Up close, I can see how thoroughly both bodies have been rubbed with red ocher—face, hair, clothing—it coats them like the blood that coats a baby as it emerges from the womb.
The dancer completes circle upon circle upon circle around the graves, as the sun slides slowly into the west. All the while I feel Mya’s presence. I want to look up, but I can’t. Sweat trickles down my back, yet I shiver with cold. Beneath my feet, I notice the shifting of my shadow, bending toward the east, toward home. Still, the drums play on and on, the music rising, carrying the Spirits up, bearing them to the Land Above the Sky.
Finally, the last note is struck. I turn quickly, striding off into the meadow to the east, not wanting to speak to anyone.
Voices die away, until only the sounds of the meadow remain—the thrumming of insects, the whisper of the wind. I lie down, surrounded by tall grass and clusters of tiny blue flowers.
I try to listen for bees. Eventually, I hear footsteps. Someone lies down beside me. I don’t have to look. I’ve been in the dark with her enough to know her by the cadence of her walk, the sound of her exhaled breath. . . .
She slides her hand over and wraps my fingers in hers. I don’t pull away. Warmth floods through me, like it did that first time in the cave, the night she saved my life.
We lie still for a long time. “You were right,” Mya says after a protracted silence. “Summer has returned. This parka is too heavy for this day.”
“It’s also too big for you,” I say. “Why do you wear it?”
“It belonged to my mother.”
And just like that, one of the many mysteries of Mya is solved.
We fall silent again, content to listen. Eventually, I hear it—the whir of wings. She does too. We both sit up. Without a word or even a glance, we focus on the bee. We both climb to our feet and follow him.
He joins another, then another. They move with purpose, following their secret pathways over a sea of blue and violet blooms. After following them for so long I’m convinced we’ve gotten confused and will never find the hive, we discover it in a grove of withered spruce, tucked beneath a ledge beside the sea.
I slide down onto the ground in the scant shade of the trees, staring out over the water. Mya sits facing me, her back to the sea. Before I can shift my gaze, she lifts her hand to my face.
I turn to her, and I’m startled to see her cheeks damp with tears. I wipe them away, and she kisses me.
This kiss is different from our first. Mya’s lips are warm and urgent, sending heat like white light through the very core of me, chasing away all my darkness.
Slowly, we stretch out our bodies, easing onto the ground. I pull her close to my chest, encircling her in my arms. At first she doesn’t move, but then silent sobs come, her damp, hot face buried against my neck. When her body finally stills, I kiss her again—the slowest kiss I can stand.
I pull back and look into her eyes. The sun forms a tiny fire in each, a signal fire, a light far away, but bright enough to guide me into the future.
I cannot go into the past. I cannot stop change. Change is coming. But lying here beside Mya, I realize, for the first time since we carried Lo’s lifeless body down the cliff, that the future may hold some good.
My eyes drop to the pendant around Mya’s neck, the pendant of ivory, the twin to the pendant of bone still wrapped around Lo’s neck in her grave.
Absently, my finger touches the flat disk at the center, carved with the image of two mammoth tusks. “You fixed it,” I say. “I found pieces of it scattered at the foot of the trail where you and Lo—”
“This was my mother’s,” Mya says. “Hers was ivory; mine was bone. When we moved—when she died—hers became mine.”
This simple story indicts me. I unfairly judged Mya, assuming she wanted ivory since Lo had a pendant of bone.
“It hurt me to do it, but I broke it on purpose and left it there. It was a clue for you. I knew you would find it, and you would know where to look for me.”
“You knew—” I pull my hand back, tucking it under my head so I can steady my gaze. “How did you know I would look for you?”
“Because . . .” She rolls onto her back and her eyes fall shut. “Because I trust you.”
I trust you. A breeze stirs the leaves above our heads, and cut-out shapes of light and shadow move across us like ripples on water. I trust you. . . . The words echo, fade, and return to echo again through my mind. Since the morning of that first hunt, I have longed to hear those words.
Mya kisses me again, and her hand slides up under my tunic and glides over my chest. Her skin is warm. The sun disappears behind a cloud, and shade encloses us like the walls of a hut.
“Mya.”
Her other hand finds my wrist. She guides my hand up under the hem of her own parka until it’s resting against the warm skin of her back.
She kisses me again, and half sighs, half whispers my name. “Kol.”
That’s when I know. I know we will survive. I know that we will move and there will be fierce, hard, startling changes.
I will feel lost.
But I won’t be lost. We will be together. And together, we’ll find ourselves again.
