Cece Rios and the Desert of Souls by Kaela Rivera (online e book reading .txt) 📕

The woman called Grimmer Mother nurtures all apprentice brujas on their path to becoming true brujas. She told me I must meet her in Envidia to become powerful. She said I must meet her there, and then she could teach me how to be a bruja. I hope she’s telling the truth.

Next to the writing was a small, scribbled map. I’d been following it out of town for the last thirty minutes, keeping an eye out for the signs depicted in the journal. Envidia was supposed to be out here somewhere, to the west of town. Partly broken adobe and abandoned ranchos dotted the surrounding landscape. It was hard to believe Tierra del Sol had once been as large as this, before the dark criatura attacks had reduced our numbers.

The illustration led me to the farthest section of ruins from town. I stopped as I spotted an outcropping of nine decrepit buildings, all clustered together strangely, unlike the other houses around them.

The two houses facing me were set so the space between them created an archway. Black charcoal markings had been scraped across their faces, warning people away from the makeshift entrance. A purple papel banner waved over the narrow street, the paper decorated with symbols I didn’t recognize and didn’t really want to. Beyond it lay a narrow path, but shadows hid whatever waited there.

I exhaled nervously and glanced at the warnings on the wall. “I’m going to get myself killed.”

I tried not to think as I forced my feet to move forward. The air seemed to grow colder as I approached the archway. My footsteps reverberated in my ears, or was that just my heartbeat? I swallowed hard as I crossed the entranceway, my hands shaking. The narrow alley closed in on me left and right. The shadows were cold. I was terrified, and it was obvious I didn’t belong here.

But I had to try. If I did this right, I really might be able to get Juana back. Papá would be able to smile again. Mamá would embrace her and me, and she’d be proud of me then.

Or at the very least, she’d have Juana to be proud of again.

I came out the other side of the alley, and just a few steps into the center of Envidia, I realized I was even more out of my depth than I’d thought.

It was pretty obvious by the way the inhabitants looked at me. There weren’t many, only about fifteen brujas and brujos in total. Some sat on the concrete back steps of the old houses while they sharpened their black knives; others leaned against the walls in the shade, stringing together jewelry made of bone. But all of them immediately turned to glare at me as I entered the small space. I froze there, holding my breath. A few looked me up and down. Most of them scowled or smirked. One flipped her knife up and down.

I gripped my elbows, forced myself to move forward, and looked around for Grimmer Mother, the woman Tía Catrina’s journal spoke of.

I didn’t get very far before someone bumped into me.

I stumbled back. Oh no, I’d hit a bruja! Wait, no. Tía Catrina’s journal said only those who’d been accepted into Devil’s Alley and developed fangs and glowing eyes were really called brujas. This girl had to be an apprentice. She whirled around, eyes narrowed to slits. Half of her hair was shaved off, and a bullring piercing hung between her nostrils. She cocked a sharp black eyebrow as she turned to face me, her hand fingering the necklace strap at her throat.

She was only two inches taller than me, but held herself like she was six feet tall. “Do you mind, pollo?” she spat. Literally, I mean. Drops beaded my face.

I tried not to look hurt that she’d just called me a chicken. “Sorry. It was an accident—”

The moment I said “sorry,” her gaze traveled the length of me, taking in my age and lack of a criatura’s soul stone necklace, and met my gaze again with a sharp, predatory smile.

“Oh, you’re an accident all right.” She pressed toward me. I backed away. “What’s a little kid like you doing in the heart of brujería?” She plucked at my serape cloak’s tassels. “Did you get bored? Want to see what a real monster looks like?”

“N-no,” I said. It came out smaller than I wanted, so I swallowed and tried again. “No, I’ve come here to become one.”

She stared. And then laughed. “You’re joking, right? You don’t belong here—”

A hand struck the girl across the face.

My shoulders shot up to my ears as Bruja Bullring stumbled back, holding her cheek. An old woman stood between us now. Her hair was long and black and fell past her waist in a thick, luscious braid. Thin streams of gray ran through it, almost as metallic as her narrowed eyes.

“You fool,” she said to the other girl. “Do you know who this is?”

Oh, my holy sunset. Did this woman recognize me? Bruja Bullring looked somewhere between angry and almost as confused as I was.

The old woman reached for me. I flinched back. Her fingers paused, so the black moths tattooed across her light brown–skinned hands hovered between us. The eyes on their wings moved to watch me. I gasped at the sight.

“You share blood with us,” the woman said. Her mouth curled up on one side, and a thin white fang sliced into view. I bottled up the instinct to scream. Behind her, the girl scampered away. “Don’t you, Cecelia Rios?”

I gripped Tía Catrina’s journal to my chest. I knew who she was—but how did she know me?

“I am Ascalapha Odorata,” she said. Her hand pulled one of mine from the journal and curled around it like a snake constricting. “But you may know me by a different name.”

“Grimmer Mother,” I whispered.

Later in her journal, Tía Catrina wrote about this woman with the tenderness