The Last Fallen Star by Graci Kim (the mitten read aloud .TXT) 📗

magic if history had gone differently and I had been raised Horangi. The thought leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.

“The birds are books? Shut up right now.” Emmett walks toward a blue parrot and gingerly reaches out to touch its tail feather. Immediately, the parrot disappears and is replaced by a blue hand-bound book about the Spiritrealm and its numerous boroughs. He grabs the flapping book from the air and shakes his head in disbelief. “This is so cray.”

Hope surges through me. “There has to be a book about fallen stars in here, Em. Keep looking. We have to find it!”

We transform birds into books for what feels like hours, all the while growing more and more worried about the cheollima’s shift ending and the new guard discovering us. As we discard the books, they fly in a flock above our heads. And though we find loads of volumes I’d die to read, none of them have anything to do with the Godrealm’s fallen stars, or even the dark sun and dark moon.

Exhausted, we fall onto a bench, startling a nearby stack of books and sending them flapping to the ceiling.

“We’re never gonna find anything,” Emmett whines, rubbing his bird-pecked fingers. “There are just too many, and we’re pushing our luck with time. We need to get out of here, like, now.”

I look down at Hattie’s heart vial and bite the inside of my cheek. “We can’t give up. Hattie wouldn’t lose faith. We just need to be smarter about it.” I scan the next section of birds and think hard. “What else did the cheollima say when you gave him your cookies?”

Emmett thinks. “He said something about books finding their rightful owner. Oh, and if we trust in their wisdom, we’ll have a hoot.”

“Wait, hoot?” I say.

Emmett’s eyes widen. “Holy shirtballs, we need to find an owl.”

Propelled by a second wind, we run up and down the conservatory, until, eventually, we find the owl section behind the giant Venus flytraps.

Emmett rubs his palms down his face and groans. “Who knew there were so many owls?”

There are countless types of them, all similar and yet distinctly different in color, markings, and shape. Some with black spectacles around their eyes, some with spotted orange tails, and even some that look like they’re covered in white fluff.

I study their big eyes. The last thing I want to do is get in touch with my cursed Horangi side, but for a moment, I wish I could channel the part of me that summoned the birds in the first place. Maybe if I could, I would somehow know which owl to touch.

Emmett and I roll up our sleeves and get started on the lowest row of owls. I’m just about to tap the third one when something bangs into my head.

“Ouch!” I yelp, as the claws of an owl dig into my hair. “Argh, get it off me!”

Emmett swats at the pointy-eared owl and manages to chase it off for a second. But as soon as it regains its balance, it swoops in and lands on my crown again. It hoots loudly.

I freeze. Books have a way of finding their rightful owners, the cheollima had said.

I get a rush of adrenaline. “Em, wait—I think this might be the one.”

I try to stay as still as possible. And when the bird stops flapping and scratching, I quickly reach up and pat its side. The owl immediately transforms into a book, falling with a heavy thump onto my shoulder.

“Ow! Why couldn’t they have just made this a normal library, darn it!” I rub my shoulder and pick up the brown leather-bound book. The cover reads The Loyal Tales of the Haetae.

Emmett and I open the book and skim the contents, hoping for clues. But instead, the pages are full of old stories about Mago Halmi’s guardian lion-beast using his time-manipulation powers to help her. I sigh and close the cover.

“Hey, what’s this?” Emmett picks up a piece of paper that dropped out of the book.

It’s a letter, dated almost thirteen years ago and signed by someone named Sora. It reads:

Dear H,

If you are reading this, we have already lost the battle.

We will continue to keep the seventh artifact hidden, but I worry it may already be too late. Something is brewing, and I fear the elders may have figured out our secret.

Please let us know what we should do. Our safety is in your hands.

In Knowledge and Truth,

Sora

On the back of the letter, there are additional scribbles:

Fifth artifact: sword—presumed destroyed

Sixth artifact: midnight bow—presumed destroyed

Seventh artifact: sunstone ax

Eighth artifact: unknown—a celestial object?

I rub my eyes. My mind feels like mush. I don’t understand what this letter is, or why it was in the book. And why did this owl choose me?

“Who do you think H was?” Emmett asks. “And what about Sora?”

I swallow. “Well, Knowledge and Truth is the Horangi clan motto—it’s written on their statue’s plaque in the Gi sanctuary. So maybe they were two scholars writing to each other?”

He clenches his jaw. “This Sora person says that they’re keeping the seventh artifact hidden. But why would they write down what it is when the note could fall into the wrong hands?”

I shake my head, feeling despondent. “I wish I knew. Maybe it wasn’t Sora who wrote that stuff on the back.”

He pauses. “Do you think the artifacts have something to do with what we’re looking for?”

It’s my turn to pause. I study the list and read the words eighth artifact: unknown—a celestial object? over and over again. “Well, a star is a celestial object. So the eighth artifact could be the Godrealm’s last fallen star, couldn’t it?”

Back at Santa Monica Pier, the goddess had told us that the fallen piece of her world could grant divine power here in the Mortalrealm, and it had driven humans mad with greed, leaving only destruction and despair in its wake. She had called it evil. Maybe the sunstone ax had the same effect on people, and the