Chapter Thirty-Nine

There is a shadow in the shape of a girl. Her head is full of dry leaves and ashes, like an old, choked hearth. She races beneath branches woven into symbols that draw power from the earth, but the trees droop as if they are weary.

Bato-Ko’s glass fortress gleams somewhere behind her. Revelers wear tired faces that tell of too much drink, and the air is still peppered with music celebrating Midsummer. When she cuts through the streets, they avert their eyes as if she is something to fear. To her, they are ghosts that fade in and out of focus. She does not even remember who she is, but her sleeve is rolled up, and there is a name scratched onto her skin: Kuran Jal.

The name is a hammer in her skull, as heavy as a stone. Something about it feels important.

A market crowds around her, full of merchants setting up tables and wares. They wave her off and push her back. She crashes into a woman selling fruit on a blanket. The woman flinches as she nears her, and she stares at the girl’s neck instead of her eyes.

“Do you know this person?” The girl lifts her arm. “Please. I need your help, po.”

“Get away from me!” The woman swats her hands away as though she is filthy. “Or I’ll call the Guardians!”

The fruit seller pelts the girl with a rotting orange and screams, but a young asog takes pity on the girl and leads her away. They stop together at a wooden gate, and she checks behind her as if she’s afraid she’s been followed. “Here, child.” The asog shakes her head and hurries away before the girl can thank her.

The name etched upon the weather-beaten wood reads: “Jal.”

The girl drifts over the threshold, but no one rushes to greet her. When she enters the main house, its shadows take her in as if she is one of them. She passes from empty room to empty room, kicking up dust in this shell of a home.

Upstairs, the rattan furniture is polished and clean, but green cushions have faded to yellow, and embroidered flowers have turned the color of autumn leaves. The air smells faintly of tobacco and mold. Was this her home?

An old woman appears in the doorway, so still that at first the girl thinks she is having a vision. Her skin looks cured by the sun. All leather. She wears an expensive-looking baro jacket and loose silken trousers.

They stare at each other, and the girl gleans the resemblance between them by the reflection in a mirror.

“Have you come here to kill me?” The old woman brandishes a wicked-looking cleaver.

The girl puzzles it over. How can the old woman ask such a thing if they share blood? For who are the Tigangi without family?

The girl takes two steps toward her and presses the back of the old woman’s hand to her forehead for a blessing. “I am lost. I need your help, po.”

The cleaver clatters to the floor.

“Oh, child.” The old woman’s wiry arms encircle the girl, and she wonders if the floor is shaking, but it is only the old woman. She pours her shame into the girl’s back and soaks her tunic with hot tears. “I am so sorry. I thought that to turn in Shora was the right thing to do, that righteousness and adherence to the laws would restore the Jal name—but it has broken me instead. The cost is too much, and I cannot bear it.”

“If we are still here.” The girl kisses the old woman’s forehead. “There is still a chance to make things right.”

The old woman wipes her eyes and coils her hair back into a neat bun at the base of her neck to compose herself, but she still shakes like a leaf in the wind. The girl is afraid she might blow away.

She shakes her head. “What I have done can never be forgiven, but I will help you. I’ve wasted too much time agonizing over what I might have done differently.”

“Can you help me, po?” the girl asks.

“No,” she says. “But I know someone who can.”

…

A stocky old woman with a cloud of white curls and a pineapple-cloth shawl opens a gate. Her lips twist from amusement to surprise when she notices the girl and the tangled mess of scars on her palm.

“Come inside, quickly.” The white-haired woman slams the gate shut and shoos a noisy gaggle of grandchildren off her porch. They walk straight past the main building into a shed dug into the rocky Tigangi soil. Tree roots snake in through cracks in the cellar’s walls, and its roof is held up by huge chunks of stone. Dangling roots are braided into wards of protection and quiet.

It looks like a refuge built to withstand some great disaster, but the girl fears it might not be enough. Worry chased her clear across the city, but she cannot remember why. She grasps for answers, but none come.

In the middle of the room lined with jarred pickles, baskets of onions, and bottles of rum sits a lanky boy in dire need of a haircut and a short Rythian girl with a nose that looks like it was broken once. The Rythian girl screams at the sight of the girl and squeezes her so tightly that her bruises bloom in pain. Everything aches, but the girl lacks the heart to chide her.

The boy stares at the girl and hesitates as though unsure if he should fear or appease her. The hesitation in his smile makes the girl’s heart hurt.

“The palm spell,” the Rythian girl says. “She doesn’t remember.” The other girl’s palm is red as though it was scrubbed over many times, and the boy’s palm matches hers. A faint blue smudge remains where an orasyon might once have been painted.

“Please, there is something I must tell you.” The girl is certain she should know these two, but their names do not come to her. “I need to remember, or we are all in danger.”

The two grandmothers examine the girl’s scarred palm and argue over it.

“We may be able to restore your memories if we burn away enough of the affected area, but some damage has already been done. I don’t know if we can reverse it all,” the Rythian girl says.

“If there’s even a small chance, I must take it,” the girl says.

The Rythian hesitates and scratches at her crooked nose. “I can’t.”

“You must. I beg you. Something terrible will happen before the Sundo is complete. I need to remember.”

Indecision does not seem fitting on the Rythian.

“I trust you.” She takes the other girl’s hands in hers.

The Rythian’s are cool and clammy, as if a fever has taken her recently, but she does not pull away and takes a deep breath. “Someone fetch a torch, cold water, salve for burns…” She rattles off a long list. There is a smudge more conviction to her voice this time. “We will also need blood.”

“I will pay the price. I will give up the breaths of my life or anything else you need. Let my last days not go wasted.” The first grandmother rolls up her sleeves.

A Turinese woman returns with an unlit torch. The girl shivers, but she does not change her mind.

“This will hurt,” the Rythian says with regret.

The girl accepts her fate, but doubts remain. Who will she be if she remembers? There is peacefulness in forgetting, but it feels shallow.

Her hands shake, but the first grandmother twines their fingers together. They are as strong as iron. She stares at their hands, and she sees not only her own, but her mother’s, and her grandmother’s, and all the family who came before her. She does not feel so alone, because their blood sings in hers, and it sings strong.

“I’m ready,” she says and hopes that it is true.