“And then she was sick all over her shoes,” Suki couldn’t resist adding.

Her twin grinned. “It’s true. And when I got back home, I was sick all over Suki’s shoes, too.”

I laughed, but my brain replayed the story. There was something so brilliant and hopeful about Samara finding out that the thing she loved, the one thing she knew she was good at, was actually every bit as useful as anything any of the others could do.

“I know what you’re trying to say,” I said. “You’re saying I shouldn’t let Vishnu or Lej decide what I’m capable of. I should decide for myself.”

“And you shouldn’t let them tell you how you should fight back,” Jojo added. “You can’t fight monsters like anyone else. You can only fight monsters like you.”

Along with myths and stories and lullabies, Mum would read me poems when I was little. One of those poems was by a man called William Ernest Henley. There were two lines at the end of the poem that went like this:

I am the master of my fate,

I am the captain of my soul.

That was what they were all trying to tell me. They were telling me to be the master of my own fate.

But it wasn’t that easy. How could I not take what Vishnu had said to heart when I knew he was right? He hadn’t said anything that I hadn’t already said to myself over the past couple of years. I was an anxious little girl who wanted her hand held. I was a little girl who could hold a pencil, but not a sword.

“Sometimes I still doubt myself,” Samara said, like she could hear what I was thinking. “Then I see the books on my shelves, and I remember that I outsmarted a wolf.”

I smiled. “You bet you did.”

She reached over and squeezed my hand. “It’s okay to be scared,” this kind, smart little girl said. “We all are.”

I clutched my cup tighter. “I don’t know how to beat my big bad wolf.”

“That’s because you’ve let yourself believe that there’s only one way to do it,” Pip pointed out. “But a sword isn’t the only way to fight, Kiki.”

It was true, of course. Every room in this house, and every Crow in it, was proof of that. Hope unfurled inside me, like a small flower reaching for the sun.

“I don’t think drawing pictures is going to help me stop Mahishasura,” I said. “And I can’t think of anything else I’m especially good at, but if I can’t find a way to the top of Mysore Palace and break the gandaberunda’s eye, I’m going to have to figure out another way to beat him.”

“Potions are very useful,” Suki said. “I can teach you how to make them!”

“We can all teach you,” Jojo chimed in. “We’re all good at different things. We can all help you.”

Pip beamed. “I’ll have you making the stinkiest stink bomb in no time!”