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

coming and acts immediately. Her eyes burn with hatred and, by fanning her wings, she redirects the flame straight back at Jo, screeching angrily as she does so. The volunteer’s hair catches on fire and the inmyeonjo cackles.

“You will never tame me!” she shrieks.

I cover my mouth. Wait, she talks?! Her voice is so screechy and warbly, it makes me wince. The sound reminds me of those woodcutting saws that people wobble and play like a stringed instrument, except it’s three octaves higher.

Jo jumps into the lake to kill the flames and comes out a few moments later looking decidedly less well-groomed than before. His man bun is scorched.

Sora looks disappointed. “Next!”

The two remaining volunteers step forward together. One of the women has a pixie cut, while the other has a side shave and walks with a cane, but apart from that, they’re identical. They’re both wearing T-shirts with wingless fairies on them and the text TWINS BEFORE WINGS underneath.

They whisper something to each other, and then the pixie-cut woman manipulates the earth, making it move and rise around the inmyeonjo. It swallows the bird-woman until she is trapped in a mountain of soil and only her head is visible. A look of pure hatred passes over the inmyeonjo’s face as she fights to get free, but the witch has her hand clasped tight, and the earth stays firm around the bird body.

That’s when her twin sister strikes. She animates her cane, which I realize now is actually a wooden staff. And with a swift Spider-Man gesture of her wrist, the sharp end of the staff slices through the air, scraping past the inmyeonjo’s face.

The bird-woman lets out a bloodcurdling scream as blood gushes from her cheek. The sisters high-five each other, and the crowd cheers.

“Now yield to us, inmyeonjo!” the earth-witch yells.

The bird-woman stays unmoving, still trapped in the soil mountain, and for a moment the crowd goes silent. This could be it.

The inmyeonjo closes her eyes and takes a big breath. I hold my breath, too.

“Never!” she finally cries. “I will shatter every one of those mirrors, and you can’t stop me!” She caw-caws as she tornadoes out of the mound like a corkscrew.

She flies at the sisters, her talons outstretched. They cover their heads, but the inmyeonjo has the element of surprise on her side. She dips low and swipes at them both with one sharp movement of her talons. Side Shave trips and stumbles onto the soil mound, and the bird-woman goes for her again.

“Stand up, Yumi! Run!”

Pixie Cut helps her sister up just in time, and together, they run for their lives. Austin magicks the cage back down over the bird-woman.

Sora’s face drops. “Good try, Yumi and Yuri, but not quite.”

The clan leader finally turns to me. She gives me a small smile, then addresses the crowd.

“Everyone, I’d like you to meet Riley Oh. She is a Horangi, daughter of the late Mina and Yoon Seo.” Murmurs of recognition and curiosity ripple through the crowd. “But unbeknownst to us, she was taken from our clan and raised by a family of Gom.” The crowd gasps. “Fortunately, she has, defying all odds, returned to us of her own accord. And she wants to pledge her allegiance to our clan. She’s going to volunteer herself today in this task as her initiation, so I ask that you show her a true Horangi welcome.”

She raises her arms and the crowd breaks into applause. As they cheer, something cracks open inside me. There is no backing out now. I am actually doing this.

Sora quiets the crowd with her hands. “Riley, we know you’ve only just been biochipped today, and you may not have had a chance to unlock your power yet, but tell us, what is your dominant element?”

“Um, fire,” I mumble.

“The symbol of transformation and will. How fitting for this occasion. Well, good luck. I hope you burn bright today!”

I gulp. She hopes I burn bright? With four elemental fires, she has no idea….

The crowd applauds again, and Henry and Grace—the two kids who volunteered earlier—cheer the loudest. Jo steps forward and tosses me his lighter. “May you have beginner’s luck, kid,” he says. The lighter has one of those flick tops and the words NOT YOUR AVERAGE JO engraved on the front. I throw him a grateful look.

Then, as Austin raises the metal cage back into the sky, I cautiously approach the inmyeonjo.

Her eyes are piercing and unnaturally still. They blink once in the time that I’ve blinked ten. And I suddenly realize it was a bad idea to go last. She is now angrier than ever, having been singed, squashed, and scraped by the others. The creature lowers her head in a predatory way and opens her wings to their full width. She lets out a snarl/squawk and scratches the ground with her talons.

“Make your move, child,” she says with a hiss.

I look down at my hands. The lighter is shaking, and I realize it’s because I’m trembling. There are over a hundred pairs of eyes on me, and I have no idea what I’m doing. In the absence of a plan, I decide to take my new gift for a test drive. What have I got to lose?

I grab hold of Hattie’s heart vial. Then I repeat her line under my breath. “Sometimes you gotta burn your fingers to enjoy the s’more.”

I rub my wrists together, and, as the heat ignites on my right arm, I watch the gifted mark glow red. I flick the lighter until a small flame appears, and then close my eyes.

Taeyo said to imagine floating in the sea—to be one with the water. So I visualize lying on my back in the Pacific, looking up at the sky. I try to relax and stoke the flame. But when I think of the Pacific, I remember the summoning gone wrong and my sister’s unconscious body floating in the ocean. I recall dragging her limp body onto the sand and feeling more