WE STILL HERE

The fog had cleared, making way for the afternoon. First Chief Albert Desravines was running out of options. Sooner than later, he’d have to trek outside the city to ask the Peoples if they knew what had become of First Queen, the Spy Boy, the Flag Boy, and the others. First Chief had searched the whole of the Seventh Ward, and nobody seemed to know nothing about his tribe. Now he stood at the intersection of Canal and Dorgenois and squinted into the sun as he smoothed the feathers that grew out of his arms. His feathers and scales caught the light, turned it, iridescing through a riot of colors.

The need for food rumbled in the pit of his belly. He did not realize it, but as he stood considering, a quiet tune pumped itself out of the stout, hollow quills that jutted from his back. The tune was not loud, but its notes tumbled softly over one another, somersaulting into the afternoon air. When he noticed the music, he grunted—and even that guttural sound was oddly tuneful. Thass right, he thought. Why, I’m the prettiest, me.

The smell of cooking had drawn him here, but the door to this little place was too small. First Chief glared at it, and the door swung open. He stooped, bending, squatting his long body at the knees and at the haunches, and stepped inside.

The dining room was full. Nearly a hundred heads swiveled on their stalks as First Chief appeared to them, and mouths fell open. First Chief accepted their silent tribute. This was the only correct response to his overwhelming majesty. After allowing the spectators a merciful moment to drink in his splendor, First Chief spoke.

Hey wanna wanna. Hey wanna way.

Heyyyy! Hey, wanna wanna, whatchoo got fo Chief today?

First Chief, me. Bold and feather-proud

Tell Marraine to git it git it

Tell Marraine to git it git it, git it good

Sixty-two inches cross my chest

Sixty-two inches, me

Sixty-two inches cross my chest

And I don’t bow but to God or Death!

Lord! Tell Marraine to git it good!

As he recited his demands, First Chief shook his giant crest and the feathers of his arms. They flashed red, blue, yellow, white, black, then green, and the noise of his heart rose through the pipes on First Chief’s back, percussing to let his subjects know the seriousness of this matter. First Chief paused, giving the lesser beings a chance to process his command.

One of the subjects, a young man dressed in a purple T-shirt and a grimy apron shook off his expression of blasted wonder and turned to the stout woman next to him. “What…? What is that?”

The woman shook herself out of her own trance. “You must be from Away,” she said. “This the Chief of All Chiefs. He say get him some food.”

Wanna wanna hey, thass right thass right

I’m the prettiest, me. Prettiest of all

Tell Marraine to git it, git it

Tell Marraine gonna set that jail on fire!

The woman had warmed to her role as translator for the Lessers. “Move! Y’all over there, I’m sorry, but you gots to clear that table. Chief of Chiefs need somewhere to sit!”

“But what he want?” asked the youth who’d spoken before.

“Get him some of everythin. As much as you can fit on a plate. Just put it together and start bringin it out.”

Pretty little baby

Pretty little girl

Pretty little thing done right by Chief

Got me riches got diamonds and pearls

Remind me of First Queen, thass no lie.

Don’t bow to nobody but God and Death!

The diners at the table the woman had chosen cleared out now, and many other patrons had risen from their seats. First Chief commanded the attention of all, but now the kitchen staff had swung into action, scooping food from buffet trays and piling it on plates. As First Chief watched, the woman set three large plates on a tray and carried them to the table. She set them down, unsure what to do. First Chief regarded her sternly, waiting for her to recover her manners.

The woman bowed, then went down on one knee. “Chief of Chiefs!” she chanted. “You honor us with your presence. A thousand million thanks!”

Pretty little girl rise up rise up

Pretty little girl gonna rise on up

Whatchoo got for me today?

Whatchoo got for me?

Didja tell Marraine to git it good?

The woman stood and pulled out a chair. “Yes, Chief,” she said. “This restaurant is one of the best in the city. Is there anything I can do to make you comfortable?”

Chief of Chiefs considered, then took the seat he’d been offered. From his position, he could see the restaurant’s broad windows, but while moments ago they had offered a view of the sunny sidewalk and the street beyond, now faces and bodies blocked them, pressed against the glass, staring. There must have been a hundred people looking on, and Chief of Chiefs thought nothing of this. Of course the Lesser Beings sought to drink in his beauty; how could they do otherwise? Chief of Chiefs was prettiest of all.

He lifted a heaping plate of dirty rice and poured it into his mouth, taking it in a single swallow. The drum and cymbal sounds of his heart rattled to express his approval.

“Chief of Chiefs,” said the woman, “please forgive me. It is not for me to ask, but why have you come here today? Where are your Spy Boy and your Flag?”

