Labyrinth Lost (Brooklyn Brujas #1)(59)

“What do you do with an obstacle?” Nova asks.

I don’t like where he’s going with this. “You go around it.”

“What if it keeps moving in your way?”

“You get rid of it.” If I shut my eyes, the wind sounds like the ghosts of brujas and brujos screaming for their lives. “My mom believes in the balance of all things. She says La Mama and El Papa are a symbol of that.”

“The Deos don’t create the balance,” Nova says. “We do. Their power is in us.”

“Maybe they should be more careful in giving power to people in the first place,” Rishi says.

“Then why did they choose me?” I wonder aloud.

“Don’t go down that rabbit hole, Alex,” Nova says.

“I mean, no one should have this much power. No one. But here we are.”

“It could be worse,” Rishi says. “Your spell could have worked, and then who would be here to fight the Devourer?”

“I would.”

“But you stand a better chance having this great bruja power.”

I reach down for the earth and push my magic into it. The land’s weak pulse answers back in greeting. I remember you. It doesn’t speak it, but the thought pops up in my head. The land aches, as if waking from a deep slumber. I pull at the dead patches of grass. Right where my magic met the land, a tiny, green bulb appears.

I place my hands on another patch of earth. The dry, yellow grass comes away with a snap. It reminds me of Mama Juanita plucking the feathers off a chicken. It reminds me of pulling at my hair in an angry fit, alone in my bedroom with the lights turned off while I listened to my mother crying for my dad.

I remember you, says the earth.

Green sprouts twist from the ground like newborn fingers stretching. My heart races with the boost of my magic. Instinct, as old as this place, grips me. I take a step toward the center of the temple, pulling away the dead plants from the dirt. My fingers touch something hard. A worn stone tile buried and forgotten. I jolt as sparks burn my fingertips.

I need light. I raise my hands to the overcast sky.

“La Estrella,” I say, “bless me with your light.”

The air in my chest escapes in a gust. My magic pushes against the clouds, and they race away across the night sky until there is only the blazing light of a million stars. They shine down on the circle of stones.

One by one, the symbols etched at the top of the stone pillars glow, creating a circle of light that reaches down to the ground. The newborn grass bulbs spring up higher, alive and lush.

Something’s missing. I can feel my magic, taut like a guitar string, urging me to take another step. I place both feet on the stone tile. It gives under my weight, sinking into the earth, snapping into place. The light bounces off each pillar, then funnels into a single beam, crashing over me.

“I remember you,” I say as the light fills me. Every cell of my body snaps awake, and I wonder if this is what it feels like to be born once again. If this power is a good thing. If I can control it.

The skin at my throat burns where my necklace catches the light that shines down on the grass in front of me. Yellow grass breaks away, revealing another stone. The stones glow, and when I step on them, they sink. The dirt ahead clears, revealing the next step for me to take—then another and another, leading out of the circle and down a hill and then up another.

When I look up, I’m filled with so much color and joy and light. I walk ahead, lighting up the path for Rishi and Nova to follow. The path is dizzying, and just when I think I’m heading in the right direction, the stones change. I struggle for breath as the stones lead us up a new hill, then alongside patches of lavender, and then another stretch of dead earth.

After a while, I look over my shoulder. Nova’s face is full of awe. His eyes are wide and looking only at me. Rishi, my little magpie, urges me to keep going.

So I do. I keep going until my muscles ache and my tongue is parched. Until the incline is too steep and we struggle to breathe. Until I see the ripple of the glamour, and I know we’re closer. Until the clouds return, darker and stronger, and the light of my crescent moon disappears.





29


Take me to the glittering mountain

to find the riches of the world.

Take me to the glittering mountain

to mine its treasures untold.

—Folk song, Book of Cantos

When I fall down, hands grab me instantly to pick me back up. Nova turns me over on my back.

“I’m fine.” My body is screaming with pain, and my heart and mind are racing.

He holds my face in his hands. “You’re not fine. We’ve walked for miles. You’re exhausted.”

“Don’t tell me what I am.”

A smile creeps on his face. “Stubborn.”

“Jerk.”

“Do you see that?” Rishi shouts, running ahead.

“Wait!” I call after her, but when we make it around a steep hill, I can see what has her so excited. There’s a smattering of trees that grow so low to the ground they appear to be bowing. It’s a tiny oasis in the middle of a barren land.

Despite the ache in my bones and the sight-splintering headache that comes from recoil, hunger, and general exhaustion, I sprint to the perfectly round pond nestled in a valley between two hills. I cup the water in my hands and drink greedily until my belly is full and my head spins.