Inside the World of Die for Me

  We leaned away from each other as Mamie turned back toward us. She smoothed her skirt with the palms of her hands, and with a look of resignation said, “Please call Monsieur Grimod and tell him we will arrive promptly.”

  MAMIE VISITS LA MAISON

  “My dear woman, can I just say what a true pleasure it is to meet you at last,” Gaspard said, shaking only slightly in his tic-y way as he did a bow/hand-kiss combo that I knew would melt Mamie’s heart.

  “Katya, I will join you when I finish talking to the gentlemen,” said Mamie, excusing me. And accepting Gaspard’s arm, she accompanied him into the sitting room. JB closed the door behind them.

  “Rolling out the red carpet!” I exclaimed.

  “Well, it’s not just an act,” said Charlotte. “JB and Gaspard do love you, or at least Gaspard does. I’m not sure that ‘love’ is a word I would use too freely with JB.”

  I smiled. “So what are they going to tell Mamie?” I asked as we began walking toward the kitchen.

  “They’re going to let her ask any questions she wants, and then work with her on a solution that will make her feel comfortable about your safety, since being with us was what compromised it in the first place. You know,” she said as we walked, “if you had never met Vincent, you would not be in danger.”

  “Neither would Vincent,” I said, with a trace of regret.

  “Vincent would probably be exactly where he is now,” Charlotte insisted. “Violette would have gotten to him anyway.”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head. “She would never have been able to beat him if he hadn’t been in such a weakened state. Which was because of me.”

  “Gaspard caught me up on everything you learned from the numa yesterday,” said Charlotte. “Violette had actually ordered Lucien to bring her Vincent’s head! Which he would have accomplished if you hadn’t been there.”

  “Lucien would never have gotten into your house if it wasn’t for my sister. Who Lucien only dated because he wanted to use me to get to Vincent.”

  Charlotte came to an abrupt stop and turned to face me. “That’s enough, Kate. Let’s just say that you’ve both done enough saving each other—and putting each other in danger—that you’re even. In any case, now no one is safe.”

  GANESH AND ANJALI

  Charlotte and I walked into the kitchen to find the table full and a lively discussion taking place over an Italian-themed meal. The sharp smell of garlic hung thick in the air, mixed with the comforting aroma of baked cheese.

  Geneviève jumped up from her chair and swept across the room to hug me. “Oh, Kate, I was so sorry to hear about Vincent.”

  She waved an arm toward the table. “Come meet some of our Indian kindred. This is Ganesh,” she said, leading me to a boy with coffee-colored skin, cinnamon eyes, and coal-black hair. He looked to be in his midtwenties like Geneviève.

  “Hello, Kate. I’ve heard all about you,” he said in English infused with a rich Indian accent. He pressed his palms together with his fingers almost touching his chin and nodded his head. I dipped my head in return and said, “Namaste,” winning a wide smile from the boy.

  “And this is his sister, Anjali.” Geneviève gestured toward a girl who looked just like her brother, but with waist-length wavy hair and thickly lashed eyes the color of melted caramel. She looked a couple of years older than her brother: closer to thirty, I guessed.

  “So good to meet you,” she said, giving me the same quick praying-hands bow.

  “Ganesh and Anjali surprised us, arriving from Delhi the day after you and Vincent left,” Charlotte said.

  Not even a week ago, I realized with amazement, Vincent and I had been in the south of France, sitting on the cliff overlooking the ocean and talking about our future. Just six days ago he explained the Dark Way to me, and his plan to kill numa in order to resist dying. And now he was gone.

  Sadness weighed like an iron yoke across my shoulders. Noticing my expression, Jeanne came over from where she was preparing a tray for my grandmother and gave me a firm, affectionate kiss on each cheek. “You’ll join us for some lasagna, won’t you, Kate?”

  “I actually haven’t have breakfast yet, but I’m not that hungry. Thanks anyway, Jeanne,” I said, taking a chair that Ambrose had pulled out for me.

  “Nonsense,” she said. She picked up a plate, loaded it with a steaming square of gooey pasta, and set it in front of me, before doing the same for Charlotte.