Baby, dontcha know, don’t know myself

Baby dontcha know, can’t figure it out

Chief of Chiefs him all alone

Lookin’ for the tribe he call his own

Sixty-two inches cross his chest

And he don’t bow

Don’t know how

Where they at, now, where him peoples at?

“Well, I’m from the Seventh Ward, born and raised,” said the woman, “so maybe I can tell you what you need to know. What tribe you with, Chief?”

First Chief plucked a stuffed green pepper from a plate of them and popped it whole into his mouth. He let it slide down into his belly, and his heart rattled its approval. When First Chief considered the question, the natural answer seemed that he was with all tribes (seeing as how he was the greatest and the prettiest and he had a sixty-two-inch chest), but the question also made him think of piano music, its notes tumbling over and over, and the thought made First Chief uncomfortable.

But why should that be? No jail could hold him, and he bowed to none. He wouldn’t know how to bow down even if he wanted to. His knees could bend, but not that way. His knees bent only for dancing. Wasn’t he a man?

… But… but was he? Men and women crowded the dining room. Many of them had risen from their own meals to ring the room, staring wide-eyed at First Chief as he ate his meal and spoke to this Pretty Little Thing. The men looked so small—the Black ones, the white ones, the Spanish ones and Asians. None of them stood over six and a half feet. First Chief wasn’t sure of their measurements, but surely none of their chests approached even fifty inches across. Some of the oldest ones had liver spots standing out on their flesh, or leathery, lived-in skin that seemed ready to tell countless stories. If these were men, First Chief wondered, then what exactly was First Chief?

He stood tall—eight feet if he was an inch, with two great pipes standing out of his shoulders, each one flanked by two lesser pipes. If he chose, he could direct the sound of his heartbeat—the sound of the drum and the sound of the cymbal—through them to make the most beautiful of rackets. His face was black as black—no Black man in the restaurant approached even a tenth of the darkness of First Chief’s face—and his teeth were bright red. All these people—when they opened their mouths to stare or yawn, they were pink and soft inside, but First Chief knew that the inside of his own mouth was bright yellow and his tongue was not fleshy pink, but the brightest white. Feathers stood forested on his upper arms, on his shoulders, and of course, on his giant crest, changing color and position to suit his mood. As he considered them, they rose and fell thoughtfully, following the motion of his breathing. While he wore no shoes, First Chief’s bright red three-toed claws were much stronger, much tougher, than leather.

He knew his name—First Chief Albert Desravines, Chief of Chiefs, Prettiest, Strongest, Most Formidable in Battle—and he knew what those epithets meant, but try as he might, he could not reconcile them with his surroundings, or the simple physiological differences he observed between himself and others. How had this happened? Had the world changed as he slept? And when had he slept? When had he last eaten?

Fear stole into his mind, and First Chief spoke in a whisper before he could banish his fear with rage or bluster. “I don’t… I don’t understand any of this,” he said, so softly he wasn’t sure even the Pretty Thing could hear him. “Something… something terrible has happened.”

“It did,” said the woman. “But don’t worry. The Storm was bad, but we still here.”

Perry steeled himself—or tried to. It wasn’t long before the bouncing keyboard intro segued into the song itself, and by that time, Doctor Professor’s piano had fully manifested. The man himself faded in after, singing loud as his head rolled on his shoulders. For the first time, Perry felt no compulsion to dance, and the absence of that need made him a little sad.

Kick off ya grave clothes, get in line

Baby, dance down the street

Cain’t no dirty floor hold ya down

Catch them chords and dig that beat.

Perry didn’t know this one, but he liked it. He wanted to hear the whole thing, learn it, hum it as he went about his daily business. But he’s a liar, Perry thought. Damnear got us killed. He thought of Brendy’s assertion that there must be some misunderstanding, that Doctor Professor hadn’t meant to steer them wrong. But could grown folk—even magic ones—be trusted?

Perry loved his parents, and he loved Daddy Deke. He respected his teachers and knew they meant him no harm… but did that make them trustworthy? If grown-ups were just old kids pretending, could they be trusted even when they meant well? Perry had no idea, and he did not like this line of thinking.

He cast a glance in Peaches’s direction, and the sight of her determined frown made him stand a little straighter. The grown-up who’d challenged them had been dancing since the song’s first chord, sliding back and forth on his feet, twirling now and again. Even the old robot seemed to dance, creaking unsteadily on his red and crumbling knees. Brendy bopped a couple steps, then looked up at Peaches and Perry and settled down, just nodding her head.

Feelin’ fonky and I can’t sit still

I done rolled down the mountain

I done climbed that hill

With your rocket in yo pocket

And the gold on your teeth

That rocket in ya pocket

And the gold on ya teeth!

“Well, hey there, baby,” Doctor Professor said with a grin as the song went on. “Nice to finally meetcha. I hear you got some thangs belong to me.”

