Bruja Born (Brooklyn Brujas #2)(83)

And then, silence.

A serene quiet unlike anything I’ve heard before. I open my eyes expecting to be in a dream, the in-between where La Muerte and I used to meet when I was close to death myself.

But I’m still in my backyard, surrounded by family and friends and allies. The wound on my chest is healed, leaving a scar in the shape of a ring between my breasts. Lady de la Muerte squeezes a slithering black mass in her hand.

“Is that an octopus?” Rose asks.

I would laugh if it didn’t hurt too much.

“This was how the dead were feeding on you. It started off the size of silverfish.”

The thing has dozens of tentacles with pointy suctions. It slithers them in the air, trying to grab at something.

“Shouldn’t we kill it?” Adrian asks.

Lady de la Muerte turns her head slowly in the direction of the boy. The crowd parts, just as the sea parted for me when I went to retrieve the spear. Adrian gulps, but other than that doesn’t move an inch.

Lady de la Muerte bows her head once, then throws the creature on the ground, and before it has a chance to slither away, she stabs it right through its center. Then again and again until it cannibalizes itself and melts into the earth, killing the entire patch of grass it touched and turning dirt to sand.

“That was inside of your chest?” Alex asks. “Gross.”

When I stand, I feel lighter than ever.

“What did you mean when you said that wasn’t the sacrifice?” I ask La Muerte.

“All the lives that were taken as a result of your betrayal,” she tells me, staking her spear in the earth and lifting her chin up. “I will require a year off your life for every person that was taken.”

“The bus accident was not her fault,” Alex says.

“That may be so. But the others. The ones killed by the casimuertos. Those deaths were robbed from me.”

“How many years?” I ask her, afraid to hope.

“One hundred and six.”

I have to laugh. “I’m not going to live that long.”

Lady de la Muerte walks in a slow circle around me. “I know how long every single one of you is going to live. You, Lula Mortiz, could have had a very long life.”

My great-grandfather lived to be one hundred and twenty. Even if I’m meant to live to ninety, it wouldn’t be enough. As much as I want to think I’m ready, I’m not. I look around the backyard full of brujas and hunters and the THA. I look at my sisters and my parents and Nova.

“Then what are you waiting for?” I take a steadying breath.

“Lula, no,” Mom snaps at me, then softens her voice when she turns to Lady de la Muerte. “Please, My Lady. I beg you. Take years off my life instead.”

“No, take mine.” Dad steps in front of my mom.

“What about a deal?” Nova asks. He weaves through the throng of people in the backyard. “How about years taken from some of us?”

Her black line of a smile is terrifying as she sets her sights on Nova. “Not you, Noveno Santiago. With your gift, you do not have enough years to give me.”

Nova’s face blanks, and the bravado he had moments ago is gone.

“But I consent to your proposition,” she says. “Only, I get to choose who gives me their life years.”

“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.