“You’re Anyanwu; we knew each other well. You can crush this djinn like a pepper seed.”

“I don’t remember how!”

“Then you have no idea who you are!”

Sunny pressed her lips together but didn’t argue.

Ogwu paused and then quickly ascended up her web. Sunny’s stomach dropped. When she looked at the bronze toad, all of Ogwu’s children were gone, too. Hiding wherever they liked to hide. Probably poised to watch the djinn take her life. Sunny would be like the guy from forty years ago. How could Sugar Cream throw her down here knowing that had happened? How could they send anyone down here knowing about it?! The Leopard People could be a callous people, especially when it came to adhering to certain rules. The damn rules.

Sunny brought out her juju knife. There were the bones. Right beside her. And the smell of sulfur. She ran through the handful of jujus she’d learned so far. How to bring music, how to keep mosquitoes away, healing minor injuries, staying dry in the rain, making a cup of polluted fresh water drinkable, testing if something was cursed or poisoned, how to push back a heavy aggressor, creating a barrier. She paused. The barrier, she was good at that one.

She held up her hand and opened her palm. Then she brought up her juju knife and made a circular flourish. She caught the pouch with the same hand while keeping the other one up. The invisible packet was cool and wet in her palm. “Stay back,” she firmly said. Before she could speak the activating words the wilderness descended on her, layering her world. A black shadow flew from the pile of bones. Eyes wide, Sunny stood her ground. She opened her mouth to speak, but it was on her too quickly. Something sank into her arm like fifty needles. She screamed and her entire world, both physical and wilderness, flashed bright. She felt the djinn sucking as she tried to shake it off. But there was nothing to shake off. It had no body. Not even bones. There was nothing but a thick oily brown shade.

Suddenly, it froze. Then it let go. Sunny rolled away, avoiding her arm. She got to her feet and ran for the nearest bookcase. Only when she got around it did she chance a look back. It was disgusting. Hundreds of red spiders had pinned the djinn to the floor like a sheet of brown-red solid smoke. Sunny had to blink to fully understand what she was seeing. On one plane, the djinn was a pile of dry bones and the spiders were the size of American quarters, Ogwu the size of a dinner plate. On the other, the djinn was a large blob of brownish smoke and the spiders were large as basketballs, Ogwu the size of a small child. On both planes they were tearing the djinn apart.

She could hear the dry bones snapping, crunching, and crumbling. And she could hear the wet smacking as the large spiderlike creatures tore off tiny pieces of the djinn with their sharp legs and ate them. All the writhing legs and bodies made her stomach turn. The djinn didn’t make a sound. It accepted its sudden defeat like an old man giving up on life.