“No,” I say. “I have to do this. I have to pay this price.”
“Lula, we don’t agree all the time,” Mayi says, “but any of us would have made the same mistake.”
“Most of us have,” McKay says, and my heart feels a familiar joy when I see him.
“Enough,” Lady de la Muerte says, her voice deeper, a darkening cloud. “I grow tired of this realm. You and you.” She turns to my father and Alex. “You are the souls I choose.”
“Dad,” I say. “What if she takes your life and then you drop dead? I only just got you back. And, Alex. I’m sorry I made you do my half of the chores. I swear, I forgive you. Just let me do this—”
Alex places a hand on my shoulder and looks at Dad. “We have to. In a way, this all started with us.”
Lady de la Muerte pushes me aside and presses a long, thin finger on Dad’s cheek. “Your timeline is strange. I cannot read you. You’ve been to a realm I cannot follow.” Then she sets her eyes on Alex. “So have you. Brave girl. Powerful girl. I want your years for simply fighting against me.”
“It’s done,” Alex and Dad say at the same time.
Lady de la Muerte raises her hands and makes a pulling motion with her fingertips. Three threads, one from my father, Alex, and me, wind around her wrist and burn into her flesh, a silver tattoo against her porcelain skin.
“Good-bye, Lula Mortiz,” she tells me. Though it’s already dark, her shadows pool around her, twisting into a cloud of smoke. “I don’t want to see you for a very long time.”
36
El Fuego, most misunderstood of his kin,
sought the dark refuge beneath the earth.
Don’t you know?
His flame is destruction.
His flame is rebirth.
—Tales of the Deos, Felipe Thomás San Justinio
The fire spreads faster than we want it to.
It starts in the kitchen, eating its way through layers and years of paint and old curtains. Jars of oils and elixirs blow up like grenades. The stove blows a hole clean through the second floor and into the attic.
Dad and Alex run inside, conjuring rain. But they only needed to get one thing. Our Book of Cantos.
Rhett makes his way through the cleanup and stands in front of my parents.
“I know you don’t want to hear this,” Rhett says, “but it will be safer for you to let it burn. We’ll take care of the bodies.”
“What will we tell the police?” Mom asks, her eyes flooding with tears that reflect the red flames.
“I’ll stay,” Rhett says, starting to retreat. The shadow boy who watched over me like a dark angel. “I’ll take care of it.”
My mom pulls him into a bone-breaking hug.
“The sun is rising,” Frederik the vampire says. “Some of us must go.”
“I’m starting to wonder how many so-called accidents are actually THA cover-ups,” Alex says out loud. She rests her arm on my shoulder and leans her head against mine.
McKay and others of the THA pile as many casimuertos as they can into the back of a black SUV that pulls into our yard. The Alliance works quickly. Expertly.
When it comes to Maks, I ask them to wait. I take his severed hand and place it on his chest. I press my fingers to my lips and carry that kiss over to his. My eyes sting at seeing him like this. In spite of everything, I loved him, and the last memory I want to have of him is on that bus as he tried to save me.
“I’m sorry,” I tell him one last time.
When the bodies are all gone and the fire reaches Alex’s room in the attic, we finally hear sirens.
“That’s our cue to go,” McKay says, adjusting his black baseball cap and hopping into the driver’s seat. He points a finger at Rose. “Be good, little magical hacker.”
I try to thank everyone here. But the Alliance is hard to thank. They brush it off like it’s just another day.
“Got all the weapons?” Rhett asks one of his hunters. They pack up anything that might look suspicious when the NYPD does their sweep.
“I guess a living room full of daggers and machetes was going to raise a lot of questions,” I say.
“We’ll try to replace what we can,” he assures me.
I watch my house go up in flames. This is the place where I was born. I broke my nose sliding down the banister and Rose wore a permanent spot on the carpet in the nook where she liked to read. We celebrated our dead in there. We ate and drank and gossiped in the kitchen. I snuck out the window and broke my ankle. Twice. We saved lives and lost lives, and we laughed and cried and whispered our secrets and fears into every corner we could find.
We lived.
Mom sits on the tree stump that was once a portal, clutching the Book of Cantos to her chest. Dad rubs her back. I hold my sisters’ hands. Nova takes a power nap on the grass but wakes when a car door slams.
A black cop car pulls up on the front yard. We know what to say. Rhett told us to talk about the electricity going haywire, which is true. And the fire, which Alex technically started when she was fighting off a casimuerto. But that’s always been our lives—half-truths and half-lies.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I say, then sling a string of curse words that feel so good to say out loud.
“Ms. Mortiz,” Detective Hill says as he walks toward us across the lawn. His face is like a melting candle and his leather jacket smells of cigarettes and bourbon. “The fire department is on their way.”
There’s nothing left for them to save.
There’s a fresh gleam in his eyes, like he’s excited about what he might find. When he looks over my shoulder, something he sees upsets him. Someone.
“Mr. Dulac,” the detective says, a scowl on his face. “I’m surprised to see you here.”
Rhett. He’s dressed differently. In a plain, long-sleeved shirt that looks soft to the touch and dark slacks. He holds his hand out to Detective Hill, who stares at it longer than is the custom before shaking it.
“I’m sure surprised isn’t the word you really want to use.” Rhett pats the detective on the back and leads him back to the front of the house, a silent understanding between them I can’t fully grasp, but perhaps I don’t need to yet.
For now, I have to be present.
I join my family.
We gather around and watch our home burn.
37
She lives in the glimmer of dawn.
And when the night is weak,
and when the light is gone.
—Rezo for La Esperanza, Goddess of Sighs and All the World’s Goodness, Book of Deos
Graduation isn’t something I thought I’d get to have. After they closed the school early because of the accident, they discovered a pile of dead bodies in the school basement, which the casimuertos used as a hideout, and so, my entire class graduated automatically. I was probably one credit away from failing, but here I am in my cap and gown, sweating under the July sun.
The first half of the evening was a memorial for the students killed in the accident. They wanted me, as the sole survivor, to give a motivational speech. Something that would make people feel hopeful. But I couldn’t bring myself to do it. And so Dante Ramirez, Ramirez’s little brother, gave a speech he could barely get through.
As I watch our valedictorian give her speech, I can’t help but focus on the knight sigil that’s on the podium and think of the THA and the Knights of Lavant.
When each student walks across the stage, the applause is subdued, respectful. They call out my name, and I go through the motions. I shake the principal’s hand and the hands of local councilmen and women who came to pay their respects. I don’t miss Detective Hill in the audience. Even McKay and some of the THA showed up. They wave at me as I make the walk across the stage.
When I step out of school, I breathe in the midsummer air. It’s over—the casimuertos, Maks, high school. And I let myself bask in this moment of calm. A couple of friends invite me to graduation parties, but I’m not in a party mood. My family and Rishi’s family are in conversation when I find them.