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“What, you’re like secret service for hire?”
“I am a descendant of the Great Soothsayer’s secret keepers. It’s my ancestral legacy,” she said, sitting taller. “I’m protecting a secret that I and those who went before me are bound to keep.”
Heat flashed through me. “And you never thought to tell me any of this?”
“It wasn’t time.”
“Why’s it time now?”
“When the demon runner escalated things so close to the eclipse, I knew the prophecy was beginning to unfold.”
I didn’t tell her I was the one who escalated things when I cleared the path to the cave so old Pukeface could send his stupid distress signals to his lame-brain demon runners.
I scratched my head. “So let me get this straight. All these Maya—you, Brooks, the demon runner—are here because the god of death has been living in a magical artifact in my volcano for hundreds of years, waiting for me to let him out?”
“Yes. Haven’t you ever wondered why you can see so clearly in the dark?” Ms. Cab asked.
“How did you…?”
She let out a long breath. “I know everything about you, Zane Obispo. I was there when you were born.”
I wanted to run home and confront my mom about my supernatural dad to see if she could give me any more details, but right now, I had a more important goal. Okay, maybe two goals: find Rosie, and stay alive.
I sat up straighter. “I need to go to Xib’alb’a. Can you help me?”
Ms. Cab shook her head vigorously. “You can’t go to the land of
the dead, Zane.”
“Because I’m not dead?”
“Because it’s too big a risk. They don’t exactly throw out the welcome mat for the living, and if you did show up, well, the underworld would suck you in and never let you go. The inhabitants simply adore flesh….It’s quite a delicacy, you know.”
I held my hand up in sickened protest. “I get it, I get it.”
“I’m afraid you’re going to have to accept the fact that Rosie’s gone.”
Ms. Cab looked genuinely sorry, but her words made me want to scream. Rosie was not gone! She couldn’t be.
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Fine,” I managed. “Then you could bring her back. I mean, you’re a powerful seer.” (Yeah, I know it was a stretch.) “I mean, they might need someone with your skill set, right? You could use that to maybe negotiate or something.”
“Zane, we have to focus on what’s most pressing—keeping you safe.”
I sprang off the couch and started to pace like a maniac. “Rosie needs me! I don’t care about staying safe.”
This wasn’t happening. I know it was selfish, maybe even stupid, but I couldn’t get Rosie off my mind. I remembered the day I found her and how I’d pulled stickers out of her paws and given her a bath. She’d been trembling all over, so I’d rolled her in a towel and held her close and promised I’d never let anyone hurt her again.
I was a liar.
Ms. Cab unrolled the scroll she had placed on the coffee table. Pointing to a series of odd symbols, she said, “Tomorrow is the solar eclipse. The day of reckoning. The day of numbers. It’s when the Prophecy of Fire will finally unfold. We may need a good escape route.”
I wiped my sweaty, sticky palms across my jeans. “But we still have a few hours left! There must be something we can do to get Rosie back.”
“I don’t want to give you false hope, Zane. Even if I could get her back, she wouldn’t be the same dog. She’d be…” She hesitated. “Changed.”
“Changed how?”
“I don’t know. But I’ve seen a few souls brought back, and they were never the same.”
