The Shadow Crosser (The Storm Runner 3)

“I was just thinking how the stars—the constellations—are the same ones the ancient Maya gazed at thousands of years ago and that…that somehow connects us to them.”

“I don’t want to be connected to no ghosts,” Louie said.

Ren looked like she was going to argue or call blasphemy, but instead she said, “Look for something out of place.”

“Like a missing planet?” Louie asked. But he wasn’t helping to look. His eyes were glued to his destiny thread bobbing a foot or so above him.

I shook my head. “That would be too obvious.” Pacific had stayed hidden for hundreds of years without the gods even knowing she was alive. She for sure knew a thing or two about playing hide-and-seek. Like, she’d stashed four hundred boys in a constellation….

“That’s it!” I shouted.

Everyone turned to me.

“K’iin is hidden in the stars!”

“I was going to say that,” Itzamna offered.

Ren got down on her knees and traced her fingers over the universe. She gasped, pointing. “Zane, you’re right. Look! There—at the bottom of Orion…. It’s supposed to have a triangle of stars, but there’s only two!”

“You seriously know stuff like that?” Louie said.

“She has a blog about aliens,” Alana said, peering closer at the star chart.

“The Maya called Orion Ak ’Ek, the Turtle Star,” Ren said, churning out the words so fast I had to focus to catch them. Her expression was nothing but tight concentration. She was puzzling it all out, and to be honest, it was amazing to watch her brain in action. If anyone knew the planets and constellations and all things astronomical, it was Ren.

“So what does Orion’s missing star have to do with K’iin?” Alana asked.

“For the ancient Maya,” Ren said, never taking her eyes off the night sky, “a turtle shell was a symbol for Earth.” She took a shaky breath. “They believed that time began with the planting of three stones on the tortuga’s back.” She held up three fingers, smiling. “The stones are the stars. Right, Itzamna?”

He hesitated, then said, “Yes, that’s correct. I told you to look more to the left, Zane!”

“Seriously?” Louie said. “The world was made on a turtle’s back?”

“Exactly!” Ren said. Her blue destiny thread hung a mere two feet over her head, swaying to the left like it was trying to peek over her shoulder.

“Louie,” I said breathlessly, “what did you just say?”

“The world was made on a turtle’s back?”

My heart did a little jig. Okay, maybe a big one, as Louie’s words reminded me of someone else’s. They rocketed out of my mouth. “‘The world was born on the back of a story,’” I said. “‘And the world might be saved—’”

Everyone threw sharp say-what? glances my way.

“Itzamna!” I said, pointing to the constellation. “Was that the part you didn’t finish that night in the boat? Were you going to say the world might be saved on the back of a story?”

“Affirmative. Very poetic, isn’t it, Zane.”

“But—” My mind was spinning. “How did you know? Did you foresee all this?”

“Of course not,” he said. “I believe everything is story—story is the greatest magic and power in the universe. It can paint something good or evil, beautiful or ugly. It can create believers and liars and murderers and kings. If I saw all this coming, don’t you think I would have warned the gods?”

“Excellent point,” Louie said, ducking away from his destiny string.

It felt like a million-volt electrical current was running through me.

Ren pressed her finger into the spot where the third star should have been.

We waited.