Chapter Thirty-Six

Bodin jumps so high that his head partially blocks the moon. “What is that?”

“A double-edged sword with black leather wrapped around the hilt.” I approach the weapon cautiously. In the absence of the sun, the silver of the blade should dull. Instead, it catches so many of the moon’s beams that it seems to sparkle with its own light source. “Is it Rae’s? Looks just like it.”

“Has to be,” Bodin says distractedly, staring at the blade. “There’s only one sword like this on the island.”

I lift my head. “How do you know?”

“Something Three said. One blowgun. One dagger. One of every magical weapon. Only the krabongs are in common use.” He tugs me a few inches away from the sword, closer to the noisy rush of the sea. “How long has it been there? And how did it get there?”

I look up the beach. There are my footprints in the wet sand, walking right past it, and Bodin’s longer, bulkier prints, parallel to mine.

“Did we just not see it when we passed?” I asked.

“Dark out here,” he mutters. “But the way that thing’s gleaming, it’s hard to believe we missed it.”

“So, it just…appeared?”

He lifts his shoulders. “Maybe.”

I reach for the hilt—

“Don’t touch it.” Bodin yanks my hand back. “They took our weapons,” he says, his tone wobbly. “But if this is Rae’s sword, then she has a special kinship with it. Her ability allowed her to bond with it, so to speak. So it’s not just a weapon. It interacts with her energy. It may even follow her instructions.”

“You’re saying Rae sent the sword here? In order to aid me?”

“Possibly. But that doesn’t mean you can touch—”

With one smooth motion, I grasp the hilt with both hands and pull it cleanly out of the sand.

Bodin blinks. “Scratch that thought.”

I test the heft of the sword—and then take a practice swing, trying to imitate Eduardo’s form.

“Hey!” I exclaim. “How come you haven’t fallen over, clutching your head?”

He steps closer. “She lent you the sword. Doesn’t mean you also inherit her ability. Besides…” He moves the sword, his hand over mine, showing me the proper way to swing it. “I’m not your enemy, am I?”

“Quite the opposite.” I grin as we slice the blade through our invisible opponent, right in his chest.

…

Too soon, Bodin leaves me to head back to camp, and I abandon the beach to continue my journey through the woods.

The dark closes in. The moon casts shifting, elongated shadows. They could be anything. Robotic monkeys, hiding within a tree’s branches. A naga who is not Eduardo, slithered in from the sea. A crocodile, waiting patiently for one wrong step so that it can swallow me whole.

And eyes. Eyes that live in the night, that feed on my fear. Eyes that rise with the moon, that are born from my nightmares. Hundreds, thousands of eyes watching my back, scouring my body…when there only needs to be two to put me in danger.

Two eyes, one mind, following my every move.

I run faster, hoping to escape the dread. Paranoid—that’s all I am. Terrified to the tips of my toes. But I can’t shake the sensation that someone’s watching.

I wish the monsters would come out of the dark. Then I could, I don’t know, count them. It wouldn’t do much to dispel their power, but it would sure help me.

I count my steps instead.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11.

I nimbly leap through the night, my strides long, my pace fast. The moon reflects off the sword, lighting my way through the dense maze of these woods.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11.

A rush of energy fills me. I’m anticipating obstacles—exposed tree roots, a fallen log—long before they arrive. I shouldn’t be able to do this. I just hiked down a mountain today. I shouldn’t have this kind of energy.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11.

Either the moon shines more brightly, or my senses have gotten more precise. I can feel the dark, its contours and its edges, its energy and its pulse. And it is no longer scary to me.

Even if someone is watching.

I arrive at the mouth of the cave, at the northernmost tip of the island.

Here, I hesitate, just for a moment. If Three is right, magic seals the cave closed. Magic that can perhaps be pierced by a sacred double-edged sword. I have no idea if this will work, but the certainty that it will grows inside me.

