Return of the Hunters (The DeathSpeaker Codex Book 4) by Sonya Bateman

Author:Sonya Bateman [Bateman, Sonya]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: shapeshifter, coming of age, witch, dark urban paranormal thriller voodoo elf fairies werewolf New Orleans Papa Legba swamp bayou moon magic spells supernatural seelie unseelie manhattan new york city evil ancient cult murder hunter police detective reluctant hero journey humor family, Fae, ghost, god
Published: 2016-06-26T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 22

Our destination turned out to be a place called Baptiste Landau—a swamp shanty town that was little more than a strip of land along an unnamed tributary with a single row of stilt houses, bordered along the back by a thick cypress forest and endless swamp.

For the Duchenes, it was home.

A small crowd of people had been waiting at the dock where T-Sam and Aubin pulled up to moor the boat. More cousins. A bunch of them carried Rex and Senobia’s bodies into the house, a sprawling single-story A-frame with splintery wood siding, three or four cobbled extensions and added rooms, and a long, screened front porch. There was a wooden sign next to the porch door with a picture of a snapping alligator, and words beneath it: I Love Tourists They Taste Great.

At least the place had personality.

The cousins had wandered off not long after our arrival, and the bunch of us sat listlessly on the porch, surrounded by a chorus of insects and swamp calls and the occasional harsh buzz of the bug zappers hung at the corners. I’d decided not to elaborate on my suspicion that the Valentines had set the traps. If they were in the area, they could be anywhere, and we’d traveled another hour after the javelin trap. That was the last one I’d seen.

The odds of actually making contact with them out here, in this metric ton of swampland, were slim to none even if they were around. And I sure as hell wasn’t going to go looking to find out.

“So, is this your house?” I said eventually.

Bastien was the only one who seemed to hear me. “Naw. This T-Sam’s place,” he said.

Well, that explained the alligator sign. T-Sam definitely seemed anti-outsiders. “Is he coming back?”

“Not tonight.”

“We got a long day tomorrow,” Denei said abruptly, in apparent response to nothing. “Folks’ll come here for the viewing, and then the cemetery in the evening.”

I hadn’t even considered how strange this whole thing was. After years of working as a body mover, I was more familiar with the after-death process than anyone—the police, the hospital, the morgue, the funeral home. None of those things had been mentioned once. “You’re not having them…I mean, not even coffins?” I said.

Denei gave me a dark look. “We take care of our own around here.”

“All right.” I did understand not wanting to involve the police. I mean, what were they going to say—a voodoo god killed them by ripping centipedes out of their backs? Even if they believed it, the cops couldn’t do anything. So we’d have to. “What about Legba?”

“What about him?”

Her words were heavy with warning. And she was probably right—this wasn’t the best time to talk about it. I’d just drop it for now.

But Bastien had other ideas.

“What you mean, ‘what about him’?” he snapped. “He murdered the young’uns. So what we gonna do about it?”

Denei stared at him. “Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

Isalie shivered and touched his arm. “Bastien…” she whispered.

“No!” He jerked away from her and stood. His eyes burned with fury.

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