Chapter 31

CHAPTER 31

ANTONELA AND I ARE BOTH smoky shadows, our shapes identical silhouettes. I look down at my purple form in awe, my gaze jumping back and forth between it and my body lying unconscious on the floor.

This doesn't feel real. Am I dead? How do I get back to myself?

"How is this happening?" Antonela asks me, and I know she's not the one doing this. As she follows my gaze, my body looks vulnerable and unprotected.

The lights flicker, and we look around us.

This is the castle's doing.

La Sombra has been leading me to Antonela since I arrived. The purple room gave me the photos, the letter in the journal room revealed I had a sister, the mirror room showed me Antonela's past, and my dreams shared memories of our childhood together. Brálaga told me they are partly this castle, which means this place is in league with them. It keeps us chained to Brálaga's vision.

This is how the cycle continues.

The blood we've fed la Sombra has made it a real-life member of the family, and it wants what any creature wants—to survive and reproduce.

We are its children. If it wanted to, the castle could eat the whole world—but it doesn't. Because it loves us. And in our own sick way, we love it. This place gives us shelter and purpose.

We are cursed with the castle's love.

"I don't want either of us to die, and I know you don't, either," I say to Antonela, subtly moving closer to my body to shield it from her. "Today is our eighteenth birthday. We should be celebrating, not fighting. We can figure this out together if you can just have some patience."

I hold out a purple smoke hand to her in an offer of peace.

"There is nothing to figure out," she says, leaving me hanging. "I must have your body in order to achieve my goal."

"You mean Brálaga's goal." I start moving toward her to lead us away from my body. When I get too close, she pulls back, keeping a buffer between us. She must've picked up more than a few defensive mechanisms at that school.

"You have been used by Brálaga and Teo, but you're free now," I tell her. "You can do what you want. After being alone your whole life, don't you want a family? A sister ?"

"I want power."

"You told Sebastián that he opened you to new feelings."

She stops moving, the shadow beast a sore spot for her. I shrink the distance between us to three feet, and still she doesn't budge. She waits in silence, as if daring me to come closer.

I stay where I am. "Give me the chance to do the same for you. I can show you how it feels to be loved —"

" Bast knows what it is like to grow up among monsters, trapped in others' power grids, the prisoner of a fortress you cannot escape," she says, her voice a snarl. " You understand nothing . You are innocent, gullible, young. The only one of us who has anything to teach the other is me to you, so get out of my body."

Before I can even think to protect myself, she jabs a fist into my gut, and I double over in pain.

My vision goes dark, and I'm in a black space that is pure grief. I feel every bad feeling I've ever had sucking me down, every depressive thought, every betrayal, mad moment, sadness, nightmare—

Only the feelings are not mine.

They're hers .

Five-year-old Antonela stands amid black flames as the spell sends her to the other castle. She is terrified, crying, hysterical, as the world spins around her, and then she's in and out of consciousness.

She sees fragments of scenes. A door opens, and hooded giants pull her through. She opens her eyes to find she is trapped in a coffin. She is being bathed by a tall hooded being.

She finds herself in a space with other young beings, and none of them look like her. They have things like horns, or fangs, or claws, or wings. She has no recollection of anything except for this moment, this home, this family.

Antonela grows with her cousins, brought up by their hooded instructors. Yet she and the others do not age at the same speed, and she gets left behind.

The others are constantly picking on her. They throw things at Antonela, they beat her, they set her hair on fire, they burn her skin—

"Enough!" I shout, breaking free of her memories.

"You cannot even stomach the ghost of what I have endured," she says, sounding almost proud. "You have nothing and no one, remember? What is the point of hanging on when all life has to offer you is pain?"

Before I can block the blow, she pops me again, this time in the jaw.

I'm on the subway, with Mom and Dad and the four girls.

I'm at the center, sobbing into my pillow while my roommate snores.

I'm in front of the media while the FBI director lies to the world.

I'm sitting across from doctor after doctor at the center, each of them trying to get me to speak.

I'm at the Madrid airport, and Lety is telling me to find my voice.

I'm holding Bea's body, begging her to hold on as Antonela takes over.

I'm with Sebastián, and he's saying, "I choose you over everything—"

I blast out of the memory black hole, his love reminding me of my strength. I refuse to retreat into that lost girl again. I will not fade away into my grief.

I will fight.

"We have both had our share of pain," I say to Antonela. "If anything, that should bring us closer, not pit us against each other. We should be looking for a way around this curse—"

"I am not interested in a human life," she says, coming in for another strike. "I have the chance to be something greater than you can ever become. Your fame on this planet comes only at my hand. Yet I can reach heights beyond this realm. I can be the first of a new species. Do you really believe your insignificant life is worth thwarting evolution?"

