Paradise Cursed – Chapter 26
The delicious smells in the dining room had drawn Dayna to the buffet before she realized she was hungry. She piled at least a pound of fried fish and “swimps” on her plate, plus a mound of fries. She could blame her gluttony on hard work and fresh sea air.
Looking at the “swimp” as she dipped it in red sauce, she thought of Ayanna. Erin had explained a little of what was happening, but it was too weird to believe. A curse? Could that be a real thing, not just a plot device for some low-rent horror flick?
Erin’s sadness was real enough. It’d been bad after she ditched the jerk, but at least she had also felt rage. Now her face had frozen in frown lines, like their mom had always warned them might happen. And who could blame her?
Even though Erin wasn’t responsible for Ayanna’s condition, she’d been wheedled into helping by Captain Moody, and Erin’s help had only made it worse. At least that was her spin on it. Dayna hoped to get a word with old Moody Blue Eyes and learn his side of it.
Regardless, whatever had happened in this room during their voodoo-seance-witch-spell thing must have gone awfully wrong. What Dayna had seen in Ayanna’s cabin was a horror from Hell.
And how much of that was Dayna’s fault? Her mind had been worrying that question around ruthlessly, like when she was six and couldn’t keep her tongue off a loose tooth. If she hadn’t pressured Erin into taking this cruise, they could be lying on the beach under a big yellow canopy while a couple of cute cabana boys massaged their skin and muscles with coconut oil.
From the beginning, Erin had balked about coming aboard, and maybe that was some spooky guardian angel telling her to steer clear. But Dayna pushed and pulled and harped until her sister couldn’t find another reason not to go.
So yes, it was Dayna’s fault.
Oh, boo-hoo, poor you. She grinned, knowing that’s exactly what Erin would say. Stop wallowing in your screw-up. Get busy and fix it.
Okay. She didn’t know how, but she’d think of some way to help Ayanna and Erin. For now she was almost too stuffed to walk, but she hadn’t forgotten the captain’s number one rule—keep the passengers happy. Rising to find Jase and tackle her next dreaded “make nice” assignment, she saw that Erin had come in and was sitting with Ola and Lorraine, a lady as skinny and white as Ola was chubby and black.
“Let me tell you, chile,” Ola was saying, apparently talking about Erin, “this girl is the real deal. She sat right here last night reading my cards, and ever single word she spoke was pure truth. If she can read that good on stuff that’s already happened, then I know she’s on the mark with what’s happening later this year. And it’s goooood. You should let her read the cards for you, girly.”
At Lorraine’s insistent begging, Erin retrieved the cards from her big yellow bag while Ola stacked their dinner plates.
“I’ll take those,” Dayna said. She wasn’t on galley duty tonight, but she carried the dishes to the bus cart by the galley door.
From inside Cookie’s private space, where he turned out such delicious grub, she heard a guitar being tuned. She crept to the door and peeked in.
Cookie saw her and smiled. “Show time, pretty lady. What are you singing tonight?”
“Me? I don’t sing.” Not entirely true, but not in front of strangers.
“Well, then, you’d best know how to dance.”
Behind her, someone rang the bell Cookie had used to announce the dinner buffet. She turned to find Jase Graham standing in the middle of the room, where several tables had been pushed back to clear a space.
“Tonight our usual ten-minute rain shower is likely to last a while longer. Those clouds you probably noticed in the northeast have moved in, which means we won’t be comfortable lying on our lounge chairs, gazing at the stars to digest this fine meal Cookie made for us.”
Someone applauded. Others joined in, including Dayna. Pretty sure they were not applauding the rain, she peeked in at Cookie and put her hands together good and loud.
“So we’re going to create our own entertainment,” Jase said. “Everybody here has a story to tell, a personal truth, a whopping fish tale, a joke, or maybe you have a song, which our galley king will be happy to accompany on his good ol’ Gibson.”
On cue, Cookie came out picking a tune Dayna remembered hearing but couldn’t name, probably because it came from the dark ages. This time Jase started the applause.
“Here’s one I’ll bet most of you know,” he said. “The sailor coming around the room right now is handing out lyrics to ‘Greensleeves,’ and also to a few other songs. While we’re singing, think of that joke or story you want to share with us. You know you want to.”
As an emcee, Jase wasn’t all that bad, Dayna admitted. She still didn’t trust him, maybe because he seemed to be stealing Ayanna’s job as first mate. Considering what was keeping Ayanna locked in her cabin, though, Dayna decided she should cut Jase some slack. He did appear to know about running a cruise ship, including how to please the passengers.
Even Erin wasn’t frowning so hard now that she’d been reprieved from reading Lorraine’s future.
Instead of heading back to their table, Dayna detoured to the open doorway to look outside. Light rain, wind at twenty, waves running long and fairly smooth. Nothing dramatic. Relief not to be battling a storm tonight turned quickly to self reproach. A good storm could teach her a lot about sailing.
*
The door to Ayanna’s cabin radiated heat. Standing at the threshold, I stared at the doorknob for a full minute before finally reaching for it.
Heat? I pulled my hand back and stared again.
Nonsense. You simply don’t want to go back in that room.
I leaned against the bulkhead beside the door and filled my pipe. Judging by what I could see through the open companionway, the rain was still light enough not to be a problem. With luck, the night would pass without further incident from the Bokor and with no further agitation from those rainclouds.
A figure hurried down the companionway holding a sheaf of papers overhead to catch droplets, and I recognized it as Marisha. I should not feel so grateful to return bedside duty to her, but I would rather face my old enemy, the rain, than go back into that room for any length of time.
“How is she?” Marisha asked.
“Some physical changes, but she’s resting.”
I grabbed the doorknob—not even warm—turned it so we could peek in.
Ayanna’s eyes were closed. Her leathery lips were parted, showing the awful teeth. She stirred, moaned.
Quietly, I asked, “When her body first began going through this transformation, did she at any time seem angry or aggressive in her behavior?”
“Aggressive?”
“As if to snap your head off.”
“Oh.” She seemed startled by the idea. “No, nothing like that. Pain, yes, but not anger.”
Was it my presence that caused the Bokor to manifest with such malice? If Marisha had encountered anything as malevolent as what I saw in Ayanna’s eyes, and continued sitting alone in that room, she was a better man than I.
“Did Demarae tell you what Shaman Shawnte said about the sedative?”
Marisha nodded. “I won’t give her another dose, unless…” Catching her bottom lip between her teeth, she shook her head. “It is very difficult to watch a person suffer such torment and not help.”
“You’re the physician,” I said. “She’s your patient, not Shawnte’s, at least not yet. It must be your decision, and I’ll respect it.”
Again, she nodded, then she went inside.
An odd notion crept into my brain. Was it possible the Bokor had cursed Ayanna simply to maneuver her into traveling on the Sarah Jane?
She professed to having no idea who would pay to have her cursed. If the Sarah Jane’s rumored magic attracted the Bokor’s interest, he may have chosen Ayanna merely because of her qualifications as a seaman, and he might reasonably assume I’d be the person to deal with most aggressively.
Or I was merely the person in the room when he showed himself. In any case, Ayanna appeared to be resting now as well as we could expect. I asked Marisha to note any further aggressions in her patient.
Then I mounted the stairs to the main deck.
As I feared, our light shower was rapidly thickening.
Join me here next week for another chapter of Paradise Cursed, or BUY THE BOOK now, because you’ll want to read what happens next.
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