The Wicked Within

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THE CRUNCH OF OUR SHOES on asphalt, leaves, and debris was loud in the quiet of Coliseum Street. Violet, Henri, and I had little less than two hours before nightfall, two hours before the February chill would invade the sun-warmed bricks and pavements, when blurry halos would appear around the few working streetlamps, when the predators, both natural and supernatural, would wake and begin to hunt.

We had to hurry.

A barely-there breeze moved through the Garden District. I saw it more than felt it; the jagged strips of Spanish moss waved gently from the limbs of old oaks. All the way down the street, the low-reaching limbs and pale moss created a tunnel of swaying, ghostly dancers.

The GD was a semi–ghost town, a ruinous, forgotten neighborhood populated by squatters, misfits, and other things that preferred to stay hidden. By day it was a beautiful, overgrown jungle, a strange mix of grandeur and decay—southern opulence turned rotting splendor. But at night the GD was downright still, as though the entire neighborhood was holding its breath, hoping like hell it’d make it to see another sunrise.

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