not, my powers were wild. The elements called to me. She feared for my
life. Rightfully so, I suppose.”
“What made you stay?” I ask.
“Your father.” She looks pleased with the shock on my face. “That
same night, we were at a social circle. We had to make the rounds, so
our mom wouldn’t suspect anything. You always had to be one step ahead
of her. She had the Sight, like Rose.
“So at the circle, there’s this handsome guy with big, gray eyes
and creamy, light skin. Real fresh, you know? He spoke about all these
hopes for all magical kind. How we needed to come together with not
just brujos and brujas, but with the half-beings. I thought he was
cute.”
“Gross.”
“But your mom, man. She loved him even before he started speaking.
She loved him even more when he walked up to her and introduced
himself. I knew I couldn’t leave. If I left, Carmen would have come
with me, and I just couldn’t do that to her.”
“Do you think you made the right choice?”
She looks at my face for a long time. “I don’t regret staying. I
regret a lot of things, but staying, being part of your lives, I never
regretted that. I want you to know that we could have left. The
thought was there. You weren’t the only one who felt like the magic
was too much.”
“I wish she’d told me. Maybe I wouldn’t have been so weak.”
She grabs my face in her palms. “Never, ever could you be weak. We
all think about leaving, Alejandra. We all get scared and want to turn
away, but it isn’t always strength that makes you stay. Strength is
also making the decision to change your destiny.”
“But look at what I did! My powers are gone.”
“That’s where you’re wrong.” She stands and dusts off her white
dress. She holds out her hands for me to take.
“What do you mean I’m wrong?” I ask.
“The Deos act through us. Only my own blood can free me, and here
you are. You were born a bruja, Alejandra.” She looks at the big sky.
“Your powers are at the Tree of Souls, but your body is still a
conduit. Your body is made to hold your personal brand of magic. It’ll
always be yours. That’s why the Devourer constantly needs to feed to
accumulate power. With every bit she consumes, it takes a toll on her
physical body because the power is stolen. What happens when you don’t
feed a fire?”
“It burns out,” Rishi says.
“What do I do in the meantime?” I ask.
Aunt Rosaria grips my hands tighter. I jump with the shock of
power. “You’re going to borrow some of mine.”
36
She ate the stars and swallowed the earth.
She is the girl with all the power.
- Witchsong #5, Book of Cantos
Aunt Ro’s power floods my body. It’s familiar but foreign all at
once, like listening to my grandparents speak in the Old Tongue and
understanding what they say even if I can’t pronounce the words
myself.
Every time I look at her, I’m filled with more wonder. She’s
alive. I don’t know if I’ll ever be okay. I’m not sure if this will
work, but Aunt Ro says to trust her, and I do. The first step is
breaking her free. I pull the borrowed magic and rip the chains from
the ground. I think of Agosto and the Meadowkin. I whisper a prayer to
El Guardia for their safety. The chains break apart and melt into the
ground. I hiss as the recoil hits me harder, and my hands glow as
black marks burn farther along my skin.
The labyrinth shudders around us. For a long time, I wanted
nothing more than to be ordinary. As we run through the changing paths
of this maze, I realize I was never ordinary to begin with. We are
built a certain way, and the only thing I regret is that it took me so
long to see that. The Devour tried to take that from me when she took
my family. I’m going to get it back.
“Has the Devourer seen you here?” I ask. “I mean, the Deos put
both of you here.”
“The Devourer was put here by her crimes in her realm, your human
realm,” Aunt Ro says. “I have a different path. When Xara discovered
she could make herself stronger by feeding off the Tree, she thought
she could become so great, no Deo could imprison her here. She
recruits vulnerable creatures in other realms and uses them to bring
others she feeds off here.”
Nova . An unblessed brujo. A marked brujo. A boy who wanted more,
to never be powerless. A boy who didn’t want to die.
“So if she has enough power, she can break out of Los Lagos?”
“I believe so,” Aunt Ro says. “Power is addictive. She needs it to
survive, just as much as she needs it to destroy. The only way for her
to break free from her punishment, to rule with unlimited strength, is
to become a god herself.”
“Is that even possible?”
“By definition of immortality, yes. With the right amount of
powers, she could. Our family is among the oldest lines of brujas in
the world. She’d get pretty damn close.”
No , I think. She won’t.
We stop at a fork in the labyrinth.
“Remember what I said,” Aunt Ro tells me. “Don’t stand in one
place for too long. If you get taken by the vines, stab the thickest
part closest to the ground. Even plants have feelings, after all.
“Get to the tree, Alejandra,” she tells me.
“Keep Rishi safe,” I tell her.
Rishi kisses my cheek, and then they’re gone. A hedge separates
us. I run. With Aunt Ro’s magic, my strength is renewed. I skid on the
ground as a wall appears in front of me. The labyrinth blocks my way,
creating a perfect square around me.
“Alejandra,” he says.
The ground swims beneath me as I look at his face.
He hasn’t aged a day. It’s like looking into a mirror when he
smiles-same teeth, same smile, same shape of our eyes. His are gray
like Lula’s. His hair is combed back. I can smell the gel he used
every morning, the spice in the aftershave he used after making his
face silky smooth and trimming his mustache. I remember the way his
mustache tickled my skin when he’d kiss me good night.
“It’s all right,” my father says.
“It is not all right.”
He looks around him. “I can take you to the others. I know how to
get us back home.”
I find myself breathing hard. I can’t stop my heart from racing in
my chest. Can’t stop the questions from racing through my head. Why
did you leave?
“You’re not real,” I whisper.
I can feel the shadows surround us.
Look twice. Look twice. Look twice.
“Listen to me, Alejandra,” he says.
It sounds just like him, I think. It even has the scars on his
hands. The laugh lines around his eyes. It looks just like him.
“Listen to me, nena,” my father says. “I had to leave. Leaving was
the only way your power would become as great as it is now. From the
moment Rose was born, I knew my children would have a bigger destiny
than I ever did. Me? I thought I’d change the world. But I couldn’t. I
was never good enough for you, for your mother. You made me
feel…inadequate. I couldn’t look at you without remembering my own
failure. I tried to make the world better for you, and I couldn’t.”
“Stop it.” I shut my eyes and stumble back.
“I left because I could never love you,” he says. His body becomes
straighter. The smile fades. “No one can.”
A shudder passes over me. I’ve wanted to believe this for so
long-that there is something inside of me that is so wretched, no one
can love me. But that can’t be true. My whole family, living and dead,
protected me from the Devourer. Rishi followed me into a black hole. I