seconds, then burned to ash and drifted to the floor.
“The accent was wrong,” said Mother Morevna. “It is Ent-flahm-t. Try it again, the right way. Keep your back straight. Blow hard.”
I stood still, my heart pounding. A tiny spark of anger lit and began to spread in my mind. What right did she have to demand me to do magic like this, to correct my pronunciation, when she couldn’t be bothered to teach me in the first place?
I put the pepper to my lips, and, focusing all my energy, all my frustration, all my anger on the spell, I said, “Entflammt!” and blew.
Immediately, there was an orange flare of heat and light. I nearly fell backward as fire rocketed outward from my mouth and hand, like a circus fire-breather. It hung there in the air, a tongue of flame almost as big as me. Then it began to dwindle, until it was only a solitary shred of ash drifting to the dust at my feet. I turned to face her, my eyes as steely as hers.
Mother Morevna’s brows were furrowed, her wrinkles deep. My magic had impressed her, I could tell. But not in the way I wanted. I wanted her to welcome me into the fold, to really teach me like I knew she could. But the look on her face was one of concern. She opened her mouth to say something to me, but before she could, a high, screeching sound wailed out over Elysium.
Sirens.
Fear scraped the bottom out of my stomach, made my breath come in spurts as the old panic rose inside me. A dust storm.
“Go and seek shelter, Sallie.” She pulled a cloth dust mask from her pocket and put it on. “Go,” she said, her voice muffled. Then she turned on her heel and strode out of the room, her skirts billowing behind her.
Every part of me was telling me to run, to hide, to seek shelter. No, I thought. I want to see how to do this. I tried to calm my breathing. With shaking hands, I put my dust mask on and followed her.
Dust storms didn’t come as frequently as they used to, about once a month now, but my fear of them never lessened. Every time I heard the sirens, every time I heard the rumble of dust, it was as though I was nine again, out in that field, seeing Mama running toward me on one side and the dust on the other.
Out the window, everyone was going into the dust storm preparations like automatons: goggles on, dust mask on, stockings up, neck covered, sleeves down. I saw guards climbing from their towers to take shelter, the cowboys bringing their cattle to the barn, men and women running inside, shutting their windows, stuffing rags under their doors. All of them glanced fearfully back toward the church, waiting for Mother Morevna to come out and perform her spell to keep us safe. Beyond the walls, an enormous horizontal line of dust advanced, dark and ominous. Dust Dome was a spell we all knew. It covered the whole city, keeping the dust from flowing in and smothering or infecting us. But it only went as far as the walls. My palms sweated, my mouth was dry.
Just then, there was a sound from upstairs, in the room across from mine: a frantic, wordless shouting, a scratching at the walls, the sound of someone throwing themselves against the door.
I almost screamed and ran for cover in my room, but I saw Mother Morevna turn the corner and I darted after her, trying not to listen as the person in the room pounded at the door.
When I caught up to her, Mother Morevna was in the Dust Room. In a bin, there were four packages in plain brown paper, marked STORM. She reached and took one, unwrapping it deftly and tossing the twine in the corner. As she unwrapped each item, I tried to take note of it as well as I could from a distance.
She took out three chicken eggshells and smashed them, then put them in her pocket. What followed was an envelope labeled seashell dust, a handful of tawny fur, and a tiny vial of what looked like blood.
From the shadows, holding my hands over my ears, I watched her pour the small vial of rabbit blood onto her steady wrinkled hands. Then she turned and walked out into the vacant streets, her hands filled with bloody fur and eggshells and dust.