modified weapon in our arsenal.
Priest twisted the head and it hit the ground, cracking the concrete floor.
“It’s a sign.” Alara picked it up and walked toward the hole, ready to toss it inside. But she stopped short. “Priest?”
He took the hunk of metal from her and examined the circular groove where it connected to the handle. A large plate lay behind it with a channel cut through the center. Priest used his screwdriver to remove the plate, exposing a circular chamber. A disk’s silver edge rested against the lip, completely protected.
He flipped over the head of the hammer, and the circle of yellow glass dropped into his hand.
Alara gasped. “How did someone get it in there without that vengeance spirit going crazy?”
“Maybe they gave him something he wanted.”
Jared picked up the handle off the floor. Numbers were scratched into the wood. “What do you think they mean? It looks like math homework.”
39.9159082-80.7420296
Lukas jerked the handle out of his brother’s hand, studying the numbers. “They’re coordinates.”
“You think they lead to the last piece of the Shift?” Alara asked.
Lukas tightened his hand around the splintered wood. “Yeah. And if we find it, we can destroy Andras.”
“Let’s get out of here.” Priest handed the metal detector to one of the spirits. The child grabbed it and scampered away.
We walked back down the aisle between the beds. The children were already playing with the metal detector, possibly the only toy some of them had ever seen. We moved past the nightmarish drawings and up the cracked stairs. I thought about all the innocent people the Legion must have saved over the years, and I couldn’t help but wonder…
Who saved the innocent souls?
28. FLORIDA WATER
I waited on the front steps, hoping to avoid the awkward-ness of being alone with Lukas and Jared. Priest and Alara had disappeared the moment we left the basement. Priest was determined to figure out where the coordinates on the handle led, and Alara had mumbled something about tying up loose ends.
I stared at my hands, splinters and dirt embedded under my nails instead of black charcoal. Artists protected their hands. What did that say about me? How much would I have to give up for the Legion?
The muffled sound of voices rose inside the house. Without any vengeance spirits to fight, Lukas and Jared were left with each other. A door slammed and snippets of their conversation drifted outside.
“We both know you don’t care about her,” Lukas shouted. “She’s just something else for you to take —”
A knot formed in the pit of my stomach. Lukas meant something to me, even if I couldn’t define exactly what it was. I didn’t want to hurt him.
“Luke, I didn’t mean for this to happen—”
“Like you didn’t mean to kill Dad?” The words echoed through the house, layered with pain and anger.
“You know that was an accident,” Jared said quietly.
“Everything’s an accident with you because you never think about anyone but yourself.” I leaned against the door debating whether or not to open it. “Is Kennedy going to be your next victim?”
“Hey, are you going back in?” Alara climbed the stairs behind me, a canvas knapsack slung over her shoulder.
“Wait—”
She opened the door before I could stop her, catching Lukas and Jared off guard. They both turned and looked past Alara to where I stood. I dropped my eyes, hoping they wouldn’t realize how much I’d heard.
Alara broke the silence. “Am I interrupting something that looks like it needs interrupting?”
Jared slouched against the wall, his eyes glued to the floor.
Lukas noticed Alara’s knapsack. “What are you doing?”
She strode past them. “My grandmother would never leave the spirits of those children in this awful place. I have to try to release them so they can move on.”
“Can you do that?” I followed her tentatively.
“I’m not sure. I’ve only seen my grandmother do it, and I don’t have the traditional supplies. But I think I can make some substitutions.”
“Why didn’t the spirits disappear like the little boy in the well?” I asked. He had seemed at peace.
“Sometimes they don’t know how to move on. They’re lost and need help finding their way.”
Lukas frowned. “And you’re going to be their guide?”
“More like their travel agent.” Alara pulled four packages of Red Cap tobacco out of her bag. “If you guys want to help, I’m going to need a bucket.”
The spirits crowded around Alara as she emptied one of the tobacco packets into a bucket of water and stirred it with her hand. “We have to make a floor wash and cleanse the room of negative energy or the loas won’t come.”
“The what?”
“The loas are intermediaries in the spirit world. Some of them guide lost souls to the other side,” she explained, her arms soaked to the elbows. “But they won’t show up unless we scrub this room down.”
Jared studied the brown water. “And this is what we’re using to clean the place?”
“Florida Water makes the best floor wash. Unless you have bergamot oil, rose water, oil of neroli, and about seven other ingredients stashed in the van, we’re going with this. Lots of cultures use tobacco to purify sacred spaces.” She handed Jared a wet towel. “Start purifying.”
Lukas walked up and down the stairs, refilling the bucket in the kitchen until Alara ran out of Red Cap and the floors were clean, at least according to her standards. He didn’t say a word to Jared and not much more to me. When he caught me watching him, his usual playful expression was gone.
Alara lit a novena candle in the center of the room. By now, some of the children were sitting cross-legged around her, fascinated. “We need something to offer the loas.”
I glanced at the stripped beds and the IV poles, the bare bulb and the dirty faces of the spirits. There was nothing here. Lukas and Jared looked through their pockets, but weapons and salt didn’t seem like the right sort of offerings.
I only had one thing of value.
My hand shook as I slipped my mother’s silver bracelet off my wrist and handed it to Alara. I heard a rip and turned in time to see Jared tearing something off his father’s jacket. He dropped the white patch bearing his last name next to the candle.
Alara shook her head. “I’m not sure it’s enough.”
One of the smaller children scrambled to her feet and disappeared behind a metal bed frame. She scurried back and handed Alara a dirty bundle with two circles drawn on the front, and a piece of IV tubing wrapped around it. A crude doll made from one of the bed straps.
Alara’s eyes glistened in the candlelight as she opened her journal and read from a page written in Haitian Creole, the language of the loas. The children listened intently and she turned to the next page, written in English—Psalm 136.
Her voice was quiet, and I only heard snippets as she spoke.
