51. Chapter 51
Tap, tap.
Tap, tap, tap.
The insistent knock woke Yareli. She opened her eyes, her eyelids swollen with sleep.
Her childhood bedroom’s ceiling stared back at her.
An odd sensation of wrongness made her frown.
It had been over a week since she had returned to the human world—home, she corrected herself—and she still wasn’t used to it.
In fact, she couldn’t remember how she had made it back to her family’s house after arriving at Enchanted Brew.
“Yareli, if you don’t get up and help Mom with the dishes, I’m going to steal your makeup bag.” Her brother’s voice was muffled through her locked door. At his threat, she perked up.
“Fernando, ya! Gimme a second.”
She opened her door a minute later, dressed in her pajamas, her hair tied back in a messy bun. “Geez,” she grumbled.
Fernando scowled. “Just because you’re still getting used to the time zone difference doesn’t mean you get to sleep all day, and let me do all the chores.”
“You try living in Europe for over a year and coming back to the States,” she retorted, surprised at how smooth the words came out of her mouth. Lying had become so easy; it was almost as natural as breathing.
“Whatever. Mom’s in the kitchen. I’m going downstairs.” He walked away, sticking his tongue out at her. She made a face at him in return.
When she entered the kitchen, vertigo hit her. It was like the Curse Eater’s nightmare—her mom had her back to her, cutting up garlic.
“Yo te ayudo con los trastes,” Yareli said to her mom, hurrying to the sink before her mom could notice her distress. She would think Yareli was sick and make her drink some foul-tasting home remedy.
“Gracias, mija.”
“Hey ma, when did I get back again?”
The steady sound of chopping paused for a moment before she answered, “About a week ago. Did you forget again?”
She gave an awkward laugh. “Yeah, the time zone difference really messes with my sense of time.”
Despite the times she had inquired about her return, her mom hadn’t provided any more details, saying Yareli had simply knocked on the door.
She finished up the dishes and hopped into the shower.
The soap ran down her arms, and flashes of another world fluttered through her mind.
She attempted to hold onto the images of her friends, but they faded.
She remained under the water until her fingers pruned.
On her first day back, she had grabbed her phone, opened her contacts, her socials, her photos, searching for their existence.
She looked up Augrys’s human pseudonym but didn’t find anything under August. Erick, Don, Donna.
She had searched for all of them, but nothing appeared.
A cold shiver had run down her back, and she hurried out the door without asking for permission from her mom, deciding she’d deal with the consequences later.
Queen Reamiria had forcibly sent her home while the Great Tree was dying.
The thought had looped over and over in her head.
Izmari was being condemned to destruction by its own queen, and Yareli had been denied the power that was rightfully hers.
The thought of her friends back in Izmari, their fates unknown amidst the coup, had added to her desperation to return to the cafe.
She had to know. She had to be certain that they were okay, then she’d demand they take her back to Izmari so she could finish what she had started. She had run from the bus stop, heading straight to the old building that housed Enchanted Brew, and had skidded to a stop in the alley.
A brick wall stared back at her.
The despair of that day had haunted Yareli since.
The message had been clear—stay out. And it hurt her pride and heart that Augrys had not reached out to her.
He had to know she was back in the human world, safe and sound.
She dried herself with a towel and stared at her reflection; her eyes were drawn to her round ears.
When she had first woken up in her childhood bedroom, she had looked like herself, but something odd had occurred within a day.
Something that confirmed that she needed to return to Izmari.
She nullified the illusion charm, and her pointed ears revealed themselves.
Her blemishes were gone, including the mole she had asked Augrys to keep; her dark brown eyes glinted purple, illuminated by the magic that coursed through her blood.
It thrummed, churning in her veins, aching to be released, but she didn’t.
She had another week at home before she headed back to her shared apartment, and she didn’t dare cast another spell in case her mom’s eerie sixth sense caught wind of brujería in her house.
She pinched her cheeks, the sting reminding her that she was still Yareli Ines Martinez, but…
The crackling electricity in the air, the smoke in her nostrils, the wind tousling her hair, and the fire that burned at her fingertips were a haunting reminder that she may have returned home, but she was no longer fully human. She agonized over some of Tuom’s last words.
You’ll never be the same.
She had talked big back then, fueled by wrath, but now that she was alone, she was frightened.
Her memories had begun to fade again, and her magic had continued to grow, but she had no way of getting answers.
Weni had stopped talking to her, leading her to believe she couldn’t reach her because she was in the human realm.
Yareli was stuck, forced to navigate the unsettling change alone.
She swallowed, clenching her hands into fists, and set her shoulders back.
One more week at home, she told herself.
Then, she would go searching for answers.
And just as she had feared back in Izmari, she realized that home was no longer the end of her journey.
Izmari was.