My pulse raced. “The ojiji?” I breathed, reaching out to take the memory from him.

He drew back, frowning. “It was . . . obscene. At least ten thousand children, lined up and drilling, like they were part of an army. Something rotten’s going on. Those children should have passed into Egungun’s Parade the moment they died in the Underworld. If they’re still down here, it means their souls have been enslaved for five hundred years.”

“I know.” Disgust and pity churned my stomach. That boy who had murdered Thaddace—he had seemed so confused. All his memories appeared to have vanished—or at least have weakened, as though his soul was trapped in the preserved corpse of his body.

“Whatever the abiku are planning, it’s happening soon,” said Zuri. He turned on his heel, gesturing for me to follow him down a tunnel—the opposite route of where my map told me to go. “If we want to stop them, we’ll have to hurry.”

Heart pounding, I began to follow him down the murky, narrowing tunnel . . . and then I stopped.

He glanced back at me, raising a concerned eyebrow. “Idajo?”

“This is the wrong way,” I said.

“I know.” He sighed. “But we can come back here once we’ve saved those children. You have your map, don’t you?”

He was right—I could always turn back. But for every moment I spent in the Underworld, I grew weaker. And the weaker I became, the more likely I would give in to the abiku, begging for the sweet release of death.

Zuri shifted on his feet—so impatient. So full of life, anxious to be useful. Nothing he’d said so far rang false in my ears. Still, my eyes narrowed.

I had always been good at puzzles.

“All right,” I said softly, smiling at him. “I’ll go with you.”

“Good. There’s no time to lose—”

“I’ll go with you,” I said, “if you kiss me.”

He blinked, then grinned. “I’ll kiss you all you want Idajo. After we stop the abiku, we can—”

“I’ll go,” I said, choosing my words carefully, “if you kiss me right now.”

Zuri nodded, coming toward me with confidence. Again his cologne overcame me. “Have it your way.” When he leaned in, I trembled.

“Ask me,” he whispered. “Ask me to kiss you.”

“I’m ready.”

“I know.” His beautiful dark eyes searched mine, warm and pleading. “But I want you to ask, Idajo. Because—”

“Because you aren’t Zuri,” I said calmly. “You are one of the abiku. And for as long as we’re in the Underworld, you can’t touch me unless I tell you to.”

He froze, looking puzzled, and then he—it—smiled, mouth stretching wider and wider, teeth sharpening to points as the spirit shrank to a child’s height, Zuri’s form and features melting away.

“Such a pity, Wuraola,” sighed the abiku, in a voice like rust on iron. It stared up at me, a creature with ashy gray skin and red-pupil eyes. “If you had only come now, your journey would have been so much shorter. But never worry.” A narrow white tongue flicked out of the creature’s mouth, licking its thin, cracked lips. “You and your friend will join us soon.”