  “Never say no to Jeanne,” muttered Ambrose, taking a sizable bite of garlic bread. “Especially over one of her Italian grandmother’s recipes. Not that she’ll get offended. She’ll just take it as a challenge. Watch this.” He gestured to his empty plate. “Jeanne, that lasagna was delicious. I’m so full I couldn’t imagine having another bite.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” she said, and bringing the pan over to the table, plopped a giant-size piece in front of him. “With all the fighting you boys do, you need all the calories you can get.”

  Ambrose lifted an eyebrow and smiled at me in triumph.

  “Um, so . . . how do you know each other?” I asked, looking from Geneviève to the newcomers.

  “We met at a convocation,” Anjali said, dabbing her lips politely with her napkin, “oh, maybe thirty years ago?” Her brother nodded.

  “We’ve been traveling through Europe for the past few months and heard that Geneviève and Charlotte had moved to the Riviera. So we decided to pay them a visit. And when we heard what happened to Gen’s husband, we decided to stay a while,” her brother said, placing his hand compassionately on Geneviève’s.

  Geneviève returned the gesture, covering Ganesh’s hand with her own. “You and Anjali have been so kind,” she said, showing as much warmth as she could with her gesture. Because as soon as Ganesh mentioned her husband, her eyes lost their spark and her face took on a lost expression.

  I noticed Ambrose staring at Ganesh’s and Geneviève’s hands, which remained clasped together on the table, and I felt him stiffen uncomfortably beside me. “Well, that was certainly thoughtful of you to stay for Geneviève. When are you going back?” he asked.

  “We’ll stay as long as we can,” Anjali replied. “Especially with all that is happening, we figure that our French kindred could use all the help they can get. Jean-Baptiste told me he is preparing for all-out warfare against the numa if Violette doesn’t free Vincent’s spirit.”

  “There’s going to be all-out warfare against the numa even if she does,” conceded Ambrose, relaxing as Geneviève dropped the boy’s hand and returned to her lasagna. “Violette isn’t stealing the Champion’s power just so she can sit around and send off sparks. She told Katie-Lou here that she was planning on overthrowing France’s revenants. So it’s more a matter of who’s taking the war to whom at this point.”

  “Well, we just added an Indian contingent to our side,” Charlotte said, beaming at the siblings. “And you should get a load of how these two fight, Ambrose. You’ve never seen anything like it.”

  “Is that so?” said Ambrose with a broad smile. Taking his plate to the counter, he leaned down to give Jeanne’s shoulders a squeeze, then walked toward the door. “I might just have some kataras down in the armory if either of you feels like a workout. Just sitting around and waiting for news from Langeais is making me crazy.”

  “Now that’s an invitation I can’t resist,” crowed Ganesh, and thanking Jeanne for the meal, followed Ambrose out the door.

  “I’m in for a fight!” exclaimed Charlotte, and Geneviève and Anjali stood to join her.

  “Leave your dishes, dears, and go work off some steam,” said Jeanne, waving them away from the table and out the door.

  BRAN’S ESCAPE

  A week passed. Arthur’s group in Langeais, which included Jules, reported seeing no numa enter or leave the castle. Gaspard and his scholar friends continued to search for information on wandering souls. And Jean-Baptiste prepared for the inevitable attack.

  I went to school and tried to foc
us on finishing my junior year instead of wondering if I would ever hear from my boyfriend’s spirit again. I had once joked with Vincent that I couldn’t date a ghost. Well, now I would be happy to have even that much of him. But I tried to push those thoughts out of my mind as I made the movements to go to school, study, and spend every extra moment in special low-impact fight training with Gaspard. (No swinging of heavy maces while my shoulder was still healing.)

  To my complete surprise, Georgia had begun training as well. She had gone to La Maison (or “La Morgue,” as she called it) to visit Gaspard two days after our run-in with Violette, and he had agreed to teach her to fight. At first I suspected that it was a ploy to get nearer to Arthur. But she had already shown up for three sessions even though Arthur was away for an extended period of time. I began to wonder if it involved more than her most recent crush. Georgia’s fight with Violette had left her feeling vulnerable and weak. And those were two qualities my sister despised.

