CHAPTER 21

The thinnest sliver of moon shines down through the trees. I’ve been walking for a long while, though I’ve lost track of time. I only know I’ve wound my way far from the sound of the ocean and deeper into the woods.

A few memory moths flutter along behind me. Every time one flutters close, my shoulder—where the Memory Thief touched me—aches, and so does my mind. But soon I’ve left them behind. I think I may be cursed, but only just barely, if that’s possible.

The patch of cloud that floats ahead of me acts strangely. Whenever I speed up, it does too, and whenever I slow down, it too slows. It wants to be followed, but at a distance, it seems. So one after the other, the cloud and I snake our way through the trees.

I’m tired and my feet hurt and my heart feels heavy. And though I’m determined to keep up with the cloud, with every step, I’m thinking about only one thing: I had a brother.

Small mysteries click together, now making sense—my feeling of missing a second half, my mom’s long days of staring out the window at the sea. He’s out there, swimming. Waiting for me.

The Murderer said that’s where they took him and dropped him in.

And there is one thing I know now, most of all: it was never some powerful secret that saved me at the hospital that night, not any key to undoing witches. It was a mistake. I should have been taken, not him.

This is the thought that makes my feet as heavy as lead. I have to force myself to keep going or I’d curl into a ball and never get up.

Soon I can hear the ocean again, louder and louder, and I know I must be getting close to the shore. It’s mistier here. The wet air tickles my face, and I squint to see the cloud ahead as it blends with its surroundings.

And then I take a step and nearly fall over as my stomach drops out from under me. I am standing on the edge of a cliff overhanging the sea.

I jerk back and steady myself. The cloud has disappeared ahead of me into the fog. I can’t follow any farther.

My hope faltering, I call out, “Hello?”

Nothing but stillness. I begin to panic.

“Please come back!”

Nothing.

I sink down to sit at the cliff’s edge.

Don’t give up, sweetie, I think.

But the truth is, I give up.

I stare down at the ground between my knees for a few minutes, thinking I’d rather be a blade of grass, an ant, a speck of dirt—anything but a girl who can’t save her mom, a twin with a missing half. I’ve tried my best and accomplished nothing. I’ve only found more trouble than I started with.

And then I feel a tickle of moist air on my cheek, and look up.

The cloud is hovering inches away from me.

I see a face loom out of it, made of mist—a round face that disintegrates and rearranges into a long and thin face, then into a bushy-browed face, and then it has no eyebrows at all. But every face appears to be a kind one. It smiles at me gently again and again as it changes.

And then a sound weaves through the mist, as if several threads of voices are joining together at once.

“Chin up,” it whispers.

The face keeps changing—one minute old, the next minute young.

“Are you a cloud shepherd?” I ask.

“We are we.” The voices gather and whisper.

Now the bushy eyebrows are back, over a bulbous nose, and another gentle smile.

“Cloud shepherds don’t save people,” I say. “But you saved me. Why?”

“We’ve watched you. We watch everyone. And we took pity. We know you are weary, young witch hunter.”

I shake my head. “I’m not a witch hunter. But can I ask you some things?”

“We will answer what we can.”

“Did my mom discover a great secret to finding and fighting the witches, or not? Is there any chance my brother is alive? Why didn’t my weapon work?” The questions come out in a rush. I can’t help it.

The cloud frowns. There is a long silence.

“We’re afraid we don’t know your brother’s fate.”

My heart sinks.

“But we can tell you a story. It begins with a lost item. Found by a man. Given to a woman.”

I wait breathlessly.

The cloud dissipates, and the face disappears completely. A moment later, a shape rises up before me—a girl, about twelve years old—all made of mist. I know instantly that it’s my mom.

Figures appear all around the girl, and by the way they circle and float, I can see they are ghosts. I smile. It’s my mom seeing ghosts, and talking to them.

The girl grows. She’s now a young woman, climbing aboard a ship. Setting off to search for witches, I guess. A few miniature clouds float in and out of the scene, high above her, with kind eyes watching her.

