77 pages • 2 hours read
Rebecca RoanhorseTrail of Lightning
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2018A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Chapters 18-22Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 18 Summary
Hastiin approaches Maggie but introduces himself to Kai, saying that his group is warning travelers of rumors of strange things further down the valley. Maggie notices that for some reason, Hastiin seems to be ignoring her. She becomes impatient when Hastiin tells Kai that they will have to wait an hour until the Thirsty Boys’ scouting party returns. Since this approach does not work, Hastiin produces additional excuses to keep Kai and Maggie from going to Tse Bonito, saying that there is a fire. Somehow, in a way that seems almost magical, Kai manages to stare Hastiin down and convince him to let them go. Nearing Tse Bonito, Kai suggests that they swing by Grandpa Tah’s, but Maggie has an ominous feeling. When they arrive in town, they realize Tah’s place is on fire.
Chapter 19 Summary
Maggie tries to drive near where Tah’s place used to be, but Law Dogs block the area. Longarm is there, too, expecting Maggie. After parking just outside of town, Maggie and Kai argue first about who will investigate. Then, Maggie accuses Kai of trading their freedom with Longarm the previous day for Tah’s life. Kai denies this vehemently, saying, “I have a way with words, okay? People listen to me” (141). Then he heads off to investigate. Maggie goes to investigate as well, hiding in a crowd of onlookers. After overhearing that no one has seen Tah, she panics and hides in fear before deciding to find Kia. When she does find him, however, he appears to be acting friendly with Longarm. Maggie suspects Kai of collusion again but quickly realizes that Kai is, in fact, unconscious and handcuffed. When Longarm begins to beat the unconscious Kai, Maggie’s clan powers activate, and she shoots Longarm.
Chapter 20 Summary
Maggie tries to wake Kai. In response to killing Longarm, she thinks, “I expect to feel some emotion at seeing him like that, seeing what I’ve done, but I don’t expect to feel satisfaction” (150). However, when Kai wakes up, she still expects him to consider her killing horrendous. She thinks, “I wait for him to recoil in horror. To demand to know how I could have done such a thing. To look at me and see the monster” (150). Maggie drags Kai to the truck and drives towards the Checkerboard Zone, where the Law Dogs have no authority. While they head towards the house of Grace Goodacre, a woman who Maggie knows hates the Law Dogs, Kai reveals that Longarm told him that Tah was dead. Maggie thinks Longarm was a liar. They arrive at Grace’s place, finding her young son guarding the entrance. Luckily, he, too, hates the Law Dogs and lets Maggie and Kai in. A man takes Kai away for treatment, then a woman brings Maggie to see Grace. Grace and Maggie bargain over payment for her and Kai’s protection, and Grace eventually takes the coffee and the promise of a favor one day. Although Grace is shocked to hear that Maggie killed Longarm, she says that Maggie and Kai can stay for 24 hours.
Chapter 21 Summary
While Maggie cleans herself up, she looks at photos of Grace’s dead husband. Maggie does not know how he died, but she does know his death is part of why Grace hates the Law Dogs. As Maggie looks at the family photos, she thinks about how she only made it to the first year of high school herself before the Big Water. Grace’s daughter Clarissa, known as Rissa, comes to fetch Maggie. Rissa also mentions that a few months ago, which was after Maggie had been abandoned by Neizghání, Maggie came to Grace’s to get drunk and rant about how terrible Neizghání was. After hearing that, Rissa says to Maggie, “that Neizghání sounds like a real dick” (162). Rissa also mentions that Kai was injured very badly but will recover. Maggie tells Rissa to let Kai know he has 24 hours but that he will have to figure out his own way after that. Maggie has decided to leave on her own.
Chapter 22 Summary
Maggie prepares to leave, trying to convince herself that she is leaving Kai because of her promise to Tah to protect him. She knows, however, that she is leaving because she cannot face seeing him, that “all [she] can show Kai is death” (164). Grace interrupts Maggie’s preparations, telling her it is ok to be in mourning and that she realizes Neizghání’s leaving must have hurt her. Although Grace tries to convince Maggie that Neizghání’s way of living is not the only way, Maggie is unable to realize or accept Grace’s kind words. After Grace leaves, Kai approaches with a healed face and red-rimmed eyes. Maggie wants to know how he healed so quickly, but he explains simply that he is a Medicine Man. Kai says that in the Burque, he was caught with a Urioste girl and publicly beaten. After that, when he was taken to Tah’s to heal, his clan powers of healing manifested. He says that this is why his eyes are sometimes silver. His power to heal convinced Kai that he could handle Longarm on his own, but he was wrong. Kai thanks Maggie for helping him, but Maggie only tells him to leave the area before more trouble finds him. However, Grace’s children Rissa and Clive interrupt them, reporting that there are monsters in Rock Springs.
Chapters 18-22 Analysis
Despite Maggie’s self-imposed isolation and reluctance to trust other, these chapters show the ways in which Maggie does, or did, have some semblance of family. When Maggie first suspects that Tah might be in danger, her desire to help is overwhelming. When she drives by and is held back by a police line, she thinks, “it takes all my willpower not to ram my truck through that police line and head straight to Tah’s door” (138). Once it is clear that Tah’s place is burned down, Maggie cannot focus on anything else. She fears for the man she trusts, remembering that he called her a daughter. Maggie thinks, “Daughter. That word means something in Navajo. It means family but also responsibility. It was my responsibility to keep Tah safe, and I’ve failed spectacularly” (142). The loss of her honorary grandfather makes Maggie feel even more alone and ashamed of herself.
The loss of Tah also further bolsters Maggie’s relationship with Kai. When Maggie sees that Kai is in danger, she thinks that even if Tah was incorrect about Kai’s ability to help her, “he entrusted Kai’s safety to [her]” (147). As Tah’s grandson, Kai falls under the familial obligation that Maggie feels for Tah, despite Maggie’s suspicions that Kai betrayed them both. Later at Grace’s, Maggie tries to convince herself that she will leave Kai because of this obligation. However, at this point Maggie excuses her own inability to become close to others more than she expresses an actual duty to protect Kai. These difficulties continue to be characteristic of Maggie and Kai’s relationship: As Maggie finds reasons to become closer to Kai, whether from her association with Tah or Kai’s own goodwill towards others, she just as quickly finds ways to build walls between herself and him.
Maggie’s loss of her only remaining honorary family contrasts sharply with the loving family she finds in the Goodacres. When she first visits Grace’s trailer, she finds a number of Goodacre family photos. Looking at the photos, although Maggie does see Grace’s deceased husband, she also observes “how happy they seem. Like a family” (162). However, despite Maggie’s inability to see it, Grace does seem to have some affection for her, which she proves when she gives Maggie advice and allows Maggie to stay at her place for a day, despite imminent danger from the Law Dogs, whom Maggie angered. If Maggie were not held back by her reluctance to connect to others, it seems that Grace would be a reliable source of support.
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