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Hurakan said, “Zane rescued you.”
Ixtab’s eyes flicked to my dad, then back to me. “By the skin of his teeth.”
“But you were rescued,” Itzamna reminded the goddess. “We all were.” Then, turning his attention to me, he added, “There’s someone else we need to thank. Your uncle is the greatest shadow crosser I have ever seen. He truly saved us all.”
A huge balloon of pride expanded in my chest. The greatest shadow crosser ever. Knowing Hondo, he was definitely going to have that printed on new business cards.
Itzamna went on. “This is a glorious day. Let’s not ruin it with what might have happened and how close we were to annihilation, both literally and in the history books.”
“Easy for you to say, Itzamna,” Ixtab complained. “You aren’t…” She glanced down at herself and groaned. “You aren’t an adolescent!”
“You weren’t in such great shape earlier,” I said to the moon god, remembering his sickly gray self. “How’d you get better?”
“The gods might be in a weakened state,” Itzamna said, “but with so many of them awake now, the Tree has been powered up, and me as well.”
That gave me hope that everyone else would return to normal, too. I never thought I would say this, but I wanted that to happen soon, because hanging around with a bunch of angry teen gods might be worse than being with the angry old gods. “How long will…?” My eyes darted between Ixtab and Hurakan.
“We be like this?” Ixtab hissed. “It better not be long! I have an underworld to run, a spy network to oversee, demons to punish.”
“There is no way to tell,” Itzamna said, throwing a chill-out glance Ixtab’s way. “But we are facing a bigger problem.”
I clung to Fuego, wishing I never had to hear the word problem again. “What?”
“Our written history—the truth—has been completely destroyed.”
Nodding, I said, “Ixkik’ was going to make me rewrite it, to change sobrenaturals’ memories, all because—”
“You are my chosen scribe with the power of the dragon,” Itzamna said.
“Dragon this or that,” Ixtab said, flipping her hair over her shoulder. “Who cares? Someone just needs to reconstruct what was lost. Looks like that’s you, godborn.”
All six god eyes were on me. “You want me to write the history? What do I know about it? Nothing! There…there has to be someone else.”
“You’re the only one who can,” Itzamna said. “Well, technically, I could do it, but I am in serious need of a vacation and a float through some healing stardust.” With one finger, he pulled on the lower lid of his left eye. “Look at these eyes. Puffy and bloodshot!”
“You need a vacation?” Ixtab growled. “I haven’t had one in three centuries!”
As annoying as the gods were, and as tedious as it sounded to have to record centuries of history, seeing all those books go up in flames and knowing the truth could be stolen made me want to bring it back. “Okay, okay. I’ll do it. But I’m going to need some help….”
“That’s my boy,” Hurakan said, which sounded really weird coming from a guy my age. “In the meantime, we will continue what we started at SHIHOM. But the godborn training will be incomplete without the truth, and our history will be in danger until we replenish it.”
“There are other dangers,” Itzamna said.
I rubbed my eyes and wished I was back on Isla Holbox, where I could toss all these problems and dangers to the bottom of the sea.
“Don’t tell him all the horrors at once,” Ixtab said, grinning.
I looked at the moon god expectantly.
He sighed and said, “Well, it does make for a more exciting ending to this tale.”
I felt a pounding headache coming on. “Just tell me.”
“Some of the godborns took off from Montana. We don’t know where they went.”
I was totally unsurprised. After all, Serena and a few of the others had publicly declared that they wanted to take down the gods, steal all the power and magic for themselves. But where had they gone? Did they really think they could hide from the gods? Okay, maybe they could at the moment, but that moment wouldn’t last forever. “How many?” I asked.
Ixtab scowled, holding up five fingers. “I cannot wait to find the traitors and give them a long cruise down Blood River.”