Insignificant?

I see her smoky hand clenching into a fist, and before she can swing it, I punch her in the face, my chest swelling with some of my happiest memories.

I am nine years old, and after binging R. L. Stine books, I write a short story about a girl whose enemy slumbers inside her and only wakes up if she stops moving, so she must always be on the run. When Mom reads it, her eyes tear up, and I have never felt prouder.

I am ten, and Mom introduces me to one of her favorite films, Back to the Future . I love it so much that I watch it again and again and again all year long. I tell Mom that on my eighteenth birthday, I want to get a tattoo with the DeLorean's license plate, OUTATIME . She promises to get one with me so we match.

I am thirteen, and Mom is off on a solo camping trip, so I'm alone with Dad when I get my first period. He feels so awkward that he agrees to let me help him on a case for the first time.

I am fifteen, and we are living in an ocean-side motel in Miami, Florida. It's spring break, and the same group of local high school students floods the beach every day. That's how I meet Jair. He's got crunchy curls and gentle eyes. We kiss in the shade of a palm tree. It's the first time I taste a boy's tongue.

I am sixteen, and I'm with my parents in Virginia, lying on the beach at night. The three of us are staring at the stars, and we design a new constellation after ourselves. We Frankenstein our names together and call it Esteliviaul —

"Stop!" Now it's Antonela who can't stand reliving my memories. "Do not try to paint our family to be something they are not. They sacrificed me—"

" Teo sacrificed you! And the rest of us have suffered for his actions. Losing you destroyed our parents!"

"In all your memories, our parents' only priority was to protect you. But you know what I did not see? I never saw them try to recover me."

There's real emotion in her voice. "It could have just as easily been you," she points out. "If I had been the one hiding. Then they would have abandoned you just as completely. This version of the loving family you have is only because you are the one who got to stay."

"I know, but we don't get to control that," I tell Antonela. " What-if s are worthless. What's real is this moment and each other. That's all we have. And I am asking you, begging you, to give us a chance—"

Her hands close around my neck, constricting my throat and cutting off my pleas.

" No, " she says, and her memories blast through me.

Antonela is in the Atrium of the other castle.

She is with Brálaga, but this is not the same conversation I witnessed in her memories. There are far fewer sand grains left now. Antonela must have gone back to see them again. Maybe this is when Red and Cyclops spied her going in.

"They sent me here! I was their sacrifice! Why would I even want to go back?" she's asking Brálaga.

This is a different Antonela. Until now, she seemed cool and untouchable, even in the face of constant beatings. Yet it's clear the memories of Earth stirred something in her for the first time, making me wonder if she's ever been truly hurt before now.

"I have already told you the alternative," says Brálaga pleasantly. "Would you like to live in the castle walls?"

"Then help me," she says, crossing her arms. "Or I will tell my cousins what awaits them—"

"You cannot threaten me. Nor can I help you."

"You told me I needed a body for the crossing to Earth, but you did not tell me I would need a body to live there."

"I told you it is a universe ruled by matter. If you need a body to cross over, it logically follows that you would need one to remain there."

"So I have to take my sister's. If I can even figure out how. That is the only way?"

Brálaga looks at her sadly. "How could you sacrifice if you have nothing left to sacrifice?"

Antonela feels her heart closing toward her family and any hope of reuniting with them. Which leaves her only one goal left: seize power and fulfill Brálaga's vision.

They are her true parent, after all, and she will make them proud.

I elbow my sister in the gut, and her grip loosens enough that I free myself. "We can still be a family, the two of us—"

She tackles me, and we roll around, wrestling each other as two shadows, purple versus black. I knee her, but she twists away in time, and before I know what's happening, she dives for my unconscious body.

"No!"

I race her toward it, but she turns in midair and punches me. One final memory slips in:

"I say you are fearless," Prince Bastian says to Antonela.

"I know," she says, sliding onto his lap. "The question is, are you?"

He makes a grunting sound, and I realize it's a chuckle because he's smirking. "Tell me, how will I return from Earth?"

"You will drink my blood," she says, and he frowns questioningly.

"You want me to kill you?"

"Yes."

He stares at her, and I know she's stumped him yet again, but in a good way. He leans toward her, lips parted and fangs out, and she doesn't move.

"Have you ever been kissed, human caster?"

She doesn't answer verbally, but her body language says it all. Her spine is stiff and her jaw is clenched.

