The Last Fallen Star by Graci Kim (ebook reader with highlighter .txt) 📕

shows Emmett and me. We’re at the zoo, standing in front of the tiger enclosure. We’re drinking what looks like…boba tea?

“What in the name of Mago—?”

But I don’t get to say more. Emmett grabs my wrist just as the fire-exit door swings wide, and he pulls me into the stairwell. He drags me up the stairs, and in a rush, we burst into the temple lobby. We run through the secret portal, emerge from the walk-in fridge, and hurry past the surprised man at the Korean fried chicken counter. Finally, we find ourselves back on a busy street in the heart of Koreatown. While catching our breath, we look up at the H-Mart.

“I can’t believe we made it out of there without being caught,” I say, my chest heaving.

Emmett lets go of my wrist. But instead of answering, he just stares at me. And there’s a strange look in his eyes.

“What?” I say.

He points to my chest.

For a second, I panic. Did I lose Hattie’s heart again?

My hands search around my neck for the second time today, and I’m relieved to find the vial still hanging from its cord. I grasp it and look down at my sister’s tiny heart, only to see why Emmett is wearing a horrified expression.

A corner of the heart has started to blacken, slowly shriveling like a dying flower inside its glass prison. Now I know I’m not imagining it. Hattie’s heart is changing. It’s not as alive as it was before.

My breath catches in my throat as I look up at my partner in crime. “Em, we need to hurry. Hattie’s running out of time.”

“WHAT DO WE DO NOW, RYE?” Emmett asks, massaging his temples. “We’re fresh out of clues and Hattie’s heart is…you know…”

“Actually,” I start, choosing my words cautiously, “we do have a new lead.”

“We do?”

“When you were unconscious, a bearded man came to speak to me.”

His eyes widen. “Was he the one who gassed us? What did he want?”

“He said that in order to find what I seek, I need to return to the very beginning. To where I first started.”

He facepalms. “Another riddle? Ugh, I’m sick of puzzles.”

“And right before we left, I saw the Haetae. The real one.”

“The Haetae?” He shakes his head. “I don’t even know what you’re saying anymore. I thought things were cray-cray enough when the goddess turned up with her ladle. But then came the little horse dude with an inferiority complex, and the pecking bird–books, and now a uni-horned lion beast? I mean, I knew magic was real, but all this is literally breaking my brain.”

I put an arm around his shoulders. “It’s a lot, I know. But stay with me. Because the Haetae showed me some visions, and I think they could be our next clue.”

I lead him over to a nearby bench. “Let’s sit a minute. You can check to make sure Boris is okay while I gather my thoughts.”

I have to be careful about how much to share with Emmett. The first scene I saw in the Haetae’s bell floods my mind. The Horangi clan were standing protectively over a glowing ax, and Emmett’s mom spelled it away from them. That had to be the seventh artifact—the sunstone ax.

The Cave Bear Goddess had told us that the fallen star would grant divine power. I also remember Auntie Okja telling me that the Horangi had figured out a way for witches to become as powerful as the goddesses. And when the other five clans tried to stop them, the scholars attacked. They’d left a path of destruction and despair, just as the Cave Bear Goddess had said.

These things could not be a coincidence. Maybe all the artifacts were fallen stars…which means that, if the letter is correct, she wants us to find the eighth, and seemingly last, one—whatever and wherever it might be.

Then I think of the second scene in the Haetae’s bell, in which a man with an onyx teardrop stone just like mine stood above Mrs. Harrison’s dead body. A man with angular features…just like mine. Emmett’s mom must have been killed for trying to keep the seventh artifact out of the Horangi’s clutches. By my biological appa, no less.

There’s no way I can reveal my true identity to Emmett now. But the lies are stacking up like pancakes, and I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up.

Emmett is folding Boris, signaling that I’d better be ready to talk again, when a shiver of realization goes down my spine.

If the Horangi were trying to use the seventh artifact for their own benefit, chances are they’d want the eighth one, too. They may well have found it by now. And the bearded man had told me to return to the very beginning, to where I first started. He and the Haetae’s visions were both telling me the same thing.

I swallow hard. “I…I think I’ve figured it out, Em. But you’re not gonna like the answer….”

He crosses his arms. “Try me.”

I force out the words. “We need to find the Horangi clan.”

Emmett cracks up. “Good one, Rye. You almost had me there.”

I stay silent, and he abruptly stops laughing. “You’re kidding, right?”

I shake my head.

“The bearded man and the Haetae said we need to go to the cursed scholars to find the last fallen star?”

I nod. “You saw it in the letter, too. The Horangi were keeping track of the artifacts, and hiding the seventh one. I think they wanted to use it to become divine. If we want to find the eighth artifact, we need to find the scholars.”

“But you know what they did to my mom.”

I swallow the lump in my throat and nod, focusing on a spot on his forehead. “I know.”

“They’re dangerous.”

“I know.”

“And cursed!”

I cringe. “I know.”

Emmett throws his head back and starts cackling maniacally. “You can’t be serious right now.” Spit gathers at the edges of his mouth. “You’re basing this on the words of a giant scaly