Taltos (Lives of the Mayfair Witches 3)

"Go on up," said Mary Jane, who had already hurled one sack up on the step above Mona. Crash, bang, slam. The girl was really moving.

Mona began to walk. Yes, firm, and amazingly dry by the time she reached the very top, dry as if the sun of the spring day had been fiercely hot, trapped in here, and bleaching the boards, look, yes, bleaching it as surely as if it were driftwood.

At last she stood on the second floor, estimating the angle to be less than five degrees, but that was plenty enough to drive you mad, and then she narrowed her eyes the better to see to the very end of the hallway. Another grand and lovely door with sidelights and fanlight, and electric bulbs strung on crisscrossing wire, hanging from the ceiling. Mosquito netting. Was that it? Lots and lots of it, and the soft electric light, nice and steady, shining through it.

She took several steps, clinging to the wall still, which did indeed feel hard and dry now, and then she heard a soft little laugh coming from the end of the hall, and as Mary Jane came up with the lantern in hand and set it down beside her sack at the top of the stairs, Mona saw a child standing in the far doorway.

It was a boy, very dark-skinned, with big inky eyes and soft black hair and a face like a small Hindu saint, peering out at her.

"Hey, you, Benjy, come help me here with all this. You gotta help me!" shouted Mary Jane.

The boy sauntered forward, and he wasn't so little as he came closer. He was maybe almost as tall as Mona, which wasn't saying much, of course, since Mona hadn't broken five feet two yet, and might never.

He was one of those beautiful children with a great mysterious mingling of blood--African, Indian, Spanish, French, probably Mayfair. Mona wanted to touch him, touch his cheek and see if his skin really felt the way it looked, like very, very fine tanned leather. Something Mary Jane had said came back to her, about him selling himself downtown, and in a little burst of mysterious light, she saw purple-papered rooms, fringed lampshades, decadent gentlemen like Oncle Julien in white suits, and of all things, herself in the brass bed with this adorable boy!

Craziness. The pain stopped her again. She could have dropped in her tracks. But quite deliberately she picked up one foot and then the other. There were the cats, all right, good Lord, witches' cats, big, long-tailed, furry, demon-eyed cats. There must have been five of them, darting along the walls.

The beautiful boy with the gleaming black hair carried two sacks of groceries down the hall ahead of her. It was even sort of clean here, as if he'd swept and mopped.

Her shoes were sopping wet. She was going to go down.

"That you, Mary Jane? Benjy, is that my girl? Mary Jane!"

"Coming, Granny, I'm coming, what are you doing, Granny?"

Mary Jane ran past her, holding the ice chest awkwardly, with her elbows flying out and her long flaxen hair swaying.

"Hey, there, Granny!" She disappeared around the bend. "What you doing now?"

"Eating graham crackers and cheese, you want some?"

"No, not now, gimme a kiss, TV broken?"

"No, honey, just got sick of it. Benjy's been writing down my songs as I sing them. Benjy."

"Listen, Granny, I got to go, I got Mona Mayfair with me. I've got to take her up to the attic where it's really warm and dry."

"Yes, oh yes, please," Mona whispered. She leant against the walls which tilted away from her. Why, you could lie right on a tilted wall like this, almost. Her feet throbbed, and the pain came again.

Mama, I am coming.

Hold on, sweetheart, one more flight of steps to climb. "You bring Mona Mayfair in here, you bring her."

"No, Granny, not now!" Mary Jane came flying out of the room, big white skirts hitting the doorjamb, arms out to reach for Mona.

"Right on up, honey, right straight, come on around now."

There was a rustling and a clatter, and just as Mary Jane turned Mona around and pointed her to the foot of the next stairs, Mona saw a tiny little woman come scuttling out of the back room, gray hair in long loose braids with ribbons on the end of them. She had a face like wrinkled cloth, with amazing jet black eyes, crinkled with seeming good humor.

