“I couldn’t see another way.” He sank down by Awa. A trickster crystal from the cave lodged in his foot wound, replacing one pain with another. He tugged it.

“Leave the crystal be.” She gripped his hand “A Lahesh cure for blood poisoning.”

Djola sighed. “Calling reckoning fire was not as I expected.”

“The People burn. Everywhere.” Samina stood over him. “Now what?”

“Awa carries Vandana’s bag and Yari’s drum.” He stroked Awa’s wiry hair.

“Exactly. You know what to do. You’ve always known.” Samina crouched down. Her violet eyes dazzled him. Raisin navel and nipples poked through her cloak of sleet, a challenge. “Come to Mount Eidhou.” She’d begged him to do this when she lived and there was hope, and now she asked whenever he came to Jumbajabbaland, yet—

“Impossible. I cannot walk away from the reckoning fires I have started.”

Samina stabbed a large bee stinger in Awa’s chest. The girl faded into the steam from the hot spring. “Work with Awa to put the fires out, then come.” Samina passed through his flesh, a cold shiver, a heartache. “Isn’t that what you want?”

“I’ve poisoned my heart spirit.”

“Remember what you always told me?”

“I’ve told you many things.” A hint of her raintree scent lingered on his lips. “Now my mind dissolves.”

“Green Elders say, At the crossroads, change. Then you find another story, another way.”

“Abelzowadyo,” he murmured.

“Yes. The work is never done, but—” She stabbed Djola’s golden heart and whispered, “Impossible is a word for yesterday, not tomorrow.”

8

Return

Awa’s head was trying to catch fire. Hair sizzled and smoked in chilly mist. She was slumped next to Djola who had no hair to burn. A murky crystal was jammed in his foot. They leaned against the elder tree in the foothills of the Eidhou range just beyond a thicket of haints and vines. The sun hid behind fog, offering muted daylight. She pressed her hands into damp earth and tasted tree oil on the air. She blinked several times, happy to see brambles and weeds, delighted by crows strutting along the cliff face eating poison berries. Another miracle—she’d made it back to the everyday.

A cave mouth in the ledge near the top of an outcropping spit sparkling dirt. Awa marveled at this wonder—certain it had been a solid rock wall when they left for Smokeland. And how long ago was that? Time was different in Smokeland. Djola moaned, not all the way to the everyday. Awa refused to worry. Everybody takes their own time on the light bridge. Awa put her hand to his heart Vévés. She felt the wheel whirring underneath. A wild dog shoved a cold nose in Awa’s crotch and licked her face. His bushy tail was familiar. Fannie reared, as if to pummel him.