“I’ve grown stronger. In a way that, perhaps, you can no longer understand. People change. You used to believe that most of all,” said Boo. “Or have you forgotten?”
“People don’t change. They just grow weaker,” said the Sleeper. His voice was as icy as the Cloak of Winter. “For the sake of old times, I will give you one chance. Join me. Help my cause. I will make us gods, and end this age.”
This is it. Aru waited for Boo to betray them. She braced herself to feel a rush of hurt, but Boo didn’t hesitate. His voice was loud and strong when he said, “No.”
Aru’s heart squeezed.
The Sleeper growled and threw Boo across the room. The pigeon hit a shelf with a loud smack and slumped to the floor. Mini and Aru screamed, but the moment they tried to run toward him, a wall of air forced them back. Aru braced herself, her hand flying to the pendant that Monsoon had given her. She wanted to throw it at him, but all it could do was aim right. Making sure a rock hit the Sleeper on his nose wouldn’t do much good if he could just shake his head and keep going. She needed something bigger or more powerful.
The Sleeper prowled toward them. As Aru was scanning the collection for a giant book to hit him with (the biggest one, Atlas, growled at her from the lowest shelf), Mini let out a scream. She tore off her headband and threw it like a Frisbee at the Sleeper. It caught on his ear.
For one moment, his eyes went all black. But then he recovered, and the headband vanished.
“That was your best effort?” he asked, laughing. “A headband? I’m trembling with fear. Now, let’s be honest. I could kill you easily. Two little girls. No training, no valor. Do you really think you can get the celestial weapons?”
Aru felt her face turning red. Indra had claimed her as his daughter. Maybe she’d been light-headed from standing up in the clouds when it happened, but she’d seen (at least she thought she’d seen) the statue of Indra smile at her. As if he was…pleased.
Remembering that gave her the courage to say, “We were chosen by the gods.”
Then again, what was with the golden ball? Aru didn’t have any experience with dads, but she was pretty sure giving your kid a glowing Ping-Pong ball to fight demons was like getting pocket fuzz and spare change instead of an allowance.
The Sleeper scoffed, “The gods would never trust you to do anything. Just look at you.”
The more he talked, the angrier Aru became. She wasn’t going to back down. They had something the Sleeper didn’t.
“Threaten us all you want, but you need us to get those keys, don’t you?” asked Aru. “You can’t see them. You don’t even know what they are.”
The Sleeper grew quiet and stroked his chin thoughtfully. Finally he said, “You’re right.”
Aru couldn’t believe it. Had she talked him down?
The Sleeper raised his hand, curling his fingers. Boo zoomed into his palm. The bird wasn’t moving.
“I do need you,” he said. “I would’ve taken the key you have now, but it may lead you to the other two. And it doesn’t matter that I can’t see them, because you are going to deliver all three to me by the new moon.”
He squeezed Boo, and Mini began to whimper.
The Sleeper turned toward her. “I know so much about you now. From listening to your heartbeats,” he said with mock sweetness. “Your father wears a cross beneath his shirt and an agimat necklace passed down from his family in the Philippines. Your brother hides a photo of his soccer teammate beneath his pillow, and when you found it, he swore you to secrecy. Your mother’s hair smells like sandalwood.”
Mini’s face turned white.
Then the Sleeper faced Aru. Something flashed in his eyes. “And you. Well. You and I might as well be family.”
“What are you talking about?” Aru blurted. “You’re crazy! I—”
He cut her off with a look. “Summon me just before the new moon, or I will do more than just freeze your loved ones.”
“Never!” said Aru. “We’ll fight if we have to, and—”
“Tsk-tsk,” said the Sleeper. “Before you even think about fighting me, know that I am gathering my own friends.” He gave them a cruel smile. “And trust me, you won’t like meeting them.”
He disappeared, taking Boo with him.
For a whole minute, Aru and Mini didn’t budge. Aru felt like she was spinning even though she was standing still.
Too many things were zipping through her head. Boo had fought for them just now. But once he had been the Pandavas’ enemy. Was that why he was being forced to help them in this life, in the form of a pigeon, no less? And then there was the fact that the Sleeper knew her mom—and Mini’s family. How was that possible?
Around them, the books began to run about, desperate to restore some order. Their pages ruffled like birds settling back down to sleep. Without the Sleeper covering it, the ceiling now looked like open sky. Bruised purple storm clouds drifted across it. Aru scowled. It didn’t make sense for the magic around them to look so beautiful when she felt so…ugly.
What was the point in even trying to get to the Kingdom of Death without Boo? The Sleeper was right. She had caused all this. And she had failed everyone.
“Why?” croaked Mini.
She didn’t have to say the rest.
Why had Aru lied about the lamp? Why had Boo hidden his past? Why was any of this happening to them?
Aru was tired. Tired of lying. Tired of imagining the world as it could be and not as it was. She was tired of making herself bigger and better in her own head when it was clear that she never would or could be in her real life.
She pulled the coin that she’d gotten from Adulthood out of her pocket. It had faded to dull silver.
Aru couldn’t meet Mini’s gaze. “I knew a little of what would happen if I lit the lamp—my mom had told me, but I didn’t really believe her—and I lit it anyway. What the Sleeper said was true: I did it to impress some classmates that I thought I wanted as friends.”
Mini’s shoulders shook. “My family is in danger because of you,” she said. She didn’t cry or yell. And that made it so much worse. “You lied about everything, didn’t you? Were you just laughing at me the whole time?”
Aru looked her in the eyes now. “What? No! Of course not—”
“Why should I believe you?” Mini cut in. “You said you thought I was brave. And that it wasn’t a bad thing to be the Daughter of Death.” She stared at Aru as if she could see straight through her. “You even told me that you wouldn’t leave me behind.”
“Mini, I meant all of that.”
“I don’t care what you say, because you’re a liar, Aru Shah.” Mini snatched the bite of Adulthood from Aru.
“Hey! What are you doing?”
“What’s it look like I’m doing?” said Mini. She put the coin in her backpack along with the sprig of youth. “I’m finishing this. I have to try to save my family.”
“But you need me,” said Aru. She had that hot, stuffed-inside-a-sausage feeling that always happened before she cried. She didn’t want to cry.
“Maybe,” said Mini sadly. “But I just don’t trust you.”
Mini pressed the image of the last key on her hand, the wave of water shimmering across her fingers.
“Mini, wait—”
She stepped through a cut of light. Aru tried to grab her hand, but only found air. Mini had disappeared.
Aru was left standing by herself. The books around her tittered and gossiped. There was no place left for her here in the Otherworld. The Sleeper didn’t even think they were enough of a threat to bother with killing them. She should have felt grateful, but she just felt invisible. Useless. On top of that, Boo was hurt, and Aru had earned and lost a sister in a matter of days.
At the thought of days, Aru slowly turned over her hand. She felt like she was being handed back a quiz that she’d definitely failed and was doing her best to turn over the paper as slowly as possible.
What the heck was that?
Whatever number it was, it definitely wasn’t the number six. Mini would know what it meant. But Mini wasn’t here.
Aru was running out of days, and if ever there was a time to cry, it was now.