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Then came the final visual round. Tom Horner held up a laminated card with a diagram on it: a rope configuration, lines crossing in a specific sequence.

“Name this knot, used to join two lines of unequal thickness.”

Zara had the pen out of Tempest’s hand before she could reach for it. In four seconds flat she had reproduced the diagram freehand on the answer card, labeling it in her looping hand: Sheet bend.

Tempest stared at her.

“I told you,” Zara said pleasantly. “The bones know.”

By the final round it was impossible for anyone to catch them. The margin was too great. Tempest’s heart crashed in her chest as Tom Horner crossed to their side of the room to announce the winners. Zara seized her hand and swung it high.

“We did it!”

The envelope with her half of the split contained two hundred dollars in cash. It wasn’t the windfall she’d been hoping for, but it would get her to the next stop, wherever that turned out to be. She tucked it into her jacket and tried not to think too hard about the uncertain future.

The afterparty migrated to the parking lot. Zara and her sisters moved outside with the ease of people who did this sort of thing regularly, pulling Tempest along in their wake. Someone’s car had its doors open and music filtered out across the parking lot. Asha and Nell commandeered a spot near the center of the lot and produced folding stools, including one for Tempest.

“There’s supposed to be a meteor shower tonight,” Asha said. “Keep your eyes open.”

“Keep your eyes on that bus!” Zara pointed at the rusty yellow Bluebird parked beneath the trees. “What a beauty. Who drove here in that?”

“She’s mine,” Tempest said. She tipped her head back to scan the sky and caught a flash of light at the edge of her vision. “Look! Was that…?”

“First shooting star of the night,” Asha confirmed. She raised her drink. “Well done, bright eyes!”

Tempest felt it again. That warmth. That sense of familiarity she couldn’t account for.

“Have we met before?” she asked. “In Portland, perhaps?”

“Who knows,” Nell said. “We do get around.”

They all leaned back to watch the stars, which were coming more quickly now.

The migration to the bus happened gradually. Zara wandered over first, pressed her face to the glass, and called the others over. Soon all three of them were standing beside the Bluebird school bus with drinks in hand, calling out titles of books they recognized through the windows.

“Could we get a tour?” Nell asked.

“Sure,” Tempest said. “Just don’t startle my parrot. She’s probably still napping.”

“This is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” Zara announced, stepping aboard. Tempest lingered on the step. “What’s she called?”

Tempest looked back up at the sky. Another star crossed above the tree line, the brightest of the night.

“The Stardust Library,” she said.

Zara turned to look at her with great seriousness. “You must let me paint her. Right now. I have everything I need in my bag. Please?”

Tempest opened her mouth to object and couldn’t find the words. She’d been saving for months to get the bus repainted. The old yellow paint was so ugly and prone to rust no matter how often she sanded and treated it.

“You’ve already changed my life once tonight,” Zara said. “Let me do something nice for you in return.”

“I want a peek inside! Can we get a tour?” Nell was already standing and folding her stool.

Asha and Nell browsed the shelves while Zara painted—deep blue across the side panels, a name picked out in white and gold lettering, small stars scattered in the spaces between. Zara didn’t sketch a design first. She didn’t need to. She worked quickly and easily, as though the brush were simply an extension of her hand.

“Can we buy these?” Asha asked. She and Nell had pulled a small stack of novels from the shelves. “Are they for sale?”

Tempest thought about it. It was one thing to travel with a bus full of books that weren’t entirely hers to carry. It was another to sell them. But she wanted them to find good homes.