Didn’t I have a right to know how his story ended? It couldn’t have been much worse than mine, could it?
“I don’t really know. They took him away to the Far Keep. We couldn’t be together, but I’m sure you know that. I learned it myself, the hard way,” she said, her voice sad and far away.
Her words caught in my mind, snagging on others I’d tried to push off until now. The Far Keep. The Keepers of The Caster Chronicles—the same ones my mom refused to talk about. Genevieve didn’t look like she wanted to elaborate either.
Why didn’t anyone want to talk about the Far Keep? What were The Caster Chronicles really about?
I looked from Genevieve to the lemon trees. Here we were, at the site of the first big fire. It was the place where her family’s land had burned, and where Lena tried to face off against Sarafine for the first time.
Funny how history repeated itself around here.
Funnier still how I was about the last person in Gatlin to figure that out.
But I had learned a few things the hard way myself. “It wasn’t your fault. The Book of Moons sort of plays tricks on people. I don’t think it was ever meant for Light Casters. I think it wanted to turn you—” She shot me a look, and I stopped talking. “Sorry, ma’am.”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. For the first hundred years or so, I felt that way. Like that book had stolen something from me. Like I’d been duped…” Her voice trailed off.
She was right. She had gotten the short stick.
“But good or bad, I made my own choices. They’re all I have now. It’s my cross to bear, and I’ll be the one to bear it.”
“But you did it out of love.” So did Lena and Amma.
“I know. That’s what helps me bear it. I just wish my Ethan didn’t have to bear it, too. The Far Keep is a cruel place.” She looked down at her grave. “What’s done is done. There’s no cheating death any more than you can cheat The Book of Moons. Someone always has to pay the price.” She smiled sadly. “I guess you know that, or you wouldn’t be here.”
“I guess I do.”
I knew it better than anyone.
A twig snapped. Then a voice called out, even louder.
“Stop following me, Link.”
Genevieve Duchannes disappeared at the sound of the words. I didn’t know how she did it, but I was so startled that I felt myself start slipping away, too.
I clung to the voice—because it was familiar, and I would’ve recognized it anywhere. And because it sounded like home, chaos and all.
It was the voice that anchored me in the Mortal realm now, the same way it had kept my heart bound to Gatlin when I had been alive.
L.
I froze. I couldn’t move, even though she couldn’t see me.
“You tryin’ to give me the slip?” Link was stomping around behind Lena, trying to catch up with her as she made her way through the lemon trees. Lena shook her head like she was trying to shake Link.
Lena.
She pushed through the brush, and I caught a glimpse of gold and green eyes. That was it; I couldn’t help myself.
“Lena!” I shouted as loud as I could, my voice ringing across the white sky.
I took off running across the stubbly frozen ground, through the weeds and all the way down the rocky path. I flung myself into her arms… and went flying to the ground behind her.
“I’m not just trying. I’m giving you the slip.” Lena’s voice floated over me.
I had almost forgotten. I wasn’t really here, not in a way she could feel. I lay back on the ground, trying to catch my breath. Then I propped myself up on my elbows, because Lena was really there, and I didn’t want to miss a second of it.
The way she moved, the tilt of her head, and the soft lilt of her voice—she was perfect, full of life and beauty and everything I couldn’t have anymore.
Everything that didn’t belong to me.
I’m here. Right here. Can you feel me, L?
“I wanted to check on him. I haven’t been out here all day. I don’t want him to be lonely, or bored, or mad. Whatever he’s feeling.” Lena knelt next to my grave, next to me, grabbing at handfuls of cold grass.
I’m not lonely. But I miss you.
Link rubbed his hand through his hair. “You just went to check on his house. Then you checked on the water tower and your bedroom, and now you’re checkin’ on his grave. Maybe you should find somethin’ to do other than checkin’ on Ethan.”
“Maybe you should find something to do other than bothering me, Link.”
“I promised Ethan I’d look after you.”
“You don’t understand,” she said.
Link looked as annoyed as Lena seemed frustrated. “What are you talkin’ about? You think I don’t understand? He was my best friend since kindergarten.”
“Don’t say it like that. He’s still your best friend.”
“Lena.” Link wasn’t getting anywhere.
“Don’t Lena me. Out of everyone, I thought you would understand how things work around here.” Her face was pale, and her mouth looked funny, like she was about to smile or cry, only she couldn’t decide which.
Lena, it’ll be okay. I’m right here.
But even as I thought about it, I knew nobody could fix this. The truth was, the moment I stepped off that water tower everything changed, and nothing was going to change back.
Not anytime soon.
I never knew how bad it would feel from this side. At least for me. Because I could see it all, but I couldn’t do a thing to change it.
