I take his hands in mine and close my eyes. “Let’s try again.”
This time, when the image of Michael Weir flashes into my consciousness, I’m ready for it. There are a thousand tiny cuts on his face where the glass from his car window rained down on him. He was teaching his niece to drive, and neither of them saw the tractor-trailer running the red light up ahead. He never had any children of his own, but he loved his niece like she was his daughter. He helped her with their math homework every night. She survived the accident, but she hasn’t gotten over it. She thinks her beloved uncle’s death was her fault. He died the instant the truck hit their little compact car, and Aidan drew Michael Weir’s spirit here almost as soon as it left his body. He trapped it in his lab, where it had time to grow frustrated. To grow desperate. It wanted to linger long enough to tell the girl it wasn’t her fault.
But spirits who linger rarely get a chance to actually finish their unfinished business.
His spirit escaped from Llevar la Luz weeks ago and has been trying to get back to Texas. But it’s disoriented; it doesn’t know which way is north. It doesn’t know the difference between night and day.
Everywhere the spirit looks, it sees only fire.
Now I do open my eyes. “We’re too late,” I say breathlessly.
“What do you mean?”
“His spirit’s already gone dark.”
Lucio opens his eyes. “How can you tell?”
“I saw fire.” Thanks to Victoria, I know that there are different kinds of demons. The demon I defeated on New Year’s Eve was a water demon, vanquished by fire. It drowns its victims, taking strength from the energy released when they die. She told me about earth demons, who tend to bury their victims alive.
And she told me about fire demons, who can burn their victims to death, sometimes from the inside out. Suddenly it hits me like a blowtorch to the brain. That man in the parade bursting into flames, the red demon that smelled like gasoline, that was Michael Weir’s spirit! Lucio didn’t recognize him because he had already turned. I didn’t know about him at the time so I couldn’t put the pieces together.
“Close your eyes. Concentrate. What else do you see?”
I squeeze Lucio’s hands in mine. “I see . . . a village. Or the remains of one. It’s already burning.” The demon is already so much stronger than it was that night. Now, instead of a single person, it’s setting a whole town on fire.
“What does the place look like?” Lucio asks desperately. “Anything to help me identify it.”
“Stucco buildings . . . no more than one-room shacks, really. They have thatched roofs, and the jungle vines grow up and around them. But half the roofs are burning now.”
Lucio tightens his grip. “What else?”
“There’s a wheelbarrow with a name on it. I can’t quite . . .” I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to make out the letters before they catch fire. “Lado Selva,” I say finally.
Before I know it, Lucio is pulling me down the hill, shouting Aidan’s name.
“Lucio!” I shout. “What’s Lado Selva?”
“It’s the name of a town,” he says without turning around to look at me. “It comes from al lado de la selva.”
“What does that mean?”
“Beside the jungle. It’s a tiny little town in the jungle.”
He shouts Aidan’s name again as we emerge into the courtyard. But the black SUV isn’t out front like usual.
“He must have gone into town for supplies.” Lucio throws his hands up in frustration. “He could still be back in time to—”
“Lucio!” I interrupt. “There isn’t any time to wait. We have to get to those people now.”
Lucio runs his fingers along his cropped hair, his tattoo practically iridescent in the sunlight. “I don’t know if I’m strong enough—I’ve never faced a demon in full force.”
“Then today’s your lucky day,” I say, reaching into my back pocket and pulling out the knife. “Because I have.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The Town on Fire
Lucio gasps, “Where did you get that?” He reaches out and holds the weapon, turning it over in his hands.
“Victoria gave it to me. I used it for my test.”
“Do you know how rare these are?” he asks.
I shake my head.
“Aidan invented them, years ago. He only had enough power to make five of them.”
It’s the first time I’ve heard much about the kind of work he did before the rift, back when he was a respected and powerful luiseach. I wonder what else he created before I came along and changed everything. “He must have given one to Victoria.”
“And then she gave it to you.”