Amma pointed at Macon. “He’s the one tryin’ to hurt my boy and take him outta this world. You stop him! Do what’s right!”
The Greats stared down at Macon, and for a second I held my breath. Sulla had strands of beads wrapped around her wrist, like a rosary from a religion all her own. Delilah and Ivy were at her sides, watching Macon.
But Uncle Abner was looking right at me, his eyes searching mine. They were huge and brown and full of questions. I wanted to answer them, but I wasn’t sure what he was asking.
He found the answers somehow, because he turned to Sulla and spoke to her in Gullah.
“Do what’s right!” Amma called out into the darkness.
The Greats looked at Amma and joined hands. Then they slowly turned their backs to her. They were doing what was right.
Amma let out a strangled scream and dropped to her knees. “No!”
The Greats were still holding hands, facing the moon, when they disappeared.
Macon put his hand on my shoulder. “I’ll take care of Amarie, Ethan. Whether she wants me to or not.”
I started walking toward the rusty metal ladder.
“Do you want me to come with you?” John called after me.
I shook my head. This was something I had to do alone. As alone as you can be, when half of your soul is trailing you everywhere you go.
“Ethan—” It was Macon. I held the side of the ladder. I couldn’t turn around.
“So long, Mr. Wate.” That was it, a handful of meaningless words. All there was left to say.
“You’ll take care of her for me.” It wasn’t a question.
“I will, son.”
I tightened my hands on the ladder in front of me.
“No! My boy!” I heard Amma screaming, and the sound of her feet kicking as Macon held her back.
I started climbing.
“Ethan Lawson Wate—” With every ragged scream, I pulled myself higher. The same thought playing over and over again, in my mind.
The right thing and the easy thing are never the same.
Finally
I was standing on the top of the white water tower, facing the moon. I had no shadow, and if there were any stars, I couldn’t see them. Summerville was stretched out before me, a scattering of tiny lights, all the way to the blackness of the lake.
This had been our happy place, mine and Lena’s. One of them, at least. But I was alone now. I wasn’t feeling happy. I wasn’t feeling anything but fear—and like I wanted to throw up.
I could still hear Amma screaming.
I knelt for a second, resting my hands on the painted metal. I looked down and saw a heart, drawn in black Sharpie. I smiled, remembering, and stood up.
It is time. There is no turning back now.
I stared out at the tiny lights, waiting to get up the courage to do the unthinkable. The dread churned in my stomach, heavy and wrong.
But this was right.
As I closed my eyes, I felt the arms slam into my waist, knocking the air out of me, dragging me down to the metal ladder. I caught a glimpse of him—of me—when my jaw hit the side of the railing, and I stumbled.
He was trying to stop me.
I tried to throw him off. I leaned forward and saw my Chucks kicking. Then I saw his Chucks kicking. They were so old and thrashed they could have been mine. This was how I remembered it from the dream. This was how it was supposed to be.
What are you doing?
This time, he was asking me.
I threw him against the floor, and he landed on his back. I grabbed the collar of his shirt, and he grabbed mine.
We looked into each other’s eyes, and he saw the truth.
We were both going to die. It seemed like we should be together when it happened.
I pulled out the old Coke bottle Amma had left sitting on the kitchen table earlier. If a whole bottle tree could catch a whole lot of lost souls, maybe one Coke bottle could hold on to mine.
I’ve been waiting.
I saw his face change.
His eyes widen.
He lunged at me.
I wouldn’t let go.
We stared into each other’s eyes and clawed at
each other’s throats.
As we rolled over the edge of the water tower
and fell
the
whole
way
down,
I
was
only
thinking
one
thing
.
.
.
L
E
N
A
Nineteen Moons—
Acknowledgments
Three Moons and more than 1,600 pages from the day we sat down to prove to a few smack-talking teenagers that we could write a book, our extended Caster family couldn’t even fit on one or two pages, if we tried to name you all.
We are grateful to all of our incredibly talented publishers in the thirty-eight countries that have welcomed the Beautiful Creatures novels into their world. You have shown our readers, ourselves, and the Casters of Gatlin County many kindnesses. We are grateful to our writer and reader friends, our agent and editor friends, our online and marketing/PR friends, our teacher and librarian friends, and our bookstore friends. We owe a huge debt to our translator friends, particularly Dr. Sara Lindheim, our Classicist and Keeper. More than anything, we are grateful to the teens (and the teens at heart) who read our books, and particularly our Caster Girl & Boy beta readers, who are infamously brutal editors and who, we hope, will one day make other writers weep more loudly than they have us. Good Lord willin’ and the creek don’t rise.
Finally, we are grateful to our families, our tribes, our inner circles—all of you who already know this means you because you’re probably sitting here while we’re writing this. Our books are about holding on to your family and finding your tribe, more than anything else. To us, that is magic. It took us a long time to find you, and we love you all.
Emma, May, Kate & Lewis; Nick, Stella & Alex—
We love you first, best, and last.
Contents
Front Cover Image
Welcome
Dedication
Epigraph
BEFORE: Sugar and Salt
9.07: Linkubus
9.07: Mortal Girls
9.07: Stonewalling
9.07: Off Route 9
9.12: Glass Houses and Stones
9.12: Adam and Eve
9.15: Izabel
9.15: The City That Care Forgot
9.15: Wheel of Fate
9.19: The Far Keep
9.19: The Devil You Know
9.19: Winds of Hell
9.25: Ladies of the House
9.26: Visiting Hours
9.28: End of Days
9.28: Jeopardy
10.04: Rubbery Chicken
10.09: Catfight
10.09: Good-Eye Side
10.09: Reckoning
10.09: Temporis Porta
10.13: Golden Ticket
10.18: A Real Bad Girl
10.18: Hostage
10.19: The Ultimate Weapon
10.24: The One Who Is Two
11.01: Crucibles
11.01: Demon Queen
11.01: Bad-Eye Side
11.20: The Next Generation
11.24: More Wrong Than Right
12.06: Fractured Soul
12.07: Cards of Providence
12.12: Slush Ball
12.12: A Light in the Dark
12.13: Tears and Rain
12.13: The Verdict
12.13: Perfidia
12.13: The Day After Forever
12.14: Demon Door
12.17: Passing Strange
12.19: Cream of Grief
12.20: Hybrid
12.20: The Wrong One
12.21: Plain English
12.21: The Last Game