The Blood: A Denouement

There was a knock at Jenean Morrison’s door and this surprised her because no one ever visited her. She didn’t dare to think Kris was actually back yet, and she came to the keyhole saying, “Who is it?”

“Jenean,” a voice with the trace of a French accent said, “It is your aunt.”

Later on Jenean might analyze if this was a pit in her stomach or excitement, but she opened the door for Clotilde.

Clotilde, what an old fashioned name for a good looking middle aged woman with a lion’s mane of dark hair.

“Aunt Clotilde.”

“We need to talk, my dear,” Clotilde said, coming in. “There is no time for trivias.”

“Trivialities?”

“Is what I said. I could take you to lunch. Would you like lunch?”

She was on her off day from the I-Hop, and had intended to spend it sleeping. Now, her head was spinning because Clotilde, who had come to this country some thirty years ago, did not live in Lassador and must have, with no warning and zero invitation, been traveling here since last night.

“Tante, I love you, but what is all this about?”

“It’s about your boyfriend.”

“How do you know about…?”

“Please, I know everything. Did you know he was bisclavret?”

“I…” Jenean was almost glad her aunt had used one of the French words.

“I thought. I suspected.”

“There is more to tell,” Clotilde said. And then she said, as Jenean stood before her, too stupefied to do anything useful.

“When you see him again, you should tell him that we are too.”

Lewis Dunharrow sat gloomily looking at the Cards before he stacked them back up and handed them to Levy.

Now it’s my turn,” the boy said, not wanting to look too eager.

“Don’t get excited,” Lewis said. “The information you get from a Tarot Card is limited at best. But yes, it’s your turn.”

These days Chris Ashby used the sunlit hours almost strictly for sleeping, and rose in the night to go out, which they both used as a euphemism for hunting. Chris Ashby looked healthier than ever, and Lewis stopped in their bedroom to see him sleeping nude as always, face down, mouth open on the pillow. The sunlight through the curtains made everything the color of ivory, including Chris, and Lewis thought, “Only a day or two longer, then we will be back to our life.”

He walked through the great house and to the front porch where he found Augustus looking a little bit older today, though Lewis couldn’t settle on what age. He sat in the chair nearest his uncle, and as they looked on the great lawn with the drive coming up, and the ring of green trees encircling Long Lees, Lewis said, “I am sorry for my abruptness. It was not right for me to say Long Lees was mine.”

“It is,” Augustus said. “It is yours as much as it is mine. You are Octavian’s heir and this was his. He took it with me. And with Susanna. Malachy was before us all. And if you are who you say you are…” Augustus eyed him, “and it appears you are… well then…”

Augustus nodded.

“You all fought so hard to take Long Lees, and after all the solitude I apologize again,” Lewis said. “I am bringing more white peple yo your door than you ever planned to see.”

Augustus almost laughed.

“Truthfully, I do not desire people of any color at my door. Did you see something in your cards?”

“You know how little Cards can do. I did not see. I sensed.”

“All of Pamela’s kin are welcome. At first I thought the boy James was an idiot, but it is not so, and I see his grandmother in him.”

“And Marabeth?”

“She is what Pamela hoped for, what she worked for all her life. Especially now that she has won the Gift.

When Levy came to the porch, Augustus said, “Your hair is a mess.”

“Are you a barber?” Levy eyed the old witch.

Augustus raised an eyebrow.

“You may be a Dunharrow after all.”

“Marabeth cuts hair,” Lewis said.

“Does she now?” Augustus murmured.

Levy looked dubious.

“When are people coming?” Augustus asked without looking at Lewis or Levy.

Lewis said, “Tonight.”

Marabeth sat on the porch between Augustus and Lewis, and the sound of electric trimmers clicked off as she wiped hair from Levy’s shoulders.

“You are the first white person I ever let cut my hair,” he said.

Lewis gave him the hand mirror without even looking, and Levy turned back and forth, wiped his hair onto the porch. Augustus cleared his throat.

“I know,” Levy said, a little irritated. “I wasn’t going to leave my hair there. Marabeth, it looks good!”

“In a former life I was a hairdresser,” she said, wrapping the cord around the clippers. “Or an almost one.”

“You are a woman of many hidden talents,” Lewis noted as Levy began to gather the clumbs of his hair that had not fallen on the newspaper around him.

Up to the porch, out of the woods, they saw Jim Strauss coming, tanned and bright eyed, sweat down the front of his tee shirt, and Seth walked beside him.

“You didn’t go out to day,” Lewis said to Marabeth.

Marabeth was barefoot in jeans and a tee shirt, and her hair was tied back.

“I go out once a day to learn, and to get used to the Change, and then I become myself again.”

Augustus only nodded, but when Jim and Seth sat down at the bottom of the steps, he said:

“Long ago witches Changed. Some still do. This was in a time when all things were one. Nowadays the most a witch usually does is cast herself or himself into the eyes of another animal and even then we must be careful.

“But long ago, when there were many of us, we changed all of the time. We loved the Change, the wildness, and we changed into anything. Wolves, yes, but bears, badgers, birds. It is even said that Fafnir, the dragon of Creation was once a man.

“But the more some grew to love the Change, the harder it was to come back from it and, in time, some never came back. It is said that there are many bears and many lions, many wolves as well, who were once men, but forgot themselves.”

