After the End

The sky is pitch black and the temperature has dropped. I continue my walk around the lake, rubbing my hands up and down my arms to warm myself, but I resolve not to return to camp until I figure this out.

I ran through my entire repertoire of Reading skills today, and none worked except the simplest stone-throw Readings. In which I confirmed things that I already knew: like my parents were still far away and Whit was still trying to reach me.

If Miles’s off-the-cuff theory has any bit of truth to it, then it’s a vicious cycle—the more I disbelieve in the Yara, the less it will work. I can’t just pick and choose what to believe.

Yes, you can! I reassure myself. Surely not everything my clan told me was lies. I have seen the Yara work. I have manipulated it myself.

But I also know that much of what I was taught was lies.

I feel my belief flicker like a flame in wind. I know the Yara exists, I insist, and imagine myself cupping my hands around the flame to protect it.

I whistle toward the woods and click my tongue, and Poe flaps down from a nearby tree to stand next to me on the pebble beach. Crouching, I comb my fingers over his ebony feathers, formulate what I’m going to do in my mind, touch my opal, and try to co

I believe, I think, and I try my hardest to push all doubts, all feelings of betrayal, as far from me as possible. Nothing happens. Not even a tingle.

I exhale deeply and imagine my tiny flame of faith expanding to the size of a forest fire, and after a second I feel the slightest of buzzes in my fingertips. Yes! I think excitedly, and try to center myself.

I look at Poe and then picture my father in my mind. Poe, can you find my father for me? I think. I imagine the desert setting and try to pass the image to Poe.

Poe stares at me and then shuffles away and starts pecking at some pebbles as if to say he couldn’t care less. Okay, I’ll try something easier then. I grasp my opal and place my hand on Poe once more, this time picturing Miles in my mind. Where is he? I think. Take me to Miles.

Poe cocks his head to one side, as if saying, You know as well as I do where Miles is. But he fluffs his wings and takes off, heading toward the camp. Adrenaline percolates through my veins, and I set off at a run, following Poe through the woods. When we get to the clearing, Poe circles the car once and then lands on the roof. He squawks and, his job complete, begins picking something from his wing with his beak.

Panting, I lean over and, looking into the car window, see that Miles has fallen asleep in the passenger’s seat with a book on his chest and the overhead light on. I ignore the fluttering in my chest as I peer in at him: his lips are slightly parted and his chest rises and falls with his shallow breaths.

I need to focus. My Conjuring worked. My powers are linked to my faith—that much is clear. And I am progressively losing my faith, not in the Yara, but in Whit and what he taught me. I have to start at square one and test what I think is true. And until I can figure out for myself what I really believe, I will need to gather every last thread of faith I still have in order to continue using my gift.

But what if my problem is much worse? What if my doubt slams down like iron bars and locks me out of my powers for good? If there’s even the slightest chance of that happening, I have a lot to do before it does.

32

MILES

I AWAKE WHEN THE COOL AIR OF THE EVENING smacks me in the face. Juneau is offering me her arm. “You’re going to have a crick in your neck and be no good for driving if you sleep like that,” she says. She shuffles me out of the car and over to the tent, where I groggily lie down on my side.

Juneau leaves and then returns with a mug of steaming liquid. “I made some tea. This will help you sleep better.” It tastes like licorice and marshmallow, and I drain the whole thing before lying back down.

“I’m sorry if it seemed like I didn’t believe you,” I say sleepily. “It’s just a lot to hear all at once. But I definitely wasn’t making fun of you. I’m only trying to help.”

Her lips curl up on the edges and she looks almost embarrassed. “I know. I could tell,” she says, and takes my hand in hers.

The touch of our skin sets off a reaction in me. I am immediately awake . . . 100 percent present. And it feels like a whirlwind of thorns is whipping around in my chest, stinging me all over from the inside. That makes it sound painful. It isn’t. It’s the kind of itching sensation that makes you want to do something crazy. That spurs you forward to act on an idea you didn’t even know was in your head.

Or maybe I did know it, but have pushed it away because Juneau was my ticket to redemption with my dad and I didn’t want to mess that up. Now that she’s told me her story, I’m certain there’s been some kind of mix-up. No matter what Dad says, she’s no spy. Okay, she’s been raised to believe some pretty weird things, but that’s clearly not her fault. And for her to have gone through what she has, Juneau must be incredibly strong. And brave.

I realize all this just as I notice that, for once, she’s dropped her defensiveness. Her tawny eyes brush my face with compassion, and I have an overwhelming urge to pull her to me, take her in my arms, and kiss her.

33

JUNEAU

I SHOULDN’T HAVE HELD HIS HAND. IT DID SOMETHING to him. It did something to both of us. It set off this kind of lightning storm all over my body. The electricity generated when our skin touched was like the tingle I feel when I co

I was just trying to reassure him. To get him to trust me. Saying I might have overdone it would be an understatement. Because one second I was holding his hand, seeing him once again like Nome would—I couldn’t help it. He looked so sleepy and defenseless . . . and utterly gorgeous.

And the next second his hand is behind my head and he’s eased me down on top of him and we’re kissing . . . kissing like crazy. My whole body’s buzzing, and all I want is to keep pressing my chest against his and lacing my legs through his and winding my fingers through his beautiful curly hair and feeling his lips brush mine for the rest of the night. But I can’t. I can’t do this. I have to . . .

“Stop,” I say, and push myself up onto my hands and knees, perching above him. Miles reaches up for me, yearning written all over his face, but I shake my head. “No,” I say, and pivot so that I’m sitting next to him in the tent.

His expression is a mixture of regret, confusion, and disappointment.

“I’m sorry, I can’t,” I say.

“No, that’s totally okay,” he says, raising his hands to his forehead and squeezing his eyes closed. We’re both breathing heavily, and my heart is hammering a million miles an hour. I scramble to the mouth of the tent, push through the flap, and then peer in at him once I’m safely out.

“Are you all right?” he asks.

I nod and zip the tent flap up behind me, shutting him in from the night.

I walk over to the fire and flop down in front of it. This is too much. Too much at once. I run my tongue over my burning lips and think of Miles’s mouth on mine, and my body flares with heat.

Miles wasn’t my first kiss. But kissing Kenai was different. He was a friend, and Nome and I had talked him into trying it out. It’s not like we had a large selection of potential kissing partners in our clan. Besides, Kenai was the only boy I could kiss without it meaning anything. It was kind of nice, in a friendly, warm-hug kind of way. But it was nothing like the searing heat of kissing Miles.