“The one that made the palace transform itself into a maze?” the Good Witch said. “I am afraid I cannot. Kiki constructed the palace that way. No power of mine can undo anything she has done.”

There was a terrible silence. A fist closed around my heart and crushed. We had failed. I had failed.

“It was all for nothing,” Lej said.

“I am free,” said the Good Witch, a little reproachfully. “I don’t call that nothing.” With an offended sniff, she vanished.

“Well done,” Suki said to Lej. “Way to go and act like giving a person back their life is nothing. Pip wouldn’t have taken kindly to that.”

Lej’s cheeks colored, but he turned to me and said harshly, “It should have been you.”

I wiped tears off my cheek as the others protested. “I know.”

“None of this would have happened if you had stayed put like you were supposed to,” he went on, his face full of pain and fury. “What was so important that you had to go out there?”

“I couldn’t stop myself,” was all I could say. “I know I shouldn’t have gone. I know that. This is my fault. I know that.”

“Stop it,” Jojo said to Lej, his hands clenched on the arms of his chair. “None of this will bring Pip back. All we can do now is look after each other.”

“And make Mahishasura sorry for what he’s done,” Suki added, her brown eyes flashing.

Lej shot a furious look my way. “How? She was supposed to be the answer, but it turns out she’s no help at all. I told you,” he added, turning his glare on Ashwini this time, “I told you she was more likely to get us killed than fix anything!”

There was a tense pause, and then Ashwini said softly, “Maybe you should go upstairs, Kiki. You don’t have to listen to this.”

And my being there was making things worse. It was kind of her not to say it, but it was true. This was their home and their family. I was just an intruder on their grief.

I left the room quietly. Halfway up the stairs, I couldn’t keep the tears away anymore, so I bit my lip and cried as quietly as I could. Inside my room, I sat on the floor, my back pushing the door closed, and buried my face in my arms.

A tiny tyrant. It was what Lej had called me last night, right before I had left Crow House just to get some measure of control over my own mind. A tiny tyrant. A petulant child.

Maybe that was all I was. Maybe everything I had ever done had been about stamping my foot and throwing a tantrum because I had no power over myself, let alone over anything else. I wasn’t the master of my fate. I wasn’t the captain of my soul.

I hadn’t been able to stop Mahishasura from taking over the world I created. I hadn’t been able to keep Pip safe.