Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death, graphic violence, and animal death.

The empress now shares her story. The Moon was the second creation of the great Weaver. From the sky, she watched the Water and witnessed the rise of humans. The humans fought often, but they also danced, taught by the Water for the Moon’s entertainment. They danced intricate steps with names such as “The Palm Beats the Dirt” and “The Spring Fills Our Basket” (283). Their dances contained magic to bring rain and strengthen their bodies. During this time, the Moon often visited the Inverted World.

The Moon knew that her body would eventually grow old and die and that a new Moon would be born from her bones. Fearing death, she made a deal with a man who cut her free from the fabric of the sky in exchange for a wish. When she fell to earth and took human shape, the man held her to her promise. She became his lover and empress, granting him sons and giving them her power so that they might build a dynasty. Her sons trapped her, becoming more violent with each generation.

Now, she sits trapped in a room in Luubu’s ship. The bars on the window hold her physical body. The holes in the walls allow the screaming from the Water beneath the moonrocks to fill the room and keep her powerless. However, she split her consciousness in two. While one part sits trapped on the ship, the larger part roams free in the body of a bird. As the bird, she surveys the battle that still rages between the Silver Monkeys and rebels. She sees two long boats filled with masked men approaching but does not know who they are. Jun is beaten and locked in a closet on Luubu’s ship. Luubu orders the First Terror’s head put on a platter and set on his table.

Keema survives the fall into the river, only to be captured aboard a different ship. He is chained to a wall, bloody and beaten. He feels defeated, shamed by his broken promises. He cannot help Jun, and he has lost Araya’s spear in the river. Determined to free him, the empress flies away in search of more help.

Her attention returns to her body where she now sits in Luubu’s room. He rants about his desire to be with his mother, his loneliness and resentment, and the hatred he feels for his father, who kept his mother locked away. He loves her but also desires power. He intends to eat her and become unstoppable. The empress wonders if things would have been different if she’d given birth to daughters and if even one daughter might have been enough to temper their violence. However, she suspects that it would not have been enough to battle a violent patriarchal culture.

As the bird, she finds a performing bear and moves her consciousness into it. As the bear, she attacks the soldiers and frees Keema. She breaks his chains, but he runs, forcing her to chase him all the way off the ship. When she catches him, she writes in the dirt with her paw, and he finally understands who she is. Together, they head toward Luubu’s ship.

Suddenly, the bear’s body freezes with pain. In her real body, Luubu is chewing on one of her fingers, with his head laying in her lap. She struggles to regain her focus and keep moving. A soldier attacks Keema and the bear, but the purple bird drops out of the sky, clawing at the soldier’s face. The empress and Keema keep running.

Meanwhile, the masked men from the long boats sneak onto Luubu’s ship. It is the Red Peacock Brigade, bringing their father’s body. They find his head and sew it back on, reviving him. Then, they find Jun. The First Terror tearfully offers Jun his forgiveness if he comes back to the family, but Jun refuses. The First Terror says, “That’s fine […] I’m going to save you all the same” (310). He leaves him locked in the closet.

The First Terror and his sons then confront Luubu in his room. Luubu has eaten one entire finger and now has the power to control the First Terror with his voice. Luubu orders the First Terror to kill his sons, while the sons stand unable to stop him. The First Terror cries as he lifts his sword and kills his sons one by one. Inside the bear’s body, the empress roars with anguish for her son and grandsons.

Luubu calls for Jun, still locked in the closet. Jun walks into the room as the empress watches through her unmoving body. She taught Jun to feel remorse for those he has killed, and his efforts to change and never kill again give her hope for the future. Now he walks into Luubu’s room, and the empress fears that all her hope will die with him. In the bear’s body, she leaps aboard Luubu’s vessel, with Keema on her back. They fight soldiers on the deck. Inside the room, Luubu takes the sword from the First Terror and gives it to Jun, ordering Jun to kill his father. Jun begs him to stop. Luubu asks if Jun hates his father, and Jun says that he does not want to kill him.

As Jun lifts the sword, the bear on the deck tears at the nets holding the moonrocks. The nets fall, freeing the empress. Her consciousness returns to her body, and she tells Jun to stop, negating Luubu’s order. Luubu tries to fight his mother’s power but fails. The First Terror, also freed, attacks Luubu. The empress understands that the two brothers will fight forever and destroy everyone else in the process. She hesitates, but the First Terror tells her to “do it” (325), accepting his fate. The empress kills her two sons, expending the last of her power.

Jun carries the empress’s body away from the room. Keema steals another boat, and the three escape, leaving the rebels still fighting. Far down the river, they camp on the bank. The empress tells Jun that she is dying and will not make it to the Divine City. She orders Jun and Keema to consume her body, take what little power she has left, and use it to defeat the final, Third Terror. Then, they should take her bones to the sea and offer them back to the Water. The boys swear to do so. Finally, the empress falls into a deep sleep. She dies, thinking about how strange it is that she had ever feared this moment to begin with.