"Got to hurry," Mona said, moving as quickly as she could along the railing. "I'm getting sick from the tilt."

"You're sick from the baby!"

"You go on ahead, and turn on those lights," shouted the old woman, clamping one amazingly strong and dry little hand to Mona's arm. "Why the hell didn't you tell me this child was pregnant. God, this is Alicia's girl, like to died when they cut off that sixth finger."

"What? From me, you mean?" Mona turned to look into the little wrinkled face with the small lips pressed tight together as the woman nodded.

"You mean I had a sixth finger?" asked Mona.

"Sure did, honey, and you almost went to heaven when they put you under. Nobody ever told you that tale, about the nurse giving you the shot twice? About your heart nearly stopping dead, and how Evelyn came and saved you!"

Benjy rushed by, headed up the stairs, his bare feet sounding dusty on the bare wood.

"No, nobody ever told me! Oh God, the sixth finger."

"But don't you see, that will help!" declared Mary Jane. They were headed up now, and it only looked like one hundred steps to the light up there, and the thin figure of Benjy, who, having lighted the lights, was now making his slow, languid descent, though Mary Jane was already hollering at him.

Granny had stopped at the foot of the steps. Her white nightgown touched the soiled floor. Her black eyes were calculating, taking Mona's measure. A Mayfair, all right, thought Mona.

"Get the blankets, the pillows, all that," said Mary Jane. "Hurry up. And the milk, Benjy, get the milk."

"Well, now, just wait a minute," Granny shouted. "This girl looks like she doesn't have time to be spending the night in that attic. She ought to go to the hospital right now. Where's the truck? Your truck at the landing?"

"Never mind that, she's going to have the baby here," said Mary Jane.

"Mary Jane!" roared Granny. "God damn it, I can't climb these steps on account of my hip."

"Just go back to bed, Granny. Make Benjy hurry with that stuff. Benjy, I'm not going to pay you!!!!"

They continued up the attic steps, the air getting warmer as they ascended.

It was a huge space.

Same crisscross of electric lights she'd seen below, and look at the steamer trunks and the wardrobes tucked into every gable. Every gable except for one, which held the bed deep inside, and next to it, an oil lamp.

The bed was huge, built out of those dark, plain posts they used so much in the country, the canopy gone, and only the netting stretched over the top, veil after veil. The netting veiled the entrance to the gable. Mary Jane lifted it as Mona fell forward on the softest mattress.

Oh, it was all dry! It was. The feather comforter went poof all around her. Pillows and pillows. And the oil lamp, though it was treacherously close, made it into a little tent of sorts around her.

"Benjy! Get that ice chest now."

"Chere, I just carry that ice chest to the back porch," the boy said, or something like it, the accent clearly Cajun. Didn't sound like the old woman at all. She just sounds like one of us, thought Mona, a little different maybe....

"Well, just go git it," Mary Jane said.

The netting caught all the golden light, and made a beautiful solitary place of this big soft bed. Nice place to die, maybe better than in the stream with the flowers.

The pain came again, but this time she was so much more comfortable. What were you supposed to do? She'd read about it. Suck in your breath or something? She couldn't remember. That was one subject she had not thoroughly researched. Jesus Christ, this was almost about to happen.

She grabbed Mary Jane's hand. Mary Jane lay beside her, looking down into her face, wiping her forehead now with something soft and white, softer than a handkerchief.

"Yes, darlin', I'm here, and it's getting bigger and bigger, Mona, it's just not, it's ..."

"It will be born," Mona whispered. "It's mine. It will be born, but if I die, you have to do it for me, you and Morrigan together."

"What!"

"Make a bier of flowers for me--"

"Make a what?"

"Hush up, I'm telling you something that really matters."

"Mary Jane!" Granny roared from the foot of the steps. "You come down here and help Benjy carry me up now, girl!"

"Make a raft, a raft, all full of flowers, you know," Mona said. "Wisteria, roses, all those things growing outside, swamp irises ..."