I’ve got no one to ask out here. No one to confirm my decision or poke holes in my conclusion. All I have to rely on is…me. And that, perhaps, is my biggest fear of all.

I always knew that I would have to grow up someday. That eventuality always felt in the far distant future. But the time has come, and it is now. I’ll never forgive myself if I don’t give my all to secure Mama the peace that she deserves.

I don’t count. I don’t even give myself time to think. Instead, I plunge the sword straight into the cave’s entrance. Energy shoots into my arm, the sensation of an invisible wall crumbling. And then, I’m in.

Holy crap, I was right. I’m never right—or at least that’s how it feels. But I’m also not usually the one making the decisions. It’s always Mama or Papa or some other authority figure.

The blackness swallows me whole, but a rush of information washes over me. I am like a bat who emits sound pulses to determine its location. And yet, I’m not using my ears to conceptualize the dark. Nor my eyes, nor my mouth. I can simply sense the tunnel in front of me. I instinctively feel when to turn right to continue down a smaller path, and when to duck my head to avoid a low-hanging stalactite.

I don’t know how long I walk, twisting and turning down this maze of tunnels. The feeling of eyes at my back never blinks, never wavers. At times, I swear that I can hear footsteps softly treading behind me.

But it’s so dark that I wouldn’t be able to see my stalker if they were a foot behind me, so I ignore the sound. In time, I get used to the footsteps. I decide that they are nothing more than the echo of my own feet. A manifestation of my desperate wish for company.

Eventually, I glimpse a light in the distance. My heart quickens. The infirmary. Have I finally reached it? Or am I about to walk into another one of Xander’s miserable traps?

I inhale, and to my surprise, the air is frosty as it hits my lungs. When I breathe out again, I can see water droplets in the air.

Wrapping my arms around myself, I creep toward the archway that’s emitting the light. The urge to give up and run back into Mama’s arms is strong. But I’m out of options here. If I don’t press forward, there will be nothing left to which I can return.

I find myself in a small chamber so cold that icicles drip from the low rock ceiling and along the curved walls. It’s the infirmary, all right. Cabinets line the cave wall, filled with meticulously organized medical supplies.

I dash inside the cave and rifle through the cabinets. Yes. An IV bag, lying neatly next to syringes and tubes. And over here—a selection of antibiotics for infections. I’m not sure which one Mama needs, so I grab them all. I shove everything into a blue plastic bag that looks like a vomit receptacle and turn to leave the room.

That’s when I see a rectangular metal box, similar to a coffin, standing on a high pedestal in the center of the room. I was so laser-focused on Mama’s supplies that I hadn’t even noticed.

Run! every instinct in me shouts. You have the supplies Mama needs. That’s the priority. That’s always been the priority. But I can’t help it. I creep toward the coffin—and gasp.

Through the glass window on top of the box, I can see a little boy. He can’t be more than eight or nine years old. His eyes and mouth are closed, the long brush of eyelashes dark against forever young skin. His hands are clasped together on top of his chest. A peaceful sleep. Except—not so peaceful. Because an eight- or nine-year-old boy is meant to be active. Even in sleep, they should be spinning like a clock. This boy is dead, at a tragically young age.

I lay the double-edged sword on the metal box and bring my ice-cold hands to my mouth, where the puff of my breath does little to warm them. The boy looks…familiar, although I’m not sure why. There’s something about his jaw, maybe, or the shape of his lips…

My ears prick. There it is again—the almost inaudible sound of a pair of feet as they try to sneak up on me. It’s not my imagination this time. Not an echo. Eyes drill into the back of my head. I am not alone.

I casually lean both hands on the metal box, right next to the hilt of the sword. I have only one chance to do this. One attack with the element of surprise.

I slowly exhale, letting all of the breath deflate from my body. And then, I whirl around and thrust the sword up to their throat, coming eye to eye with the person behind me. Recognition floods through me.

My stalker is Bodin.