“Maybe we do,” Peaches said, “but then again, maybe we don’t. We got lots to talk about.”

Now the music faded a bit, and Perry felt another pang of loss. Doctor Professor withdrew his fingers from the keys. They hovered in the air above the black and whites, and while his grin didn’t die, it did lose a bit of its luster.

“Yeahyouright,” he said. “We got some thangs need going over. Listen here: I’ma take back them songs y’all hunted up for me and be on my way. Y’all sure have done me proud, but I think I handle the rest my own self just the same.”

“Now, wait a minute—” Peaches began.

Perry cut her off. “After everything we went through, you wanna cut us loose? I faced down Stagger Lee himself to capture Jailbird Stomp, and that’s gotta be worth more than a thank-you-and-goodbye.”

Doctor Professor’s fingers stiffened above the keyboard, and a stricken expression appeared upon his face. “You faced down Stag?”

“You durn right he did,” Brendy said. “My big brother a hero among men!”

“Why you didn’t tell us Stagger Lee was loose and looking for the same songs we was?” Peaches demanded.

“There’s levels to this thing I didn’t know nothing bout last time we spoke. The city under attack by sumn worse than ole Stag, and I cain’t have y’all involved.”

“You’re scared,” Perry said. “You’re more scared than we are.”

“Listen here,” Doctor Professor said, a cracked and weakened sort of authority creeping into his voice.

“Don’t give us that,” Peaches said. “Don’t talk to us like we don’t know nothing. We got two of your songs. We got hoodoo for days. You tell us what bothers you bout all this, and we figure out what to do from here.”

Fess sighed heavily. “Baby, what bothers me about this is if Stagger Lee got out into the world, then whoever helped him know exactly what they messin’ with. It’s no accident that they endangered Nola—they actively trying to destroy our home for good. They’s only one thing could empower them to do that. The Storm.”

Perry shivered. He knew the Storm had devastated the city in the past. He saw its memory in the lines on his parents’ faces anytime they saw a TV weather report they didn’t like. He wasn’t sure when it had happened—whether he’d been alive and making memories or whether it had happened years and years before his birth. He’d never heard the words spoken quite the way Doctor Professor did. When he said them, his voice was marbled with panic, regret, and unwanted memory.

“There’s got to be something we can do,” Perry said. “What if we catch more songs? We’ve already got—”

“Stag done kilt two already,” Doctor Professor said. “And he’s looking for more every minute.”

“How does he figure out which ones to go after next?” Peaches asked. “How do he make the choice?”

“The Storm must be telling him somehow,” Fess said. “Telling him which murders cause what. The first one he got made all the horses and carriages disappear. The one he just kilt disappeared the traffic lights and brought down City Hall. Sinkhole opened up and swallowed it right down.”

“My God,” Perry said. “Is everyone—?”

“Cars and trucks done wrecked all over town,” the Doctor said. “Folks can feel the changes now. They afraid. They boarding up they windows and getting ready to hunker down. And now I gotta find somebody else to help me fight.”

“Hold on a minute,” Peaches said. “We didn’t say we wouldn’t find the other songs. Besides—Daddy Deke been took by Stagger Lee. Even if we wasn’t willing to help you, we ain’t done till we got him back.”

Perry frowned. Something Fess had said stuck out in his mind. “You said the Storm is telling Stagger Lee which songs to kill when. How can a storm talk like it’s people?”

Peaches shrugged. “How can a song?”

“It ain’t the same as a song,” Doctor Professor said thoughtfully. “It would need to speak through somebody.”

A thought occurred to Perry then, but he thrust it roughly away, though even as he did, he knew he was right. Still, it would do more harm than good to say anything until he had some kind of proof.

“Y’all gotta come up off the case, though, baby,” Fess said. “I gots me some enemies—maybe one or two I don’t know nothing bout. I don’t need to be makin’ no more right now, dig?”

“What?” Brendy asked. “What that means?”

Now Mr. Man spoke up. “He means somebody in your corner knows what’s at stake,” he said. “And they made it clear to this man that his endangering you may have caused him some serious trouble.”

“Somebody threatened you?” Perry asked.

“I am Doctor Professor,” Fess said. “Can’t nobody threaten me.”

“Now he lyin’,” Brendy said, wide-eyed.

“We ain’t off nothing,” Peaches said firmly. “And you best be telling us the truth from here on.”

“At least tell us this,” Perry said. “The one who threatened you. Was it Daddy Deke?”

“Naw, it was some— Wait.” Fess cocked his head, listening to something they couldn’t hear. “Hell and damnation.”

“What?” Peaches asked. She squinted, listening as well. Perry wondered why, but then he remembered the strength of her senses. “Oh no!”

“Baby, I gotta go,” Fess said.

