hearing her. I love you. I imagined her black hair and her green and gold eyes, her beat-up Chucks and her chipped black nail polish. There was only one thing left to do, and it was time for me to do it.
CHAPTER 14 Messed-Up Things It didn’t take me long to retrace my steps to the Confederate Needle, and I found my own way to The Stars and Stripes this time around. I was crossing like an old Sheer now. Once I got the hang of it—a certain way of letting my mind do the work for me without focusing on anything at all—it seemed as easy as walking. Easier, since I wasn’t actually walking. And once I was there, I knew what to do, and I could do it myself. In fact, I was actually looking forward to it. I’d done a little thinking ahead of time. I could see why Amma liked crossword puzzles so much. Once you got the right mind-set, they were sort of addictive. When I found my way into the office—past Swamp Cooler City—the mock-up of the current issue was on one of the three little desks, right where it had been last time. I fanned open the papers. This time I found the crossword puzzle without much trouble. This puzzle was even less finished than the last one. Maybe the staff was getting lazy, now that they knew there was a chance someone else would do it for them. Either way, Lena would be reading the crossword puzzle. I picked up the nearest letter and pushed it into place. Four down. O. N. Y. X. As in, a black stone. Nine across. T. R. I. B. U. T. A. R. Y. As in, a river. Six down. O. C. U. L. U. S. As in, an eye. Eight across. C. H. A. R. I. S. M. A. As in, charm. M. A. T. E. R. As in, my own. Lila Jane Evers Wate. S. E. R. I. O. U. S. As in, grave. That was the message. I need the black stone—the eye of a river, and the one you wear on your charm necklace. And I need you to leave it for me at my mother’s grave. I couldn’t spell it out any clearer than that. At least not in this edition of the paper. By the time I finished, I was exhausted, as if I’d been running sprints all afternoon on the basketball court. I didn’t know how much time would need to pass in the Otherworld before Lena got my message in this one. I only knew that she’d get it. Because I was as sure of her as I was of myself. When I got home to the Otherworld—to my house, or my mom’s grave, whatever you wanted to call it—there it was, waiting for me on the doorstep. She must have left it on my mother’s grave, like I asked. I couldn’t believe it had worked. Lena’s black-rock charm from Barbados, the one she always wore around her neck, sat in the middle of the doormat. I had the second river stone. A wave of relief settled over me. It lasted about five seconds, until I realized what the stone also meant. It was time to go. Time to say good-bye. So why couldn’t I bring myself to say it? “Ethan.” I heard my mom’s voice, but I didn’t look up. I was sitting on the floor of the living room, my back to the couch. I had a house and a car in my hands, stray pieces of my mom’s old Christmas town. I couldn’t take my eyes off the car. “You found the lost green car. I never could.” She didn’t answer. Her hair looked even messier than usual. Her face was streaked with tears. I don’t know why the town was set out on the coffee table like that, but I put down the house and moved the tiny green tin car farther along the table. Away from the toy animals, the church with the bent steeple, and the pipe-cleaner tree. Like I said, time to go. Part of me wanted to take off running the second I heard about what I had to do to get back to my old life. Part of me didn’t care about anything but seeing Lena again. But as I sat there, all I could think about was how much I didn’t want to leave my mom. How much I’d missed her, and how quickly I had gotten used to seeing her in the house, hearing her in the next room. I didn’t know if I wanted to give that up again, no matter how badly I needed to go back. So all I could do was just sit there and look at that old car and wonder how something that had been lost for so long could be found again.
- Page 3 and 4: Begin Reading Table of Contents New
- Page 5 and 6: Death is the beginning of Immortali
- Page 8 and 9: BOOK ONE Ethan
- Page 10 and 11: It was so familiar. “Ethan? How m
- Page 12 and 13: “I know. I felt the same way,”
- Page 14 and 15: CHAPTER 3 This Side or the Next Go
- Page 16 and 17: them with. But I knew as well as Au
- Page 18 and 19: CHAPTER 4 Catfish Crossin’ Gettin
- Page 20 and 21: CHAPTER 5 Another Lunae Libri Darkn
- Page 22 and 23: CHAPTER 6 Silver Button I opened my
- Page 24 and 25: grave. “What’s done is done. Th
- Page 26 and 27: CHAPTER 7 Crosswords As I watched L
- Page 28 and 29: spoon high above the both of us.
- Page 30 and 31: “Now pay attention, Little One,
- Page 32 and 33: “What are you planning to do? Wri
- Page 34 and 35: I followed Aunt Prue and the yippin
- Page 36 and 37: Aunt Prue pushed me across the thre
- Page 38 and 39: CHAPTER 11 Darker Things The room w
- Page 40 and 41: CHAPTER 12 Still Here After we got
- Page 42 and 43: morning, baked with so much butter
- Page 44 and 45: front of me, I would find my way to
- Page 48 and 49: My mom took a breath, and I closed
- Page 50 and 51: “Dragon. The kind that breathes f
- Page 52 and 53: CHAPTER 16 A Rock and a Crow Once I
- Page 54 and 55: land of the dead, a river full of b
- Page 56 and 57: CHAPTER 17
- Page 58 and 59: the Caster libraries?” Xavier str
- Page 60 and 61: CHAPTER 18 Shadows How I get there
- Page 63 and 64: BOOK TWO Lena
- Page 65 and 66: stayin’ dead, not comin’ back a
- Page 67 and 68: CHAPTER 20 A Deal with the Devil Th
- Page 69 and 70: I knocked on the screen door one mo
- Page 71 and 72: CHAPTER 21 Dark Side of the Moon Sa
- Page 73 and 74: I shook my head, letting the words
- Page 75 and 76: “You’re sure you’ll be all ri
- Page 77 and 78: CHAPTER 23 Dar-ee Keen The next day
- Page 79 and 80: “Angelus?” She popped a chip in
- Page 81 and 82: Uncle Macon was, too, even if he wo
- Page 83 and 84: I couldn’t bear to watch. Abraham
- Page 85 and 86: CHAPTER 25 Death’s Door Link stoo
- Page 87 and 88: John noticed I wasn’t moving, and
- Page 89 and 90: From just inside the hidden grating
- Page 91 and 92: “And if the origin of its magic i
- Page 93 and 94: worlds, don’t forget.” I nodded
- Page 95 and 96: Finally, the cup found its way back
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It’s about time.” Her arms cros
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Amma and me speaking the same words
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CHAPTER 30 Lost Time L. Are you the
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After what had to be a few days or
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CHAPTER 31 Keepers of Secrets I don
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No way out but through it. I had to
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“What happened to your eyes?” I
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CHAPTER 33 The Wayward’s Way I to
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“What are you doing here, then? M
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was supposed to be a library, it wa
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But there was nothing I could do, e
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now and then no me
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CHAPTER 36 Translation As I sat on
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county fairs.’ ” He shook his h
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I didn’t take The Stars and Strip
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G. O. O. D. Five down. As in, the v
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I get up in the night and make my w
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HERE ENDETH THE CASTER CHRONICLES F
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Acknowledgments We’ve loved every
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Contents WELCOME DEDICATION EPIGRAP
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Copyright The characters and events
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