The hands on the rooster neared midnight. I slid from beneath the bed and found the package in the closet. Moonlight fell in a long, pale block across the floor. I stood at the window, peering into the maze of shadows and light in the yard below. I hugged the package to my pajama top. Nothing moved on the streets beyond the fence. Windows in the nearby houses were as black as caves. A few porchlights glowed yellow and dull.
I silently descended the stairway, leaving Mom and Dad's soft breathing behind. Downstairs, wheels inside the grandfather clock clicked and whirred as the hands crept toward the hour. I turned at the ticking of Razor's nails across the hardwood floor.
"Good boy," I whispered, kneeling, scratching his neck. "Good boy, Razor." His eyes glistened in the dark, watching me. The fridge hummed. I moved toward the kitchen door. "Stay," I called softly over my shoulder, then stepped outside.
The moon was a bright hole poked in the sky, a cutout in the darkness. Light fell through, splashing the world in liquid silver, throwing everything into stark relief. The evening coolness seeped through my pajamas. I crossed the yard toward a wide pool of moonlight. My shadow fell around me in a black ring.
I knelt on the crisp grass and tore the wrapping from the package. I pushed my thumbnail along its taped center, splitting the folds of cardboard. Inside was a book. It was heavy; the cover, made of leather, was thick and soft. I thumbed through the empty pages. Squares of stark white reflected the lunar glow, waiting. Only a page near the front was marked—a symbol at its center: two circles each the size of a quarter, one white and one black, the natural and the aberrant, and where they met, a third circle, smaller, and red.
The red was dark in the moonlight, another version of black.
This is you.
Above, a flutter of wings and then gone. A night bird? A black carpet spread across the sky. Pale pinpricks for stars. The moon was a vast ivory eye, cold and distant. Inside the house, the grandfather clock began tolling midnight. I lifted my face toward the bathing light. I breathed deeply, filling myself, every sight and sound filtering through me.
I set the book aside and returned my attention to the package. I removed a slender case of dark wood and lifted its hinged top. Moonlight winked from a narrow blade, throwing light into my eyes. The blade was a duplicate of the one Ms. Bones carried in her boot, five inches of thin, polished steel. The instrument was cold; the handle, smooth and heavy.
Another twinkling came from within the case, a thread of silver. I lifted the necklace. A red stone dangled from the chain, obsidian in the moonlight. I pressed my thumb across the letters cut into the mounting, eight small grooves.
Svetlana
I turned the stone beneath the glowing heavens, reading the carved letters of my true name. I brought the clasp together behind my neck, making my promise, letting the silver lie cool against my skin, the stone at my sternum. Moonlight everywhere.
Thirteen days till I was off restriction.
I couldn't wait.