“What is it?” Perry asked. “What’s going on?”

Peaches ignored the question. “Take us with you.”

“I can’t—”

“No time to argue,” Peaches told him flatly. “We gone up against him once and came out ahead. You leave us here, and First Chief is good as dead.”

Doctor Professor grimaced, uncertain, then: “Grab on to my piano. All of y’all.”

Perry, Brendy, and Peaches stepped forward and pressed their palms against the lacquered wood.

Brendy looked at Mr. Man over her shoulder. “You comin’, Mistuh Man? Or do you just like to bark at folks?”

Without answering, the grown-up turned away. Perry tried to tell himself he shouldn’t be surprised, but disappointment stung him.

Doctor Professor launched straight into the first verse of a song Perry knew well:

Baby, lemme see ya levitate, levitate

Baby, lemme see ya hover on that air

Baby, you as fly as a midnight witch

The way you sweep that broom like ya just don’t care…!

The world faded from view.

Casey Bridgewater stood on the neutral ground outside his apartment complex and watched the morning sunlight stream down through the trees. It had been foggy out when he awakened, and he’d spent the hazy hours discussing his next step with Naddie. She had done as he’d asked and packed go bags, their most important documents. Since early this morning, they’d had WDSU on the TV, listening to Margaret Orr track the disturbance in the Gulf.

“Austin,” Casey had said. “You can go to Austin.”

“Are you seriously saying I should go to fucking Texas by myself?” Naddie’s gray eyes were wide with shock.

“I can’t leave yet,” Casey said. “I got something I gotta do.”

“Fuck that,” Naddie spat. “If you’re staying so am I.”

“Fine—just—! What do we have and what do we need?” He knew they had flashlights, a rechargeable power station, a couple cabinets full of canned food. There must be something he was missing. It had been so long since they’d had to weather a storm together. Hadn’t it?

Naddie seemed a little confused herself. “Battery powered fans?” she said. “And batteries. Lots of them.”

“Hit up Walmart, okay? But look. Things are going wrong in the city. My cousin Charly says City Hall is gone. It’s because of the storm. I know it. I gotta help if I can.”

“What does the storm have to do with City Hall?”

“I don’t know,” Casey said. “I don’t understand it myself, but Roux said it would happen before it happened. She knows, and she says I can help. So I have to try. The entire city. Our music, our future, everything is in trouble. I might not be able to do much, but I gotta do something!”

“You don’t even know what Roux gave you,” Naddie said. “You’re too afraid to look in the bag!”

Casey crossed to the jeans he’d worn last night and drew a velvet drawstring bag from the right front pocket. Something small and hard weighted it down in Casey’s hand. He considered opening it to investigate right now.

Not here! The thought was bright and terrified in Casey’s mind. Not in the house. No hoodoo in the house!

“She said it could show me where to go,” he said. “She said I’d know what to do once I got there.”

“And you want me to wait for you, wait here for you to come home and tell me it’s all taken care of? Such macho frickin’—! ”

“I’m supposed to feel bad for trying to keep you safe?” Casey asked. “The whole point of all this is to keep you out of danger! I can’t—I can’t have you anywhere near that thing I saw. I can’t. If that makes me some kind of chauvinist D-bag, fine. If you’re not here when I get back, if I can’t come back to you, then… then at least I know you can handle yourself without me.”

“Casey. Case.”

His face heated. “I’m going. I got to. Just—” His voice failed him. Here it is, he thought. He’s going to cry.

“What’s the difference between being brave and just being stubborn and too dumb to stay out of trouble?” Naddie asked.

“I don’t know,” Casey said.

“Well, at least kiss me goodbye.”

Casey did, but when it came time to disengage, he didn’t. They stood together for a long time before he let Naddie go.

Now, standing on the neutral ground, he saw a rippling out of the corner of his eye and looked toward the uptown side of the street. Four different graffiti tags floated up the street: H4INT NOBDDY, CA$$PER, BOOMDOWN, and GRAWLIQZ. He’d never seen so many at once.

He shook his head. He could still feel Naddie against him, and the memory of her helped combat the sense of wrongness, of impending doom, enough that he was able to draw the pouch from his pocket and empty it into his hand.

At first he thought the item was an overlarge locket without a string, and he searched for a seam with his fingers. He held it up to the light, turning it in his hands, and realized that there was no seam where it should open. “Okay, then,” he said aloud. “Where we going?”

Someone you must meet, a disembodied voice said from behind Casey and to his left.

Casey was confused. “To help fight the storm?”

Soon.

He felt like a fool. The thought made no sense. “Where?”

Tree Muses.

“For what? For a drink? It’s nine in the…”

Silence.

“All right,” Casey said. “Take me, then.”

Casey Bridgewater winked out of sight.