He pulls down her blue mask, and her breath catches. The Bleeder runs a finger across her lips, and she shivers.

"You have no idea what you are feeling right now," he says, his face inches from hers. "It is called desire."

His mouth brushes hers, and she leans into him, ever so slightly. Yet he pulls away before they kiss, sliding her mask back on.

"Perhaps after sating my appetite with others," he murmurs to her, "I will choose to keep you."

I pull out of her head right as Antonela and I crash to the floor.

"You have nothing," she says, locking her hands around my neck. "Not even the Bleeder is yours. This body belongs to me now."

I want to fight her off, but what future awaits me even if I defeat her? At least Antonela has a chance to make a difference in the worlds. I'm nobody. I have nobody.

If I "win," it just means I killed my sister. I doubt I could live with that on my conscience anyway.

"Yes," she says softly, seeing the change come over my expression. "Give in, sister. It is the right thing to do."

Sebastián isn't coming back. He's home in his castle, back in his rightful place, and soon I will be another memory for him, like blue bear.

My parents, Felipe, and Bea all died so my sister might live. The only one left is Teo, and he doesn't love me. At least Antonela will be wanted. Our uncle will care for her, something she's never experienced.

She seems to know it's over because she pulls away and dives for my body. I want to get up and race her, but I'm a vessel without a motor, and there's no breeze to help me along. I tried so hard to find answers for my parents' deaths, and they all led back to me, to this moment, my final sacrifice.

The last thing I have left to lose in this world.

My life.

I let my head roll over, and a tear spills out as I watch Antonela's black smoke hands prop up my head and yank open my mouth—

Then I see him.

Sebastián is sitting by my body. He doesn't seem able to see me or Antonela in our shadow forms. He's holding my hand and Antonela's picture, chanting words I can't hear. But I know what he's saying.

No hay luz en Oscuro.

I stare at my shadow beast in awe, this creature of darkness, remembering how he said I awoke in him a gentleness, something he doesn't want to lose. If there can be softness even in the hardest of iron hearts, then the chant is wrong.

There is light in the dark.

I have been missing my parents for months. My grief has consumed me, this curse has damned me, the undead haunt me—and yet, in the midst of all this death, I found new life. I fell in love.

I guess some flowers only blossom by moonlight.

My sister's shadow form is dissipating into a cloud of smoke so she can enter my body, but I vault over and tackle her to the ground before she can shift forms.

A future with Sebastián awaits me. If our blood-bond held, so can I.

"Let go!" she shouts at me, but my embrace of her only tightens.

"Bast will never be human," warns my sister, as I let my love for him invade every inch of my shadowy being, and I feel like I'm transmitting my warmth to Antonela not as memories but as emotions.

"He is a monster, and that will never change!" she says, but her voice sounds weaker, and now I know the power I have that she fears. My hope. My resilience.

She hates that I can see the light in a creature of the dark like Sebastián… or like herself. That I could forgive Bea. That I could fight for my life even when it seems I have sacrificed it all and have nothing left to anchor me.

That is humanity's true magic—our unabashed ability to hope. And Antonela can't kill me without killing that first.

I shove her away from me suddenly and clutch the picture from Sebastián's hand, which has a few drops of my blood on it.

He looks stunned when it disappears from his fingers.

Antonela is already melting into a cloud to make for my mouth again—and right before her shadowy torso scatters, I shove the photograph into her black-smoke heart.

"NO!"

She screams as the fumes that make up her spirit begin to swirl and retreat into the photographic paper, which swallows her presence until there's not even a wisp of smoke left.

I feel a wave of lightheadedness, and when I blink, I'm lying on my back, my hand enfolded in Sebastián's. I'm no longer made of purple smoke but flesh and blood.

"Estela?" he asks as I sit up. I look at him, and he searches my gaze. In a lower register, he asks, "Antonela?"

"No," I say. "Estela."

He pulls me into his chest and embraces me. "It is done," he says, holding me as I cry. "You are safe, and we are together. For the rest of your life, I am yours." He kisses me on the head. "Happy birthday, my blood-bound love."

I blink a few times, sniffing and covered in snot, my heart rate still not settling. It can't really be over, can it?

I look around and spot the bloodied photograph of a smiling five-year-old Antonela baring her chipped tooth. I already know where it's going to stay—hidden under the loose stone in the purple room, until the day I figure out how to save her.

"Does this mean," I say, wiping my nose on my arm, "that now I can live with my monster prince in our cursed castle?"

"Yes, princess," says the shadow beast, baring his sharp teeth. "Welcome to your happily ever after."