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“Hold the fire in your hand now, girl” Jilo’s whisper washed over me “Don’t let it just take you in You control it this time Don’t you enter its world till you ready to control your time there”
The sh I knew its heat must have been intense It danced in my palm as it tried to pull my consciousness back—back into a iven ues of fire that allowed me to relive experiences from our childhood in vibrant detail Now she was lost to me, torn not only from this world, but from our very reality No one knehere she was, or even if she was
These bright flickers were the last of her ic left on our plane, and they strained to touch their source like iron shavings reaching toward a led against the fla to descend into the past, step-by-step, this ti lost in the hts had given their lives one by one as they tried to guide htly, but they flickered out too quickly forled Counting this one, the flame that quivered in my palm, only five remained
“Hold on to the light in your right hand, and you listen to Jilo’s voice, hear?” She grabbed htly I squeezed back “Let Jilo’s voice be yo’ anchor in this world No need to rush, irl, no need to rush”
Jilo’s language and her insistence on speaking about herself in the third person belied her education I knew for a fact that she had graduated froree in chemistry, but due to her sex and skin color, she had been born about two decades too early to follow her drea a medical doctor Instead she beca a persona around herself that matched both the expectations and superstitions of those who sought her services I was one of the feho had ever been allowed a peek behind this mask
Jilo took a deep, slow breath, reainst th, and their frequency was diun to grow before y of Maisie’s spell froy slowed and began to stretch out before an to turn, stretching out and glowing like a coan to seek its source, reaching out in all directions until it found Maisie I honedthe flame’s path, but it was too late The fla like a nova An instant later it died So, resisting the flames’ pull caused theet the joy of reliving a beloved childhood memory Just blackness
“We got closer that tih we both kneas a lie We’d made it this far twice before She stood and hobbled over to the table where the Ball jar that held the rehtly on the as you are,” she said, but all the while her eyes never left mybetorldsthere I worried too, but I was also worried that I was running out of time to find Maisie
“I appreciate what you are doing forsto now, but I could already tell thatboy
“Jilo know you do, girl,” she said, and then said again in a tender voice, “She know you do” She put her hand on her hip, rubbing away at some ache “Jilo still think you should tell yo’ family what you up to They witches, they have a much easier time helpin’ you find your sister than Jilo”
“I don’t want to involve them The other witch fa Maisie back into our died the line, they say, weakened it” Millennia ago, powerful witches, including y to protect our world We called this barrier “the line” The beings who’d once ruled the earth—call theious, or trans-dimensional entities if you put your faith in science—had set the in huenesis of witches than in that of regular folk Eventually itches rebelled, chasing the serpents out of Eden The line prevented the back “My aunts and uncle would stop ht not have helpedmy sister
Whilethat she’d earned any punish her usual blind allegiance to the united witch fa waves Uncle Oliver wasn’t as dead set against finding Maisie, but he didn’t think there would beout the patch of lahere Maisie had last stood before the power of the angry line threw her far from our world He said the earth there had been burnt black several feet deep, and it wasn’t even worth trying to plant anything He’d returned the daed soil, laid down pavers to cover the spot, and added a sundial I guess it constituted his own form of a memorial No, I knew my family would not support my clandestine efforts, and even if they did, the other anchors—the witches like myself who had been chosen to maintain and protect the line—had forbidden any efforts to bring Maisie back into our reality, fearing she would do e to the line
“Jilo think maybe they should stop you This sister of yours, she tried to kill you”
“She didn’t knohat she was doing,” I objected “She was under the influence of a de you yourself nurtured and used to spy on , she was my twin Fraternal twin, yes, but still we’d coether If I didn’t look for a reason to forgive her, who else would?
“Jilo done told you she sorry about that She had no idea that yo’ sister had got ”