I let both hands glide across the soft skin of Mya’s back, and I know. I know. Wherever Mya is—a cave or a hut or a boat out on the sea—wherever she is, I’ll be with her, and I’ll be home.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The characters and events of Ivory and Bone would still be stuck in my head and heart if it weren’t for the efforts of so many wonderful people who helped bring them to life on these pages.
I want to thank Alexandra Cooper, who understood this story from the beginning. I owe you so much for shining the light of your editorial talents on an early version of this manuscript, and helping me see the better book within it. Thank you for asking all the right questions, and for working alongside me as we uncovered the essence of Kol’s story. Your input has been invaluable.
Of course, Alexandra would never have read this book if Josh Adams had not read it first. Josh, I am quite sure that no other literary agent could have done what you did for this book and for me as an author. I cannot thank you enough for sharing the power of your vision. You have set me and my stories on the best possible path, and I am so fortunate to have benefited from your talents.
Along with Alexandra Cooper and Josh Adams, I want to thank all the people who worked with them to bring this book into the world. At HarperCollins: thank you to Rosemary Brosnan, Alyssa Miele, Erin Fitzsimmons, Jessica Berg, Olivia Russo, Patty Rosati, and Kim VandeWater. At Adams Literary: thank you to Tracey Adams and Samantha Bagood. To everyone else whose work has contributed to this book, thank you. I am indebted to each of you for your enthusiasm and efforts. Thanks also to Sean Freeman for your contributions to my beautiful cover.
So many other writers have helped me along the way, but I must thank Amie Kaufman first among them. It would take twenty pages to properly acknowledge the difference your help and friendship have made in my life. Thank you for your constant encouragement, for taking the time to read, and for sharing your talent with me at the time I needed it most.
Kat Zhang, you have been with me almost from the beginning of my writing journey. You are so talented and supportive, and I am so proud to call you my friend. Thank you for reading and giving me your thoughts, and for the text messages, progress check-ins, and emails that assured me I was not toiling alone. I couldn’t have made it through without you.
Thank you, of course, to all the Pub(lishing) Crawl contributors and readers. Your enthusiasm is simply more than I could ever have expected or imagined, and it has made a huge difference in my life.
Thank you to all the scientists whose research and writing fed my imagination, and helped me understand the world of my characters and the lives they lived.
The goal of writing this book could never have been accomplished without the support of my friends and family. Naming all the friends who have laughed, cried, and laug
hed again with me along the way would be impossible, but please know that I appreciate all of you so much. To my sister, father, and stepmother, I can’t thank you enough for your inexhaustible faith in me and your constant encouragement. I also must mention the unconditional love and support I received from a special cat and dog, Sylvester and Memphis, who kept my lap and feet warm. Thank you for instinctively understanding that the best writing is done while peering around a furry head and between taking breaks to throw a ball.
Thank you to my son, Dylan. You are simply the purest light in my life. You never give up, and your example makes it impossible for me to give up. Your talent has always been an inspiration to me, and you never fail to make me laugh. Your sincere concern for me and my art is one of the truest gifts anyone could ever give me.
Thank you to my husband, Gary. I never knew an artist until I knew you. You live a life devoted to the art of your music, and being a part of that life has taught me how to live a life devoted to my writing. How could that gift ever be measured? You came into my life (or, rather, I dragged you into it), and you filled it with music, laughter, and love. I have the life I have because I have you.
I couldn’t thank all the people who have blessed my life without thanking God for bringing them to me. God has worked so many miracles in my life. This book is not the least of those miracles, but it’s not the greatest, either. I believe that God is Love, and all the people listed here prove that to me every day.
Thank you all so much.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo by Sub/Urban Photography
JULIE ESHBAUGH now lives in Philadelphia after having called Utah, France, and New York City home. Early on, Julie focused her artistic energies on filmmaking and online video. She made two short films and then spent several years producing an online video series for teens which received several honors from the Webby Awards. Creating videos for teens led to writing novels for teens, and Julie has never looked back. Ivory and Bone is her debut novel. You can learn more about her writing escapades on Twitter @JulieEshbaugh and on her website, www.julieeshbaugh.com.
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BOOKS BY JULIE ESHBAUGH
Ivory and Bone
Obsidian and Stars
CREDITS
Cover art by Sean Freeman
Cover design by Erin Fitzsimmons
COPYRIGHT
HarperTeen is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
IVORY AND BONE. Text copyright © 2016 by Julie Eshbaugh. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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Library of Congress Control Number: 2015958594
ISBN 978-0-06-239925-0
EPub Edition © May 2016 ISBN 9780062399274
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FIRST EDITION
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