  Week two of no Vincent began. It was the end of February and school had closed for a week and a half for winter vacation, a French institution during which everyone heads for the Alps or the Pyrenees Mountains or one of the smaller ski stations dotting the countryside. Working parents often sent their kids to ski camp, and Papy and Mamie had previously offered to take Georgia and me, but since our fight with Violette, the subject had been dropped.

  Papy hired me to work mornings at his gallery for the week. And when I asked Gaspard if he would be willing to pack in a few extra fight sessions with me and my sister in the afternoons, he was only too happy to comply. The waiting was getting to be hard on all of us.

  It was Monday afternoon, and Georgia and I were making our way to La Maison, when I heard my phone ringing. I pulled it out of my bag to see an incoming call from a blocked number. I hadn’t even finished saying hello when a man began speaking urgently in French.

  “Kate, is that you?”

  “Yes . . . who is . . .” and then all of a sudden I recognized the voice. “Bran?”

  “Yes, it is Bran. From Le Corbeau. My mother was the—”

  “Bran, I know who you are. I’ve tried to call you about a hundred times in the last couple of weeks, but no one ever answered.” “Hiding. I was hiding. But now she’s found me.”

  “Who’s found you, Bran?”

  Georgia and I stopped as we arrived outside the grand gates of Jean-Baptiste’s home. My sister punched in the door code, and I followed her into the courtyard as the gate swung back shut behind us.

  “The small one. The ancient one. Her numa imprisoned me for questioning, but I escaped before she arrived.”

  “Wait, Violette was coming to question you?”

  “Yes. But I need help or her henchmen will find me again straightaway.” Bran’s voice was hushed and there was a trace of panic in his tone. Like he was doing everything he could to hold himself together.

  “Just a second,” I said as Ambrose opened the front door.

  “Katie-Lou. We’ve just had word that Violette has left the castle and is headed toward Paris,” he said. The enthusiasm in his voice made it clear that he didn’t think this was a bad thing. It wasn’t hard to read his mind: He had been itching for a fight, and now it was coming straight to him.

  “Ambrose, I’ve got Bran on the phone. The numa were holding him until Violette could arrive, but he’s escaped. We have to go help him.”

  The burly revenant took my phone and began asking Bran rapid-fire questions. Hanging up, he strode quickly through the foyer and down the back hallway, while Georgia and I jogged along in his wake. We sped down the stairs into the armory-slash-gym, interrupting a four-way swordfight between Gaspard, Geneviève, Ganesh, and Anjali.

  Ambrose recounted the story as he armed himself, and the other four revenants sprang into action, girding themselves with Kevlar vests and body armor. They were out the back door and into cars within minutes, leaving Georgia and me standing alone in the middle of the empty space.

  “I’d say they were ready for action,” I murmured as I walked over to the wardrobe to find my fight suit.

  “Ya think?” Georgia quipped as she pulled her own new suit on. “They’ve been bouncing off the walls for a week and a half. I figure if you’d said Bran was about to jump off the Eiffel Tower, Ambrose would have scaled it from the outside just to burn off some pent-up frustration.”

  “I hope they find Bran before his captors do.”

  Georgia lifted an eyebrow, and her lips curled in a wicked smile. “With the state Ambrose and the gang are in, those numa don’t stand a chance in hell.”

  Less than an hour later, we heard the cars pull into the drive. Georgia and I hung our swords on their pegs on the wall as the door opened and the group poured into the room.

  “Did you get him?” I called, and then saw Bran’s stick-figure body supported between Ambrose and Ganesh, his arms around their shoulders. There were fresh bruises rising on his face, one eye so swollen that it was only a slit.

  “Oh, Bran!” I said, covering my mouth in horror.

  His good eye flicked to me. “Kate,” he said, and letting out a sigh, his head fell forward. Releasing his hold on Ambrose and Ganesh, Bran sank unconscious to the ground.

  GHOST BOYFRIEND

  Georgia threw her arms around me as soon as Mamie let me go. “So. Ghost boyfriend, huh. We’ll have to get a pottery wheel so you can be like Demi Moore in that old movie where that ghost guy feels her up while she gets all funky with the clay.”

