From Darkness It Comes

Madame Laveau's Tale

Darrin looks into Lisa's green eyes and they seem to have a moment of silent understanding. A thin smile cracks Darrin's lips and Lisa returns it more fully. His gaze leaves her and turns back to the old woman. "You said something about tea ma'am?"

Madame Laveau smiles and turns to walk into a back room. "Why yes I did child. Right this way so we can sit a spell and talk over some nice chai."

Darrin and Lisa take each other's hand and follow her through the short hall next to the counter into the back area of the shop. The room is simple, but nice, with a couple soft chairs and a couch along the side wall. There are numerous shelves around the room covered with all sorts of crystals, incense holders, symbols, statues, and other oddities of the like Darrin could not even describe. There are a couple small fabric draped tables in the room, between the chairs and couch, and most of the lighting comes from a red kerchief draped lamp on the far one.

Madame Laveau walks over to one shelf and picks up a box of wooden matches, which she uses to start lighting a half dozen various candles around the room. This seems to have the effect of shifting the room from an eerie red glow to a warmer dancing orange light. She waves them towards the couch, between candle lightings. "Well, have a seat you two."

They move over to the couch and slowly sit down, but look a little nervous, still holding tight onto each other's hand. The smell of this room back here starts to change from the generic sandalwood incense that permeates the whole store to a scent with more of a sweet and almost herb-like twinge. They see that it wasn't only candles she was lighting, but a few of the incense holders around the room as well.

Once done, Madame Laveau picks up the teapot from the hot plate in the back of the room and carries it over to the table on a small tray, along with a few small cups and saucers. She places the whole thing down on the small table before them and starts to pour for Lisa. "Here ya go child."

Once they all have tea, the old woman lowers herself carefully into the overstuffed armchair at an angle to the couch. She appears to be dealing with some soreness or stiff joints as it seems to take some work for her sit and small grimace passes over her face. Once she is completely seated and has tea in hand, however, her expression returns to the kind smile she seems to live with most of the time.

There is a long moment of silence, broken only by the soft sipping sounds of tea, before Darrin finally speaks and breaks it. "So, you seem to know Mr. Stark from somewhere."

Madame Laveau looks slightly annoyed at the mention of his name, but doesn't hesitate to answer. "Yeah, I know Jacob. He's been a thorn in my side since I moved here. And that's been a long time now, child. The man knows too much and not enough. He's a danger to us all, but he won't stop. Jacob has been obsessed with the dark energies here since he was a schoolboy himself."

"Dark energies?" Lisa nearly chokes on her tea.

"Why, yes, child." Madame Laveau says with a comforting smile. "This whole valley is home to a great darkness. That's why I moved here. I was called here to see if I could do some good against it. I was making some ground too, when Jacob showed up and started to break down the things I put in place."

"You've been here since he was a college student?" Darrin couldn't contain his surprise. Mr. Stark was, after all, a rather old looking man. So that would mean it would have had to of been at least thirty years since he was in college. Most likely more.

Madame Laveau chuckles softly. "No, no, child. I said since he returned here. He left after school to travel in search of things connected to what was here. That was when I first met him in fact. Down in Baton Rouge. I moved up here and started to work against the darkness, but years later he returned and started his clumsy meddling. Been a struggle to maintain the balance ever since."

Darrin decides he is going to ask...