Page 28 of Ashes of Gold
I shoot my arm in the air, hoping I’m not too late to help. “Innocenceslain!”Please let me help,I want to say, but no one else is talking. There are silent hands only, and I want to respect the tradition if that’s what it is.
“Rue, this book is a bust too.” Bri folds it closed.
“I need a minute. I have to do this with them.”
“You do?”
“Yes, I just have to. I can’t explain it.”
“Keshkech m’bwan!” The Beerchi counts the eleven hands raised. “Ya ya lo nizka. Na lo’misha!” He pounds his staff made of jpango on the ground. “Mordit’z aka!”
“Innocence slain!”
One last hand goes up and he seems satisfied.
“The burial will begin in ten minutes,” he says before departing through the doorway. Those with raised hands rush to the door.
“Listen,” I say, turning to Bri. “While we’re doing the burial, can you flip through the rest of these books and see if they have anything at all about restoring magic? There has to be a way written down somewhere.”
“Sure, I’ll look. But I’ve read tons and there’s not much on it.”
“Bri, you don’t know everything, remember.”
She blushes. “Yes, sorry.”
“There are books here you’ve never seen.”
“Got it. I’ll look.”
“Thank you. I’ll be back.” I join Jhamal in the doorway and cool air meets us outside.
“Thanks for the heads-up.”
His hand touches the small of my back as he gestures for me to walk in front of him, and my insides twinge with longing.
“I want to help.” I’m not even sure what that means. I wish I knew. I wish I knew a lot. If I’d fully understood more about where I come from, our customs, traditions, I’d have known not to touch the body. I’d have known that my people are a tapestry of clans and traditions and cultures.
“I know you do,” he says.
“How exactly will the burial ceremony go?”
“Twelve are needed to complete the burial ritual. But helping is not enough. We need to show them you are learning. You are trying to get it.”
“Get what exactly?”
He stops me. “Get what it means tobeGhizoni.”
He keeps walking but I’m stuck where I’m standing. His words hit like a brick. The truth that’s been tugging at me, the burning conviction that helping with this burial is as important as finding that spell. The weight of his words takes my breath as we climb out of the underground lair.
Embracing my father’s heritage, my people here, is one thing… but he’s right, understanding what it means tobeGhizoni is something different entirely. If I knew more, maybe I wouldn’t have failed them on the battlefield. Maybe I would have better understood the plan the others were trying to convince me of in the forest outside Yiyo before everything went to shit. Maybe I wouldn’t have been locked up for months if I knew more about our tactics, the ways Kai leads and protects her saisas.
Shame sears through me. Once we get our magic back, why would they fight beside me? Why would they believe I even care if I’m not earnestly trying to understand who I am,allof who I am?And so much of that is here, in Ghizon, which I missed out on for seventeen years.
Maybe my people would be alive if I were Ghizoni in more than name.
If I’m going to be worthy of any of this, any of them—I glance at Jhamal—I have to stop screwing up. I study the ground as we move outside, watching my feet, embarrassment coiling in my gut. Here, in this place, I am home, but… I know nothing.
CHAPTER NINE
