Lightning tore across the sky, but the universe didn’t open up, and the Greats didn’t appear.
Where are you? I pleaded silently.
Amma tried again.
“This is the crossroads I can’t cross.
Only you can take this book to my boy.
Deliver it to your world from ours.”
I concentrated harder, ignoring the heat of the Book in my hands. I heard a branch break, then another. I opened my eyes, and a burst of flames sprang up outside the circle. It caught like someone had lit the wick on a stick of dynamite, tearing through the grass and creating another circle outside the first.
The Wake of Fire—the uncontrollable flames that ignited sometimes against my will. The garden was burning again because of me. How many times could this earth char before the damage was irreparable?
Amma squeezed her eyes tighter. This time she spoke the words plainly. They weren’t a chant but a plea. “I know you don’t wanna come for me. So come for Ethan. He’s waitin’ on you, and you’re as much his family as you are mine. Do the right thing. One last time. Uncle Abner. Aunt Delilah. Aunt Iv
y. Grandmamma Sulla. Twyla. Please.”
The sky opened up, and rain poured down from the heavens. But the fire still raged, and the Caster light still glowed.
I saw something small and black circling above us.
The crow.
Ethan’s crow.
Amma opened her eyes and saw it, too. “That’s right, Uncle Abner. Don’t punish Ethan for my mistakes. I know you been lookin’ after him over there, the same way you’ve always looked after us down here. He needs this book. Maybe you know why, even if I don’t.”
The crow circled closer and closer, and the faces began to appear in the dark sky, one by one—their features carving themselves out of the universe above us.
Uncle Abner appeared first, his lined face creased by time.
The crow landed on his shoulder like a tiny mouse at the feet of a giant.
Sulla the Prophet was next, regal braids cascading over her shoulder. Strands of tangled beads rested against her chest as if they weighed nothing. Or were worth the weight.
The Book of Moons bucked in my hands, as if trying to pull free. But I knew it wasn’t the Greats reaching for it.
The Book was resisting.
I tightened my grip as Aunt Delilah and Aunt Ivy appeared simultaneously, holding hands and looking down like they were evaluating the scene. Our intentions or our abilities—it was impossible to know.
But they were judging us nonetheless. I could feel it, and the Book could, too. It tried to pull free again, singeing the skin on my palms.
“Don’t let go!” Amma warned.
“I won’t,” I called over the wind. “Aunt Twyla, where are you?”
Aunt Twyla’s dark eyes appeared before her gentle face and arms laden with bracelets. Before her braided hair knotted with charms, or the rows of earrings that marched down her ears.
“Ethan needs this!” I shouted over the wind and the rain and the fire.
The Greats stared down at us, but they didn’t react.
The Book of Moons did.
I felt the pulse beating within it, the power and rage spreading through my body like poison.