I reached for her hand, sliding my fingers around hers. My hands slipped right through, but if I really concentrated, I could still feel them, heavy and solid.
For the very first time, nothing shocked me. No burning. It wasn’t like sticking my fingers in an electrical outlet.
I guess being dead will do that for you.
“Lena, help me out here. I don’t speak chick—you know that—and Rid isn’t here to translate.”
“Chick?” Lena shot him a withering look.
“Aw, come on. I barely speak English, unless we’re talkin’ about the Lowcountry kind.”
“I thought you went looking for Ridley,” Lena said.
“I did, all through the Tunnels. Everywhere Macon sent me and a few places he’d never let me go. Holy hell—I haven’t found anyone who’s seen her.”
Lena sat down and straightened the line of rocks around my grave. “I need her to come back. Ridley knows how it all works. She’ll help me figure out what to do.”
“What are you talkin’ about?” Link sat down next to her, and next to me.
Just like old times, when the three of us would sit together on the bleachers at Jackson High. They just didn’t know it.
“He’s not dead. Just like Uncle Macon wasn’t dead. Ethan will come back—you’ll see. He’s probably trying to find me right now.”
I squeezed her hand. She was right about that, at least.
“Don’t you think you’d be able to tell, if he was?” Link sounded a little doubtful. “If he was here, don’t you think he’d give us a shout-out or somethin’ like that?”
I tried her hand again, but it was no use.
Will you two pay attention?
Lena shook her head, oblivious. “It’s not like that. I’m not saying he’s sitting here next to us or something.”
But I was. Sitting next to them or something.
Guys? I’m right here?
Even though I was Kelting, I felt like I was shouting.
“Yeah? How do you know where he is or isn’t? If you’re so sure and all?” Link’s Sunday school background wasn’t helping him out here. He was probably busy imagining houses made of clouds, and cherubs with wings.
“Uncle Macon said that new spirits don’t know where they are or what they’re doing. They barely know how they died or what happened to them in real life. It’s upsetting, suddenly finding yourself in the Otherworld. Ethan might not even know who he is yet, or who I am.”
I knew who she was. How could I forget something like that?
“Yeah? Well, say you’re right. If that’s the case, you have nothin’ to worry about. Liv told me that she’d find him. She has that watch a hers all tweaked up, like some kind a Ethan Wate–ometer.”
Lena sighed. “I wish it was that simple.” She reached for the wooden cross. “This thing’s crooked again.”
Link looked frustrated. “Yeah? Well, there’s no merit badge for grave diggin’. Not in Gatlin’s pack meetin’s.”
“I’m talking about the cross, not the grave.”
“You’re the one who wouldn’t let us get a stone,” Link said.
“He doesn’t need a gravestone when he’s not—”
Then her hand froze, because she noticed. The silver button wasn’t where she’d left it.
Of course it wasn’t. It was where I dropped it.
“Link, look!”
“It’s a cross. Or two sticks, dependin’ on how you look at it.” Link squinted. He was starting to tune out; I could tell by the glazed look in his eyes, the one I’d seen on every school day.
“Not that.” Lena pointed. “The button.”
“Yep. It’s a button, all right. Any way you slice it.” Link was staring at Lena like she was suddenly the dense one. It was probably a terrifying thought.
“It’s my button. And that’s not where I put it.”
Link shrugged. “So?”
“Don’t you get it?” Lena sounded hopeful.
“Not usually.”
“Ethan’s been here. He moved it.”
Hallelujah, L. It’s about time. We were making some progress here.
I held my arms out to her, and she threw her arms around Link and hugged him tight. Figures.
She pulled back from Link, excited.
“Hey now.” Link looked embarrassed. “It could have been the wind. It could have been—I don’t know—wildlife or somethin’.”
“It wasn’t.” I knew the mood she was in. There was nothing anyone could say to change her mind, no matter how irrational it seemed.
“Seem pretty sure a that.”
“I am.” Lena’s cheeks were pink, and her eyes were bright. She opened her notebook, unclipping the Sharpie from her charm necklace with one hand. I smiled to myself, because I’d given her that Sharpie at the top of the Summerville water tower, not so long ago.
I winced at the thought now.
Lena scribbled something and ripped out the page of her notebook. She used a rock to hold the note on top of the cross.
The paper fluttered in the cool breeze but remained where she’d left it.
She wiped a stray tear and smiled.
The paper had only one word on it, but we both knew what it meant. It was a reference to one of the first conversations we’d ever had, when she told me what it said on the poet Bukowski’s grave. Only two words: Don’t try.
But the torn piece of paper on my grave was christened with only one word, in all caps. Still damp and still smelling like Sharpie.