Jim looked up at Augustus to see the face of the man who looked both old and young, both like Lewis Dunharrow and unlike him.

“This is why, for the most part, the witches forgot the Change, and those who Change, who warg, were so careful of it, many even lost the ability to do it properly or do at all. This is, in fact, though you may no longer remember it, why some chose to change only on the three days of the full moon, for that is the origin of that old curse. Take care, Seth, that you do not love traveling through the minds of animals too much. Take care, James Strauss, that you do not love your wolf form so much you can no longer return from it.”

Augustus Dunharrow, who loved nearly no one, who had used his grandchildren to work his will and then banished them with curses when they had endangered him by falling in line with vampires, was enchanted by Marabeth. In her strange way the girl—well, woman now, reminded him of Susanna in her youth. But the reminder was a surface one only. Since the days of her first change, Marabeth instictively knew the Change would be something she must continue to do. She was disciplined, and had done it once a day. Now she came barefoot down the stairs in a black dress, and she had put a crown of flowers in her dark hair, Her lips were red as blood, and there was a wildness that had not been in her. She had seen the car coming up the drive, and as she ran down she took Augustus’s hand and kissed it.

“It is good of you to allow my friend to come into your house.”

“Yes,” Augustus thought, this girl was a witch, a true enchantress. She was a wild witch. Even her shoes meant nothing to her. She had received the Gift, and her mind had passed through animals. She would never be entirely of the human world again.

She threw her arms around Jason McCord before he reached the steps, and he swung her about and then, when she threw her legs around him and he was holding her, he realized as she planted a fierce kiss on his mouth, that he had never known she was so light.

“I don’t know what the fuck has happened to you,” he said to Marabeth, “but I like it.”

“Oh, Jason,” she said, “So much has happened to me.”

Jim and Kris had met Jason, but only as the detective who had brought them news of their father. But before they could meet him again, he introduced himself to Augustus with great courtliness, and then to Lewis with equal courtesy and lastly to Loreal.

“For a moment,” she said, “I thought you were going to kiss my hand.”

“I could.”

“There’s no time for that, sir,” Loreal told him. “You’ve got work to do.”

“Can I smoke in this house?” Jason whispered.

“Of course you can,” Augustus’s voice came from the next room.

“Anything else would be uncivilized.”

Later that day, as evening approached, Peter Keller arrived at Long Lees with Joyce MacNamara.

Marabeth, who had no Tarot cards or prescience was completely surprised, and Kris and Jim were almost like children in the presence of their older cousin.

“How did you all get here?” Marabeth asked, but just then, the front door opened and in came a man and a woman who, though they did not look alike, were definitely brother and sisters, and though they did not seem old, were certainly not young. They were dressed for the tropics, and the man wore a straw hat and a bright Hawaiian shirt while the woman, with her tumble of braids, was hung with wooden jewelry, silver and gold necklaces and bangles, and chunks of thick stones. A small cat and a black dog scooted from behind them and entered the house and even before Uriah Dunne arrived behind them, Marabeth knew they were Dunharrows.

Kris did not hide his pleasure. Uriah had been like a foster father to him, even when Nathan was alive, and he embraced the man, tightly.

“Grandma,” Lewis said, and Marabeth blinked as Lewis embraced the woman.

Drusilla was kind without being gushing, like Lewis, actually, and she kissed her grandson on the cheek, and rubbed his hand, saying, “You’ve done well.”

“The whole family,” Augustus remarked.

“The ones that count,” Drusilla said.

“It’s been a long time,” Augustus said, and Owen remarked, “I’m not entirely sure it’s been long enough. But there it is.”

All this time, the Strausses looked from one Dunharrow to the other, and Loreal had just entered the room. Peter was confused because he knew Lewis, but did not know who the young man sitting beside him was.

“This is my great-grand uncle, Augustus Dunharrow,” Lewis said.

While the youing man smiled courteously beside him, Lewis added, “Loreal’s grandfather.”

For a brief moment, Peter’s face revealed the shock that Joyce did not even bother to hide, and then Peter said, “Mr Dunharrow, I hope I am not intruding on your home.”

“I always wanted to see the rest of the family that Pamela came from,” Augustus said. “Of course, none of you are the ones she spoke of. Pray tell me, Mr. Keller, what relation were you to my old friend?”

Whatever Peter was thinking, and Lewis could see his blue eyes trying to not fall out while looking on the young man, he said, “Pamela had two younger sisters. My grandmother, Maris, was the younger.”

Augustus nodded in satisfaction, and then said, “You are most welcome here.”

“Indeed,” Lewis said, “if he had not wanted you, you would never have found this house. It is ringed about with magics and few ever come here.”

“Then I am doubly honored,” said Peter.

Loreal had spent the day with the Strausses, putting together what they had learned from the journals and the lists of names. Marabeth was relieved to see that Loreal and her old friend got along easily. Often, while they spoke of one thing or another that seemed not to matter, Peter tapped his foot impatiently and tried to interrupt. It was Loreal who said, “You’re making us all nervous. Relax.”

“Thank you for that,” Joyce said. “I’ve tried to…”

“Tried to what?” Peter said.

Loreal shrugged and told Joyce, “Sometimes you just need another woman to come in and say something. If more women said something, less men would feel the need to say just anything.”