Labyrinth Lost (Brooklyn Brujas #1)(21)

Then, they arrive.

The temperature drops, announcing the presence of the spirits. The brujos and brujas of my family are hidden in the shadows beyond the circle. I can hear them singing along to Lady’s song, louder and louder, voices rattling like thunder.

Mama Juanita once said there are many kinds of dead. Once you die, you can choose the way in which your spirit returns. Most opt for their younger selves. Others as they were when they died, no matter how gory. Others go straight onto their next lives. Some get stuck in a terrible in-between.

Even in death there is possibility, I think. If my father is dead, will he step forward?

The spirits show themselves. They dance and walk around me, cocking eyebrows at the small bird in my hands. I see my grandmothers and grandfathers, aunts and uncles, and others that have been dead for hundreds of years. One woman is as dark as night. A white wrap covers her head, and a cigar is clenched between her strong, white teeth. My heart squeezes painfully. Mama Juanita.

In my life, they’re old, fading photographs, but now they’re here and they’re waiting for me, judging me, expecting me to be fulfill this legacy.

I grab the parakeet tighter. It bites and struggles to get free. It’s stronger than I thought.

“Alejandra Mortiz,” Lady says. Her face is more severe than usual, all rough lines and angles. “What do you offer the spirits of your dead in exchange for their blessing?”

“Blood of the guide,” I whisper.

“We accept,” they respond in a chorus.

I take the knife from Lady. The handle is ivory. The steel glistens with anointed oils. Press it to the yellow feathers of the parakeet’s chest. I’m searching for two faces. Aunt Rosaria. She should be here. She’s been haunting me all these years, so where is she when it matters the most?

“Alejandra,” Lady says. “The dead don’t like to be kept waiting.”

But don’t they have nothing but time?

I search for his face, but I don’t see him, and I don’t know if I’m relieved or not that my father’s ghost isn’t here.

“The guide,” Lady says harshly.

I hold the parakeet up to my lips, kiss the soft feathers as it chirps a cry I want to return but can’t. If I don’t complete the canto now, then my life will be full of death and demons forever.

“It’s okay, Alejandra,” Mom says, seeing me stall. Her eyes are still bruised from yesterday’s attack. I hope she can understand one day that I’m doing this so we can all be safe. “You can do it.”

“Go on,” Lula says.

There’s chattering from the audience and the dead. I squeeze the knife tighter. I can feel the parakeet’s heart racing under my thumb. I will never get a chance to do it again.

With trembling hands, I plunge the knife into the bird. It stops trying to fly. There’s a smattering of applause. My mother lets go of a long sigh, as if all of our worries are now over.

But my canto isn’t complete. I gave my blood and the sacrifice. Now, I retrieve the raven feather from its hiding place. My hands shake, and sweat drips down my face. Someone gasps, but I can’t see who. I throw the feather into the flames. The dead stumble back in a great gust as the red light is replaced by shadow. White smoke billows all around us. I hear my name shouted from all over the room. The house trembles, as if a thousand fists and feet are beating at the walls.

“Alejandra!” my mother screams. “What are you doing?”

The smoke surrounds me and only me. Wind funnels into the house, bringing rain and lightning. But I sit still. I grab the bowl of coal. The feather chars and curls, then turns to ash.

“Lady de la Muerte,” I shout. I grab fistfuls of ash and salt and draw a circle around myself, breaking my connection with the others. “Accept my offering. Protect me from my living. Protect me from my dead.”

Windows shatter, doors fly open, the floorboards warp beneath me.

I cry out as my heart feels like it’s twisting out of my chest.

Something is wrong. This wasn’t part of the recoil.

“What have you done?” my mother asks me.

I don’t have time to reply. Screams twist like cyclones in the room. A force hits me in the gut, and I fly backward. I push myself up as the floor beneath me rips apart. My feet dangle over the edge, and I see spinning black and stars, like the seam of space and time is coming undone.

“It’s you.” That voice again. The one that possessed Rose. It’s coming from the portal. “I’ve found you.”

Black tree roots shoot out and wrap around my neck, lifting me into the air and toward the vortex, where a creature is waiting. I see infinite, dark eyes hiding beneath a helmet made of bone. Lady de la Muerte? It can’t be.

Then I hit the ground. My mother stands in front of me with a machete in her hand. Lady raises her hand and, with a blast of her power, sends me flying across the living room. My head spins. My throat burns where the roots crushed my throat. I try to push myself up, but my shoulder feels dislocated. My family blocks my path to the vortex. Dozens of roots slither out, like the heads of a hydra reaching for me. Instead, the roots snap around my family, living and dead.

“Mom!” I shout.

My mother screams as the black roots wrap around her waist and drag her into the vortex.

“Alex!” I hear Lula cry out for me.