Children of Blood and Bone - Tomi Adeyemi Page 0,169

its shine. The light starts at her bare feet, travels up the curves and folds of her carved robes. When it reaches her eyes, her golden sockets glow bright blue, bathing the dome in its soft color.

Ògún’s statue shimmers to life next, eyes glowing in dark greens; Sàngó’s comes in fiery reds; Ochumare’s in bright yellows.

“A chain…,” I breathe, following the path to Sky Mother. “Oh my gods…”

The solstice.

It’s happening now!

I paw at the ashes, looking for anything. Everything. The ancient ritual was painted on this scroll. Shouldn’t the spirits of the sêntaros who painted it be here as well?

But as I wait for the chill of the dead to overcome me, I realize the number of corpses there are strung across the dome. I didn’t feel their deaths pass through me, I didn’t feel anything at all.

All I felt was Baba.

The magic in my blood.

“A connection…” The realization hits me like ice. A connection I share with him because of blood. The scroll’s incantation was supposed to tether us to Sky Mother through magic, but what if there was another way to reach her instead?

My mind spins, trying to calculate the possibilities. Could I draw on the connection with my ancestors through our blood? Could we reach back, forging a new connection to Sky Mother and her gifts through our spirits?

Amari dives past, fending a soldier away from the ritual ground. Though blood drips from her back, her blows are ferocious, almost feral against the coming guards. And even as the entire army pours in, Roën and his men don’t relent.

They fight against all odds.

If they haven’t given up, neither can I.

My heart slams against my chest as I scramble to my feet. The next statue illuminates, bathing the dome in blue light. Only a few dark gods stand in Sky Mother’s way. The end of the solstice is near.

I grab the fallen sunstone, and it scalds under my touch. Instead of Sky Mother, I see blood. I see bone.

I see Mama.

It’s that image I hold on to as I drop the sunstone in the single golden column in the center of the dome. If her blood surges through my veins, why not the blood of other ancestors, too?

I whip out the true bone dagger from the waistline of my pants and slice through both my palms. With bleeding hands, I press onto the sunstone, releasing the binding blood for the ultimate sacrifice.

“Help!” I scream out loud, drawing on their strength. “Please! Lend me your hand!”

Like an erupting volcano, the power of my ancestors flows through me, maji and kosidán alike. Each grips onto our connection, onto the very heart of our blood. Their spirits twirl with mine, with Mama’s, with Baba’s. We pour ourselves forward, our souls fighting into the stone.

“More!” I scream to them, calling on all spirits linked by our blood. I dig through our lineage, clawing all the way back to those who first received Sky Mother’s gifts. As each new ancestor surges forward, my body screams. My skin tears like it’s being pulled apart. But I need it.

I need them.

Their voices begin to ring, a chorus of the living dead. I wait to hear the words inked onto the destroyed scroll, but they chant an incantation I’ve never read. Their strange words echo through my head, through my heart, through my soul. They fight their way onto my lips, though I don’t know what the incantation will do.

“Àwa ni ọmọ rẹ nínú 1j1 àti egungun!”

Spiritual pathways explode within me. I fight through my screams to get the words out as the sunstone buzzes beneath my hands. The light travels up Sky Mother’s chest, over the hand holding her horn. It’s almost over.

The solstice is almost at an end.

“A ti dé! Ìkan ni wá! Dà wá p0 Mama! Kí ìtànná wa tàn p1lú 1bùn àìníye rẹ l21kan síi!”

My throat closes up, making it hard to breathe, let alone speak. But I force myself to continue, channeling everything I have left.

“J2 kí agbára idán wa tàn kárí,” I shout as the light zips up Sky Mother’s collarbone.

The voices sing so loud in my mind that the whole world must be able to hear. They push for the last of the incantation, desperate as the glow crosses the bridge of Sky Mother’s nose. With their blood, I can finish this.

With their blood, I am unstoppable.

“Tan ìm3lè ayé l21kan sii!”

The light reaches Sky Mother’s eyes and bursts with a white glow as the last of my incantation rings.