The clouds rearrange themselves again and again, to show my mother climbing a mountain, walking the edges of a snowy field, walking into villages, talking to people (though I can’t hear the words), sleeping in a doorway in the rain—no doubt searching for witches and their secrets. The moments rise up and then drift out of sight. My heart swells with pride in the person my mom used to be.

And then a beautiful ship rises up out of the mist, and my mom—a grown woman—stands at one of the rails. Across the deck, a figure watches her. A fisherman with a kind, familiar face. My heart flutters because I know this face by heart, even from photos. This is the moment she meets my dad. I reach my hand out and let it drop as it moves through nothing but mist.

The picture vanishes. The face of the cloud shepherd smiles at me again.

Another scene rises up, just briefly. It’s my dad, pulling in his nets near a shore.

“Once,” the cloud shepherd says, “each of the thirteen witches was given a special whistle—forged for them by the Time Witch to help them travel into the past. The Memory Thief, forgetful as she is, lost hers one night. And your father found it in his nets.”

In the scene, my dad stares at something strange and small caught in the ropes of his fishing net. Then the scene vanishes, and another appears.

Now my dad is leading my mom down to a beach under a misty full moon. He opens his hand to her, and shows her what he’s found, and my breath catches in my throat. Even in the mist I recognize it. It’s the whistle I stole long ago from my mom’s room, with the shell engraved on it. The one that sits on my shelf back home.

“How did he know about magic, if he didn’t have the sight?” I ask.

“Love gave him the sight,” the cloud shepherd whispers. “Love can sometimes make us see what our loved ones do. And so, he gifted her with the magical item he had found. And it changed everything.”

I watch as, in the scene, my mom holds the whistle to her lips, and blows. And something rises out of the water. An enormous shape emerges from the waves.

My legs go weak. I take a deep breath.

This is the secret my mom found, I realize, my heart knocking around inside me. She was never talking about my dad waiting for her, swimming in the sea. She was talking about something else entirely.

There are three things that I know at once are true:

The sea really does contain the past.

The witches are hidden in it.

And now I know how my mother planned to reach them.

I don’t know I’m crying until the face of the cloud reappears, and reaches out a hand of mist to touch my cheek, and smiles sadly at me.

“My dad drowned at sea,” I say. “He’s never coming back, is he? I thought before, it might be him in the sea, but no. He’s gone Beyond.”

The face is blinking at me, watching me with concern and kindness. It nods.

“Does he still watch over me, even though he’s gone?” I ask.

“That mystery is the beating heart of the world,” the cloud whispers. “Even we don’t know.”

I pull my knees up to my chest and wrap my arms around my knees, feeling small.

“Why did my mom’s weapon fail?” I ask.

“Simply because each hunter has to use her own weapon, not someone else’s. A weapon has to be just yours, and its power is limited only by the boundaries of your own heart.”

I take this in. It’s something I should have figured out, from reading The Witch Hunter’s Guide.

“And what’s my weapon?” I ask.

The cloud seems to shrug.

“Just take your gift and combine it with a weapon close to your heart. That’s all.”

“I’m not really gifted at anything,” I say. “Just making things up.”

The cloud smiles at this, as if I’ve said something incredibly silly. “Here’s what we’ve seen people make up: Skyscrapers. Countries. Cures. Ships that fly to the moon. It took a dream to make the first house. The first language. Made-up things make the world.” An arm of mist reaches out as if to pat my head, and though I can’t feel it, the gesture feels nice inside. “Imagining is a little like the opposite of witches, don’t you think? To stretch and grow beauty from nothing at all?”

I am silent for a moment, at a loss.

“I don’t think I can figure it out, or do any of this, on my own,” I whisper.

“You are not alone,” the cloud whispers. “Don’t you realize that now? The past and the ghosts and the trees and the bugs and the animals and the moon and the hum of things—that you are connected to all of it?”

The face scrunches up a little bit and shifts this way and that, looking around, then smiles at me. “It’s going to rain.”

And then, without warning, the face disappears, and the rain falls down around and onto me from above.

And I sit staring out at the sea, legs dangling, like I’m staring off the edge of the world.