My eyebrows furrowed in confusion. I held the way home in my hands …
I looked down at the Ruyi Jingu Bang, and it clicked. In the legends, Sun Wukong’s magical staff could do pretty much whatever he asked. Sometimes he would just twirl it in the air, sit back, and watch it slay the demons for him. If the Ruyi Jingu Bang now recognized me as its owner, too, then the answer to getting home was obvious.
Closing my eyes, I held the staff up to my mouth and commanded, “Take my friends and me back to the human world.”
For a long moment, nothing happened. I felt pretty silly talking to an unresponsive stick. Maybe I wasn’t cut out to use the Ruyi Jingu Bang after all. But I had to try.
“Try clicking your heels together?” Jordan suggested. “It worked for Dorothy.”
“Who is Dorothy?” Nai Nai asked.
Before anyone could catch my grandmother up on the last hundred years of American pop culture, the Ruyi Jingu Bang glowed and shuddered in my palm. A light enveloped me. The last thing I saw was Nai Nai’s kind, dark eyes, filled with warmth and certainty.
“We’ll see you again soon, Falun,” my grandmother said. “Until the Hungry Ghost Festival ends, you can use your prayer notes to summon us—and the rest of the warriors who’ve passed—to your aid, should you need it.”
“Why can’t you just come with us?” I asked.
“We aren’t strong enough to stay in the human world for very long. We’re still recuperating from our last trip. Good luck, Falun.”
“Good luck!” Jinyu called.
There was a jerking sensation in my navel. Nai Nai, my ancestors, and the world around me vanished.
I think I screamed, but it was hard to tell. I wasn’t even sure I existed anymore inside this vacuum. After free-falling for what felt like forever but was probably only seconds, I landed on two feet on the ground.
I opened my eyes and blinked against the strong, bright light from the sun. Around me, Ren and Jordan surveyed our surroundings, too.
Chatter in a mix of Mandarin and English traveled to my ears. The smells of burning incense and fried foods wafted toward my nose. Some elementary-age kids ran past me with their heads glued to their iPhones, shouting about finding a rare Pokémon.
We’d arrived back at the Panda Express in Philadelphia’s Chinatown.
CHAPTER
23
I led Ren and Jordan into a back alley of Chinatown, behind Chef Wu’s Kitchen and Lucky Kung Fu Tea.
“Is the coast clear?” I asked, reaching into my pocket for my yuán.
“Yeah, go ahead,” said Ren.
Jordan remained silent. I had a feeling he was going to be sullen for a long time. I couldn’t blame him. After Alex had decided he’d rather kick it with a bunch of warmongering gods instead of me, his amazing big sister, I’d felt as sick inside as if I’d consumed a whole bucket of Panda Express orange chicken.
But maybe there was still hope for Alex. If my ancestors’ predictions were correct, I’d be reunited with my brother soon enough. Even if I couldn’t persuade him to help us, I’d give him the biggest older-sister scolding of his life and, in the process, yank out some of his hair to complete the memory elixir. Piece of moon cake.
I tossed the yuán onto the ground. With a flash, the small coin turned into a gigantic chariot, complete with stone lions—right in front of a pimply teenage chef who’d just come out the back door of Chef Wu’s Kitchen. Regular mortals couldn’t see the chariot, but the guy must have seen something, because he dropped the large black garbage bag he’d been holding.
“Holy smokes!” yelled the chef.
“Nothing to see here,” I shouted, scrambling over the side of the chariot and taking the reins behind the stone lions where Ashley had been before. Ren and Jordan dove in after me.
The chef ran back inside. “Yo, boss, you gotta see this.”
I didn’t hang around to hear the rest. “Up!” I urged the lions. Up they took us, higher and higher, until Philadelphia’s Chinatown became the size of a toy town in the distance. We were back in the clouds. I pulled a small contraption out of my pocket—Ye Ye’s compass.
The ride back to Huā Guǒ Shān, which took one day and one night, was silent. I knew we were all worried about Ashley, Jordan most of all.
There was too much to say. Somehow that meant we couldn’t bring ourselves to say anything at all, except for a couple of times when I asked Ren to pass up the food. Even Pocky couldn’t lift my spirits today.
“You think Ashley will get hungry down in Diyu?” Jordan’s voice sounded croaky from disuse. He stared at his unopened beef jerky forlornly. “Maybe we should’ve left her some of this food.”
“I don’t think she’ll get hungry,” Ren said gently.
“If she does, there’s bubble tea down there,” I offered.
“How do you know she won’t get hungry?” Jordan countered. “Have you ever been trapped in the Last Glance to Home Tower in place of the Ruyi Jingu Bang?” When we said nothing, Jordan crossed his arms over his chest. “Didn’t think so. And what if Ashley needs to use the bathroom? I bet she’ll have horrible cramps after being trapped for so long.”
Ren coughed loudly enough that I took my eyes off the sky and turned around.
“I’m guessing that since Ashley will be, um, pretty frozen, all of her … human needs will be taken care of,” I said.
I waited for Jordan’s biting retort, but none came. I looked back. He was fast asleep, snoring, on a disgruntled Ren’s shoulder. Ren sighed and patted Jordan’s head.
The silence stretched on into the night. With Ashley gone, the chariot felt too empty. Too quiet.
When nighttime fell, it finally emerged out of the darkness—the huge, beautiful mountain. Brilliantly colored flowers bloomed with life, and birds soared above the trees. Huā Guǒ Shān, the
