The next day.
Driving back into New Orleans, Rai was surprised to see jack-o'-lanterns everywhere. Many storefronts had scarecrows, skulls, spiderwebs, and black cats hung out front.
On the streets, some people already couldn't wait: zombies, vampires, witches, and Frankenstein full costumes. Rai suddenly got it. "So today is Halloween!"
"Strictly speaking, it's Halloween Eve," Zoe corrected.
Compared to the actual day, the Eve is the liveliest time. Adults paint on eerie makeup, wear oddly shaped outfits, and do parades, gatherings, and certain distinctive parties in neighbourhoods and on the streets.
Kids dress up as all sorts of cute spooks, go door to door and knock, demanding candy; otherwise, they'll trick.
It's a nationwide carnival, very popular around here.
Seeing the three girls beside him totally unruffled, Rai was a bit surprised. "So why aren't you even a little excited?"
Seeing the three girls with zero excitement, Rai was a bit surprised. It was normal enough for him, a foreigner, not to be into a Western holiday like Halloween, but how were these three, born and raised here, also unable to muster any enthusiasm?
"Tired," Queenie said weakly, her big body slumped across the seat.
"Boring." Madison, scrolling her phone and surfing online, didn't even look up.
Zoe spelt it out, "I used to like dressing up as an evil witch and going out to scare people. Now that I'm an actual witch, dressing up just isn't fun anymore."
Put plainly, after seeing real witches, real evil spirits, a real mutated gator man, and so on, turning back to these clumsy costumes just couldn't stir any interest. A knockoff can't compare to the real thing.
Madison suddenly said, "But the all-ghouls party tonight is pretty good. Rai, want to go? You be a werewolf, I'll be a vampire, keep the millennial blood war going?"
Werewolves versus vampires? A millennial blood war? Madison, you've been getting bolder lately, you know that?
Rai glanced at Zoe's impassive face, coughed twice, pressed down his restless thoughts, and said righteously, "No. We've been wiped these last two days, let's go back and actually rest."
Zoe's face eased, then she turned and "kindly" advised Madison: "Think about that party, Madison."
The smile that had just lifted the corner of Madison's mouth froze. For a dignified witch and Hollywood star to be drugged by some punk was a stain she'd never live down.
"Party? What about it? What happened?" As if sniffing a story, Queenie perked up, eager. Anything embarrassing that happened to Madison, she loved collecting.
"Nothing!" Madison cut her off quickly.
Zoe chuckled, watching.
Just like that, with the banter going on, Rai drove back to the academy and happened to see Spalding in the yard, happily putting up a scarecrow. The moment he noticed their return, he instantly reverted to his usual stiffness.
"An evil-witch effigy out front would be even more on-theme, Spalding."
Rai offered the suggestion and, whether or not the man responded, led the witches inside.
The instant they pushed the door open, Queenie yelled toward Delphine, who was cleaning the hall: "Delphine! Go get me some pudding yoghurt, I'm starving!"
Delphine's face collapsed at once. "God above! It's only been a few days, can't you let me rest a little longer!"
"And slice some fruit for us while you're at it," Rai added, not having eaten much that morning.
Delphine shot Rai a resentful glare. She hadn't forgotten how, when Bastien attacked a few days ago, he'd forced her to be a meat shield. But glaring was one thing; what needed doing still had to be done. Unlike Queenie, sharp-tongued but not actually doing much, Delphine knew very well how ruthless the smiling Rai could be once he acted.
"Welcome back. How was the camping?"
At the dining table, Nan, still hugging her romance guidebook, ran over and asked with a grin.
Zoe thought a moment, then answered, "Uh… pretty good, actually. Kinda thrilling."
Nan looked at her, stared for several seconds, then nodded earnestly. "It really was pretty thrilling for you."
Clearly, she'd just read what Zoe was thinking and knew the inside story.
"Mind-reading is an annoying power, but it's pretty nice here, at least we don't have to waste words," Madison said around a strawberry she popped into her mouth. "Nan, how are things with the boy next door these days?"
"Pretty good," Nan replied cheerfully. Then she looked at Madison and continued:
"I'm not lying. He says being with me feels comfortable. In his heart, he really likes me."
"…"
"Kissing? Not yet. His mother is too strict. We barely get any alone time."
"…"
"Do I need your help? No! You'll only make it worse!"
Not giving Madison a chance to speak, Nan quickly answered all the questions in her mind.
Madison rolled her eyes. "I take back what I said, mind-reading is annoying everywhere. You just made me look like an idiot."
"What a bunch of strange girls. In my day, you'd all be on the stake," Delphine muttered as she walked up with a tray and took in the scene.
