Page 29 of Whispers in the Quarter

I leave through the private exit, my hands steady but my mind fracturing like a broken test tube. The information I found in his phone will help dismantle the organization, but at what cost? Not just to my soul, but to the bright-eyed girl who once wanted to heal the world instead of poisoning it.

The night air hits my face as I emerge into a side alley. I strip off the platinum wig, letting my dark hair fall free. Behind me, the first shouts of alarm begin to rise from the Gardenia Club. Somewhere in my apartment, an acceptance letter yellows in its envelope, and a jar of saved money waits for snow that Sarah will never see.

“Sarah Deveraux,”he had said.“Such a tragic story.”

He had no idea how tragic. Because in avenging Celeste’s death, I’d killed Sarah just as surely as they’d killed my sister.Killed her dreams, her future, her very essence. Turned her scientific mind toward death instead of life, her love of plants into weapons instead of healing.

My phone buzzes.

Jazz: You ok, Melody?

Another buzz.

Lucas: My Chimera, your molecules feel troubled tonight.

I stare at their messages, my throat tight. They each have their name for me—Melody, Chimera—but neither of them ever knew Sarah. The girl who could have been something more than a weapon, something better than a ghost.

For the first time since Celeste died, I let myself really feel the loss—not just of my sister, but of myself. Of snow funds and research papers, of botanical sketches and chemistry experiments. Of a future where Sarah Deveraux might have made the world better instead of just less evil.

I text back.

Me: I’m fine. Just... questioning everything.

And I am. Every death, every step closer to what I thought was justice, has actually been leading me down a path I’m not sure I want to follow. Because if Perkins could see Sarah in me after all these years... what parts of her might still be alive under all these masks?

“Oh, Celeste,” I whisper to the night air, “what were you really involved in? And what did I give up to avenge you?”

The night wraps around me like a burial shroud as I walk deeper into the Quarter’s shadows. Behind me, sirens wail toward the Gardenia Club. Another death in my wake, but thistime, instead of satisfaction, all I feel is loss—not just for the sister I’m avenging, but for the sister I let die inside myself.

And the biggest question of all: If I finally get the answers I’m looking for, will there be anything left of Sarah to reclaim?

11

EVANGELINE

MADAME LAVEAU’S INVENTORY NOTES Private Collection—Herbs & Roots

Customer request: Old family recipe ingredients

Night-blooming jasmine

Swamp lily

Angel’s trumpet

Note: Purchaser resembles the Deveraux girl. Grandmother’s warnings about that family ring true. Some ghosts refuse to stay buried.

The bourbon burns going down,but not enough to wash away the memory of Perkins’ face as he recognized Sarah—not Celeste, but Sarah—in my mannerisms. I sit in Grandmother’s kitchen, watching ice melt in my third—or is it fourth?—glass. Dried herbs hang from the rafters, their shadows dancing in the candlelight. Each bundle holds a memory: afternoons learning their properties, evenings calculating chemical compositions, dreams of combining traditional knowledge with modern science.

My burner phone buzzes.

Lucas: “Need to meet. Urgent. Morgue. 1 hour.”

My stomach clenches. Lucas has been handling Perkins’ autopsy. Has he found something? The perfectly-delivered poison should have mimicked a heart attack, but Lucas isn’t your average medical examiner. His brilliance is what drew me to him, and now it might be my undoing.

I move to the old bathroom mirror, studying my reflection in the clouded glass. The woman staring back looks dangerous—dark circles under haunted eyes, tensed muscles ready for flight or fight. Behind me, I can see the height marks on the doorframe where Grandmother measured me and Celeste each birthday. The last mark for Sarah stops at sixteen.

My regular phone rings. Jazz. I almost let it go to voicemail, but his ringtone—”Midnight in New Orleans,” his latest composition—pulls at something in my chest. Through the kitchen window, I can see him sleeping on the porch swing, having refused to leave me alone after our escape here.

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