  “Once again, Georgia, your sensitivity astounds me,” commented Papy drily. We took our places around the table, and after Mamie wished us bon appétit, everyone tucked into the delicious food.

  “I’m just trying to point out that this kind of thing has happened before . . . ,” Georgia continued, with her mouth half-full.

  “In Hollywood,” Papy responded in a conversation-closed tone of voice. Mamie watched me as if she expected me to burst out crying.

  VIOLETTE BECOMES A NUMA

  And I finally pinpoint something that has been bothering me about her ever since she walked into the room. When I last saw her at the hotel, she was still a bardia. But now she is unquestionably numa, and it is because she killed me. There is no turning back for her. If there ever was a chance for her to change, it is now gone.

  Vincent had explained it to me: Even though it is almost unheard of, revenants can turn into numa. But a numa turning revenant is like a serial murderer saying he is sorry and going on to live a normal, productive life in society. It just doesn’t happen. Violette is damned.

  PREBATTLE MAKE-OUT SCENE

  “Are you okay?” Vincent asks. He is holding back, waiting for me to make a move. Watching to see what I want. I hold out my hand and he takes it and draws me to him. “Do you need some time to rest?”

  “Not when we don’t have any time to spare,” I say. “Who is here already?”

  “Ambrose, Charlotte, Geneviève, Arthur, Ganesh, Anjali, and a few others. I’ll make a few calls and get everyone together. You have a little time.” He leads me through the sitting room past the great hall to a hallway on the far side of the house. It is brightly lit with skylights, and three matching doors are evenly spaced down its length. Vincent holds the first one open for me.

  I walk into a small room that is decorated in white and robin’s-egg blue. A canopy bed takes up one corner and a footed bathtub is posed on the hardwood floor in another. Garlands of flowers interlaced with ribbons are painted around the ceiling, and a small glass chandelier hangs from a blue ribbon in the center.

  “I chose this room for you because I know you like your long soaks with a book,” he says, nodding toward the bathtub. “I mean, it’s temporary, of course. Your grandparents and Georgia are in the guest house in back,” he says, carefully avoiding the subject of What Is Going to Happen Next—just one of a handful of decisions I am faced with. I push that thought out of my mind. Not today.

  Vincent sees my uncomfortable expression and o
pens a closet.

  “My clothes!” I exclaim, and shuffling off his coat, go bury my face in them. They smell like home. “I cannot wait to get out of this dress,” I say, glancing down at the torn and dirty frock, and I start taking it off right there in front of him. Like a gentleman, he turns and waits until I have put my fluffy white robe on.

  “I’m decent,” I say, and he turns back to me.

  “I have to disagree,” he says, his eyes traveling from my face to my feet and back. “I’ll come get you as soon as everyone is here. You’ve got time to bathe and change.” He kisses me lightly on the forehead and turns to leave the room.

  “Wait,” I say, and he stops. “Five minutes. Give me five minutes.”

  “Kate, I don’t want five minutes.” He glances at my lips and presses his eyes shut. When he opens them, his expression is one of longing. “Five minutes isn’t enough. I want days. If we start now, I’m not going to want to stop. They’ll have to drag me out of your bedroom to go to war.”

  I walk up to him and stroke his neck with my fingertips. He shudders. “Five minutes. That’s all, I swear. I’m feeling strong enough for both of us,” I say.

  He shakes his head as if refusing. And then, suddenly lifting me into the air, he tosses me onto the bed and throws himself on top of me. “So the Champion thinks she can handle me. We’ll see about that,” he says, and begins kissing me all over. I laugh and hold him tightly as he peppers my skin with kisses.

  He kisses me until I am burning, my body on fire and my lips searching for any point on his face I can reach as he makes a tortuous tour around my features. Finally our lips meet, and he hesitates a full second before running his tongue lightly along the underside of my lip. And then we connect, his mouth on mine, still painfully light but moving deeper. I hold his head in my hands and kiss him like I’ve been longing to and he kisses me like I haven’t been kissed for what seems a very long time.