—they're all descended from families that were involved in certain events centuries ago. Events that left . . . resonances. Connections that can be activated under the right circumstances.”

“Activated for what purpose?”

“We're still trying to determine that.” It wasn't entirely a lie.

They suspected the network was designed to anchor something massive, but the exact nature of the working remained hidden.

“What we know is that each activation strengthens the overall pattern, brings whatever's being planned closer to completion.”

Delphine was quiet for several minutes, her analytical mind working through implications. “The Archive fire tonight. That was an escalation.”

“Yes.”

“And you think more escalations are coming.”

“I'm certain of it.”

She stood abruptly, pacing to the window that looked out on a courtyard where plants swayed without wind. “I want to help. ”

“Delphine—”

“No.” She spun to face him, her eyes blazing with determination. “Don't you dare try to sideline me again. I've been researching this pattern for a long time. I know the family connections better than anyone else. You need what I know.”

“It's dangerous.”

“Everything worth doing is dangerous.” She crossed back to where he sat, her presence filling the space between them.

“I'm not asking you to treat me like an equal partner in whatever supernatural conflict you're involved in.

I'm telling you that I'm going to be involved whether you want me to be or not. The only question is whether we work together or at cross purposes.”

The ultimatum hung in the air, familiar in its absolute refusal to compromise.

This was Charlotte's determination, the same unwavering will that had driven her to attempt rituals that could remake reality itself.

This was Delia's fierce intelligence, refusing to be diminished by fear of consequences.

“There are rules,” Bastien said finally. “Protocols for working with civilians in these situations.”

“I'm not a civilian . I'm a researcher who's been studying your network longer than you know.” Delphine's smile held no warmth. “And I'm the only person outside your organization who understands the scope of what's been building.”

Bastien opened his mouth, ready to remind her he’d known her the entire time she’d been alive in this incarnation.

That he’d followed her at a distance to Oxford; the only time he’d left the Quarter in her lifetime.

He was acutely aware of her entire life, and while he’d mentioned it before, they never got into any detail over it.

Perhaps they should have, Bastien thought as he let her anger wash over him.

It had become a losing game, protecting her.

Maman, who also knew this, cleared her throat delicately. “Perhaps we should focus on immediate concerns. The night is far from over, and the fire at the Archive was merely the opening move.”

As if summoned by her words, Delphine's phone buzzed with an incoming message. She glanced at the screen and frowned. “That's strange. Text from an unknown number.”

Bastien's blood chilled. “What does it say?”

“'The third circle closes at dawn. Come alone or watch it all burn.'” Delphine looked up, her face pale. “There's an address. Royal Street.”

The location was three blocks from where they sat, deep in the Quarter's maze of ancient buildings and older secrets. Bastien recognized it as one of the sites Charlotte had marked in her original network design, a convergence point that had been dormant for decades.

“You're not going,” he said.

“We're both going,” Delphine corrected. “This is directed at me, which means whoever sent it knows I'm involved. Keeping me in the dark hasn't protected anyone—it's just made me a target without proper defenses.”

She was right, and the acknowledgment felt like another small defeat in a war he'd been fighting for centuries. Every instinct screamed against bringing her deeper into danger, but the alternative was watching her walk into it alone.

“Limited partnership,” he said finally. “You follow my lead when it comes to direct contact with hostile forces. You don't attempt to engage anything that doesn't register as completely human. And if I tell you to run, you run.”

“Agreed. On one condition. ”

“Which is?”

“You stop treating me like I'm made of glass.” Delphine's voice softened slightly, losing some of its sharp edge. “I know you think you're protecting me, but protection without trust isn't protection at all. It's just another kind of cage.”

The words hit harder because they echoed truths he'd been avoiding. How many times had he made the same mistake? How many incarnations had he driven away by loving them too carefully, by placing their safety above their agency?

“Agreed,” he said.

Maman had been watching their exchange with the pleased expression of someone whose plans were unfolding exactly as intended. “Good. Now that you've finished negotiating, perhaps we should discuss what you're likely to encounter on Royal Street.”

As she began outlining the magical defenses they'd need and the possible scenarios they might face, Delphine asked questions that cut straight to the heart of complex theoretical frameworks.

Her mind adapted to new realities with the same systematic thoroughness she'd brought to genealogical research, filing away information about ward structures and entity classifications with academic precision.

But throughout the conversation, Bastien noticed moments when her attention would drift, her eyes taking on a distant quality that suggested something deeper than conscious processing.

When Maman mentioned certain historical periods, Delphine's hand would move unconsciously to her throat.

When specific magical practices were described, she'd nod as if recognizing familiar concepts rather than learning new ones.

The awakening was accelerating, triggered by proximity to the truth she'd been denied.

Memory fragments were surfacing despite the barriers that had held them in check for twenty-five years.

Soon, the careful structures he'd built to keep her safe would crumble entirely, and she'd remember everything—their love, their loss, and the price she'd paid for choosing to love across lifetimes.

“There's something else,” Delphine said as Maman finished her briefing. “I've been having dreams. Fragments of places I've never been, conversations I've never had. They started weeks ago, but they're getting stronger.”

Bastien's chest tightened. “What kind of dreams?”

“Gardens at night. Candlelit rooms. Someone teaching me to trace symbols on stone.” She looked directly at him, and for a moment, he could see Charlotte looking back—the same intelligence, the same fearless curiosity. “A man who promises to find me across lifetimes.”

The room went silent except for the soft hiss of floating candles and the distant sound of wind chimes that moved without breeze. Maman's eyes held warnings about truths revealed too soon, but Delphine's gaze never wavered from his face.

“Stress can manifest in many ways,” Bastien said carefully. “The trauma of recent events, exposure to forces beyond normal experience—it's not uncommon for people to process these through symbolic dreams.”

“Is that what you think they are? Symbols?”

“I think,” he said, each word chosen with surgical precision, “that some experiences transcend easy explanation. That doesn't necessarily make them literal memories.”

Delphine nodded slowly, but her expression suggested she'd heard the careful evasion in his response. “Right. Of course. ”

She didn't press further, but Bastien could see the questions forming, the analytical mind that had made her such a formidable researcher now turning inward to examine her own experiences.

The dreams would intensify, become more specific, more undeniably real.

Soon, she'd begin to remember not just fragments but complete scenes, conversations, emotions that belonged to lifetimes she'd lived before.

And when that happened, he'd have to decide whether to continue protecting her from the truth or trust her with a revelation that could destroy them both.

For now, they had Royal Street to navigate, whatever trap or revelation waited there in the pre-dawn darkness. Whatever was coming next in the escalating conflict that had already claimed too much and demanded more with each passing hour.

But as they prepared to leave the safe house, as Delphine checked her phone for additional messages, and Maman gathered protective talismans that might keep them alive through whatever came next, Bastien felt the weight of centuries pressing down on him.

The same pattern, the same impossible choice between love and safety, protection and partnership.

The only difference was that this time, he was running out of lifetimes to get it right.

Dawn was still hours away, but already the Quarter stirred with tensions that had nothing to do with ordinary human concerns. In the distance, church bells chimed the hour with tones that seemed to echo from multiple realities at once.

Time, as always, was running short. And the choices made in the next few hours would determine whether love could finally triumph over the forces that sought to tear it apart, or whether this would be the lifetime where even the strongest connections finally broke under pressure they were never meant to bear.