I took a few steps toward the hospital, and the net of energy that surrounded it clung to me like a spider’s web. I could feel Jilo nearby, but the closer I got to the building, the farther away she felt. I found myself zigzagging back and forth in the parking lot. After a few minutes of wandering around, a glimmer caught my eye—a wave of aquamarine reflecting off the hospital’s exterior wall. I rushed over to it, hoping to find its source before it faded.
The glow intensified as I came closer, and I sensed that it was intended as a beacon to guide me to Jilo. I looked down and realized that the light was emanating from the entrance to a set of steps that led beneath the parking lot. The heavy sheet of metal that usually sealed the opening had been moved aside. I realized that Jilo must be hiding out in one of the yellow fever tunnels that had been dug under Savannah to hide the extent of the epidemic from the populace. As a child I had spent days exploring the hospital’s grounds and the cool tunnel that went under Drayton Street and into Forsyth Park. Somehow I had never noticed this entrance before. I took one last hungry look at the light of day and descended into Jilo’s magical gloaming.
The tunnel was impossibly long and lit in a way that made it seem less like a tunnel and more like a bridge through an eternal darkness. But that darkness was not empty; it was woven from the animated shadows that I’d first witnessed in Jilo’s haint blue chamber. I could sense an endless number of them. They appeared to be seamlessly united, but each had a hunger all its own. Instinct told me that their realm fell outside the boundary of protection created by spell that had been engraved on the Candler Oak. It was somehow both deeper and farther away. The darkness watched me with its black and countless eyes as I carried on, putting one foot before the other, wondering if Jilo’s magic was the only thing protecting me from a quick death.
There was no sense of having crossed a boundary or stepped through a doorway, but I suddenly found myself in Jilo’s haint blue room. With one step, I was in the tunnel, with the next, I was standing before her. My rational, non-magical mind protested that this room couldn’t be anywhere near Forsyth Park. After all, Cook’s grandfather had driven me up dirt roads to get to this room when Jilo had influenced him to abduct me. My witch knowledge explained that the room was not only a room; it was a hub that could open up onto any number of places.
“Took you long enough,” Jilo’s voice carried from the center of the room—a space that was at once as large as a football field and as small as our walk-in linen closet. “I guess you too busy for Jilo. How is yo’ love life anyway?” She chuckled. She sat there on her aquamarine throne, dressed in a color I might have called crimson if it had been a tad less vibrant. “Come closer, little girl,” she commanded. I stepped forward, but not because I had been compelled. Despite her show of power, I could sense that that the force within me was greater. I would never have this advantage again, so until sunrise tomorrow, Mother Jilo would have to answer to me for a change. “Pretty necklace you wearing, girl. Any chance you could get Jilo one like it?” She laughed.
“I don’t think so,” I responded.
She reached out and took the amulet into her hand to examine it, but a surge of electricity shot through her, leaving her gasping. “Damn, girl, Jilo wasn’t gonna try and take it; she just wanted to see. Jilo ain’t no fool. She ain’t never stole no witch’s power, and she sure ain’t going to start by stealing from a Taylor. The penalty for stealing power is lot steeper than Jilo willing to pay for a half-day token.” I stayed silent because I didn’t want her to realize I was not completely in control of the power. After a moment, Jilo composed herself and leaned back on her throne. “So, they done made you queen for a day. Whose idea was that?”
“It’s a long story,” I said. “But the power is Oliver’s.”
Jilo smiled knowingly. “So he still with us then?”
“You did know about Grace,” I said. “Why didn’t you warn me?”
“Warn you? Warn you against my own blood? Jilo tried to protect you. She gave you what you needed to protect yourself. But Jilo ain’t doin’ a damn thing for the rest of yo’ family. That uncle of yours, my Grace’s blood is on his hands. Anything she done to him, he deserve. I wish to God she had killed that prissy little bastard,” she said and spat on the ground without a lick of self-consciousness. “And Grace just the beginning of what yo’ family done to Jilo’s. Our families got history, my girl. Real history. Jilo shouldn’t even waste her time on you. But you different from the rest of ’em, that why Jilo willing to help you. Fact is Jilo like you, more than she ever thought she could care for a Taylor. But don’t you never think Jilo loyalty don’t lie with her own blood.”