The city's old bones never slept, and neither did Étienne Boudreaux. Not when the air was thick with omens, not when the river whispered warnings in the language of the drowned. He stood on his shotgun porch, trumpet in hand, as the last notes of the night faded and the day's heat pressed in with its own kind of threat.
Sleep was for dreamers and the dead, and tonight both seemed restless.
He watched the slow crawl of the Mississippi, its muddy waves catching what little light the dawn offered. Even the river was uneasy, shifting in its bed as if afraid to settle. Étienne had felt this kind of tension before—during hurricanes, during funerals, in the liminal hours after a second line when the air still shimmered with brass and the passage of spirits. But this was something older, deeper. The city's magic was bracing itself.
He pressed the trumpet's cool mouthpiece to his lips, testing the air. The city's wards, woven by generations of music and memory, vibrated beneath his feet. He played a low, searching note—a call, an offering. The wards answered, trembling with gratitude and warning.
B'dash's presence was a wound in the melody, a sour note that wouldn't resolve. The demon's magic gnawed at the city's roots, seeking the relic buried beneath stone and sorrow. Étienne could feel him moving—always just out of sight, his glamour flickering, his rage bleeding through the cracks.
The Queen was another problem. Her power was less corrosive, but no less dangerous. She wore her authority like a blade, and the city flinched from her shadow. Yet there was something almost familiar in the way she moved—someone used to being an outsider, someone who understood what it meant to rule over the unruly.
He'd seen her at the riverbank, kneeling with her eyes closed, listening for a song she couldn't quite hear. He'd watched her in the Quarter, navigating the city's magic with a kind of wary respect. She wasn't here to conquer, not yet. But if B'dash forced her hand, all bets were off.
Étienne lowered his trumpet and stepped off the porch, bare feet sinking into the dew-soaked grass. He walked the block, nodding to the spirits perched on stoops and rooftops. Some tipped imaginary hats; others watched warily, their faces blurred by memory. In New Orleans, the dead were everywhere—sometimes more present than the living.
He ducked into a narrow alley, the brick walls sweating with old rain and older secrets. Here, the city's wards were thin, stretched tight by B'dash's magic. Étienne could feel the pressure building, like the hush before a storm.
He knelt and pressed his palm to the ground, humming a low note that vibrated through the stone. The city answered with a shiver—a warning, a plea for help.
He stood and followed the trail, winding through abandoned lots and broken streets. He passed a voodoo shop, its windows painted with salt and bone. The owner nodded, lips moving in silent prayer. Everyone felt it—the balance tipping, the old protections being tested.
Near the river, Étienne found the first true sign of intrusion: a circle of scorched earth, the grass burned away in a pattern that reeked of Limbo. B'dash had been here, tearing at the wards, probing for weakness.
Étienne lifted his trumpet and played a warning—sharp and bright, a call to the city's defenders. Spirits flickered into view, drawn by the music. Some were old friends: a jazzman from Storyville, a girl in a tattered dress, a dog that had drowned during Katrina. They gathered around him, faces grave.
"He's close," Étienne said. "He's looking for the relic."
The spirits murmured, their voices overlapping in a chorus of fear and resolve.
"He'll find it if we don't stop him," the jazzman said, his trumpet a ghostly twin to Étienne's own.
Étienne nodded. "We hold the line. Music and memory. No violence unless we have no choice."
The spirits melted into the fog, taking up their posts. Étienne lingered, feeling the city's pulse race. He sensed Magik nearby, her presence a cold flare in the heat.
She stepped from the shadows, her eyes wary. "You're guarding the relic," she said.
"And you're hunting the demon," Étienne replied, not lowering his trumpet.
They stood in silence, the city breathing around them.
"I don't want to fight you," Magik said.
"Good. Because the city would take your side, but not without a price," Étienne answered, a smile flickering and fading.
He studied her—warrior, queen, exile. She carried her pain like a shield.
"B'dash will come here," she said. "He's desperate."
Étienne nodded. "Desperation makes monsters of us all."
They stood together as the sun crested the levee, the river flashing gold and red. The ghosts swirled around them, drawn by the promise of music and battle.
A chill swept through the air. Étienne felt the wards buckle—a shock of cold, a scream too high to hear. B'dash was making his move.
Étienne raised his trumpet, Magik her hand. The city's magic surged, old and fierce.
The first true battle was about to begin.
But even as the wards trembled, Étienne felt hope—a fragile, stubborn thing, born of music and memory and the living hearts of the city.
He would play his part. Whatever came next, New Orleans would not fall quietly.