remaining within her walls was far less valid. Or far less sane, at any rate.
It was the whispers she heard in the night’s calls that inspired her to remain. There was an intelligence behind the death, and it was calling to her. She could not understand why, or for what purpose it bade her stay, but she felt compelled.
Spirits whispered often to Maxine, and she always listened. They had successfully guided her through her life up until this point, and she would never refuse their council. She had some part to play in what had befallen her city. She believed in fate without question. Perhaps not that all choices were immutable, but that some were inevitable, like death.
Death came for all, no matter the choices that were made. No matter the circuitous path a mortal might take to escape, all roads must someday cease. And whoever knocked upon her door felt like such things. The end of one journey, and the beginning of another.
Her life, as she knew it, was now over.
Squeak. Clack, clack, clack.
The soul that stood on the other side of her door was still patient and wonderfully polite. That was the first indication that it was not a ravager from the gates of Hell come to rend her asunder. More importantly, it was barely before noon and the sun was out, and therefore that meant those who waited for her—and they were plural, she now realized as she felt three distinct emotions on the other side of her door—were not a pack of the demons that now stalked the night.
But that did not mean they did not her bring danger all the same.
Rubbing her hand over the back of her neck, she shut her eyes and let herself reach out through her mind’s eye instead to focus on those standing on her stoop. Two men and a woman. The older of the two men caught her attention first. He was stern, resolute, dignified, and felt every inch a soldier. The younger man was easily distracted, his emotions flitting from one to another with little hesitation. He was bored and nervous in the same breath. The woman was eager, excited, and anticipated greatly the answering of the door.
Standing from the stairs, she brushed her hands down the folds of her dress and reached for the black silk gloves she always kept tucked into her bodice, even while inside her own home. She slipped them on before heading to the front door to answer it. The gloves were necessary. Immensely so.
Unfortunate as they may be, they were for the benefit of everyone.
Taking a breath, she let it out, steeling herself for what might come. She sensed a magnitude about this moment. This was why the spirits had called her to stay.
My life is about to change.
She was not a psychic in the truest form of the word. She could not see the future. She could only see the present and past—often in rather excruciating detail—and it was easy enough to see the strings of where she stood and predict the next thread that was to fall in the loom.
And a black stitch fell into place in front of her.
Fate was fate. It could not be avoided.
Maxine opened the door.
Upon seeing her, the older man who had been the source of the knocking pulled his hat off, and a young, beautiful blonde woman elbowed the other man beside him. The young man jumped and nearly ripped a wide-brimmed leather hat, a style rarely seen on the east side of the Mississippi, off his head. The over-eager action knocked a hand-rolled cigarette from behind his ear. He scrambled after it, and the woman rolled her eyes.
If death has come to me, it comes in a strange guise.
“Excuse me.” The older man interrupted her thoughts. “Are you Miss Maxine Parker?”
“I am.”
Her opinion of him carrying the air of a soldier was matched by his appearance. He had short, dark hair graying at the temples. Kept in a style that was all function and no form, he was every ounce the utilitarian creature she expected. His eyes were creased at the edges, and she knew it was from worry and not from laughter. He had seen grief. He had seen loss. He knew death, and he knew it well. The children behind him—they looked not much younger than Maxine herself, but they felt more youthful all the same—were marked with their own tragedies, but not nearly to his extent.