For years, dinner had been a pit stop. Something to endure before disappearing into her room, textbooks open, Caltech burning at the edge of her horizon. After the Incident—the last time she’d used her powers so thoughtlessly—shutting the door became policy. It had felt justified: Being focused. Distant. Because the more distant she was, the less people could see all the cracks.
Except tonight, while scrubbing her hands beneath warm water, Riya felt something shift. She hadn’t realized what she’d been missing.
And now Sirah khala was here, too. An anchor in the storm. A reminder that despite everything, magic still lived in this house.
But time was up.
“Riya, come sit!” Nyra called, her voice snapping Riya out of her thoughts. “Pasta’s getting cold, and Itoiledover it all evening. You’d better appreciate it!”
“Iappreciate it,” their dad said.
Riya caught Sirah khala’s eye again.
“Yes, please, let’s eat. Then, Riya, maybe you can take me out stargazing?” her aunt said slowly, her words heavy with hidden meaning. “Seems like a good night for it.”
Riya’s throat pinched.
“It is.”
The grass was damp beneath Riya’s boots as she followed Sirah khala to the far end of the backyard. They walked in silence, their path lit only by the moon—waxing gibbous, still shy of full. Just five nights left. The air held the sharp scent of soil and woodsmoke, and the cold curled at her fingers, even through her sleeves. She tugged the telescope to her side.
Sirah khala stopped beneath a gap in the trees where the sky opened wide above them, a dome of deepening blue pricked with stars.
“So? How are you holding up?” she asked.
Riya pulled her backpack off one shoulder and set it down beside her telescope. “About as well as you’d imagine.”
Sirah khala’s forehead wrinkled.
“Well,” she said. “Let’s begin. You ready?”
Riya nodded and pulled out the folder from her bag. Inside, printed on clean white paper, was her Caltech essay. Her fingers were stiff with cold. She didn’t loosen her grip.
Mr. Krug will be disappointed, she thought with a pang.
She shoved her glasses up the bridge of her nose. “What should I do?”
“Hang tight,” Sirah khala replied, pulling a canvas pouch of field chalk, a coil of garden twine, and a few small stakes from her jacket pockets. “I’ll handle it.” She knelt on the grass, but Riya stopped her.
“Wait. I want to do it,” Riya interjected. “I started this. I should be the one to... finish it.”
Sirah khala studied her for a long moment. Then, without a word, she handed Riya the supplies.
“Of course,” she said softly. “Remember to start with the five points. Then the circle. It doesn’t have to be perfect.”
Riya paced the grass, setting five stakes into the soft earth and running twine between them until a star took shape. When she was sure of the lines, she dusted the path with the field chalk, whitening the blades of grass along the twine. Her fingers smudged the dust once, twice. The spacing was off. But Sirah khala didn’t correct her, didn’t pull the chalk away.
And for the first time in a long time, Riya didn’t feel like she was doing something wrong. She just felt... present.
Crickets rasped. The grass whispered against her ankles.
Riya straightened and wiped her hands free of dust. “Done.”
“Stand in the center with your essay,” said Sirah khala.
Riya did as she was told, the late October night chilling her skin, seeping through her clothes. “Now what?”
“Now...” Sirah khala pulled out a red candle from her jacket and flicked a silver lighter until the wick caught fire. A small fluttering light bloomed in the dark. “Take this.”