Madison didn't indulge her. "You know, a two-hundred-plus-year-old like you, still alive in our time, would absolutely end up on an operating table. The old geezers in the White House and on Wall Street would be very interested."
Delphine shut up at once.
Sure enough, only the wicked can deal with the wicked.
Rai smiled. Hearing kids playing outside and remembering something, he asked, "Delphine, did you get tonight's candy ready?"
"Candy? Why would I prepare candy?" Delphine looked baffled.
"It's Halloween Eve," Rai said, just as puzzled.
Even as a foreigner, he knew that on this night, kids knocked on doors for candy or they'd play tricks. Locals should know this.
Delphine frowned. "Shouldn't I be lighting bonfires, serving food to the demons, and keeping them away from us? You must know: on this night, evil spirits walk the world. If we can't guard ourselves, the dead will rise and disaster will follow."
Rai blinked and looked to the others. "What does she mean?"
Madison and Queenie traded looks. They didn't get it either.
Zoe, who actually paid attention in class, answered: "That's how people did Halloween a long time ago. But it's different now. Bonfires got replaced by jack-o'-lanterns, offerings got replaced by candy…"
Zoe carefully explained the modern way of doing Halloween to Delphine.
Listening, Rai's eyes suddenly flashed; some hazy memory surged up. It felt like… something was supposed to happen on Halloween.
He couldn't quite recall. Too much time had passed, and the shows never marked specific dates; one episode could jump a long while. Add in the fact that this world was far more than just witches, plus his own intrusion altering things, and developments had long since changed beyond recognition.
Normally, Rai didn't bother with old memories. But Halloween seemed special.
After thinking it through, he opened his mouth to ask.
"Where's Fiona?" Rai asked.
Still reeling from how modern Halloween customs had changed, Delphine answered on reflex, "She went out with Cordelia, said they were going on a mother-daughter bonding trip."
So it wasn't Fiona. Then who?
Rai thought of New Orleans' other heavy hitter, someone who couldn't stand the Salem witches' Voodoo Queen Mary.
Delphine, whom Mary had buried alive for more than 180 years, was here; Mary's former lover Bastien, had also fallen here. If Mary didn't retaliate, it wouldn't fit her temperament.
With that thought, Rai's expression shifted. He remembered.
—
Meanwhile, in a salon in New Orleans.
Wearing long dreadlocks and a pair of oversized gold hoops, Voodoo Queen Mary, burning with fury, was ordering her people to prepare the various reagents for a ritual.
Beside her, her blood sister Chantal was still trying to talk her down. "It's dangerous enough out there already. Mary, we finally have peace. You shouldn't break it like this. Maybe we can talk it out."
"We're breaking the peace? No!" Mary snapped. "It's them those witches started it!"
"The Delphine I buried with my own hands, they dug her up! That bitch Fiona even marched into my place to strut! And Bastien, my poor Bastien! When they cut off his head and mailed it to me, where was all this talk of 'peace' then?"
"But…" Chantal tried again.
Mary cut her off, impatient. "Enough! I know you mean well, Chantal. But it's over, peace is broken. If we don't strike back, we might as well lie down and die."
"This moment matters. I don't have time to argue. Either you're with me, or you're against me."
"If it's the latter, don't stand in my way."
Under the Voodoo Queen's pressure, Chantal finally lowered her head. "I… will follow you."
"Good."
Mary nodded, satisfied.
"Go get ready. I've waited long enough. Halloween Eve is finally here."
Though her heart boiled with hatred, Mary hadn't let Fiona's parcel, the bull-headed trophy, cloud her judgment. She'd waited for tonight.
"With all those costumed fools as cover, I'll give those tender little witches a proper lesson."
Her eyes gleamed, bloodthirsty.
It was time to splash witch blood across her long-thirsty chamber again.
—
Night fell.
Witches, zombies, ghosts, werewolves, vampires, masked slashers, plus every kind of film and anime cosplay spilt out into New Orleans' streets and alleys, and the Night Parade of a Hundred Ghosts officially began.
Amid laughter and exaggerated screams, none of them knew that real fiends had already joined the crowd.
"Begin."
In the sealed chamber, as the drumbeats of her cultists thudded out an eerie, intricate rhythm, Mary stepped into the elaborate veve drawn on the floor. She opened a prepared gris-gris box, lifted out a thick white python, and wound it around her neck.
As the python hissed, she drew out a viper, sliced it with a ritual blade, and let the rank blood spill.
Whoom.
Flame sprang out of nothing.
A string of harsh, ancient syllables heavy with a strange, supernatural force poured from Mary's mouth, spanning miles to a graveyard not far from the witches' academy.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Rot-blackened hands punched up from the earth.
One by one, corpses long dead clawed free of their graves at Mary's call, rose blazing with their owners' old grudges, and shambled toward the witches' school.