
The duo finds themselves transported through a banyan tree into the realm of Astranthia. When her brother Rohan goes missing, Rea enlists the help of potential friend Leena, who is from a large Indian family. Though it has always been her home and Rea's family appears to be like all the other families there, she is about to find out she is not at all like the people of her village, and that her family holds a terrible and wonderful secret. It is her birthday, but her twin brother is ignoring that she shares it, her Amma is making her go pick tea, and then to top it off, both newly 12-year-olds are being told not to leave the small house in their village in Darjeeling, India. Gr 4-6-Rea is upset and unhappy with her family. Can she rescue Rohan, save Astranthia, and live to see it all? Struggling with the truth her Amma has kept hidden from her, Rea must solve clues that lead to Rohan, find a way to rescue him, and save Astranthia from a potentially deadly fate. Rea also discovers that she is a princess with magic. There with the help of Xeranther, an Astranthian barrow boy, and Flula, a pari, Rea battles serpent-lilies and blood-sucking banshees, encounters a butterfly-faced woman and blue lizard-men, and learns that Rohan has been captured.
In the shade of night, they portal to an otherworldly realm and travel to Astranthia, a land full of magic and whimsy. Unwilling to give up on her brother, Rea and her friend Leela meet Mishti Daadi, a wrinkly old fortuneteller whose powers of divination set them off on a thrilling and secret quest. Her grandmother, too, is behaving strangely. It hasn't even been a day and Amma acts like Rohan's gone forever. It's four in the morning and Rohan is nowhere to be found. After a big fight with her twin brother Rohan on their birthday, Rea's life in the small village of Darjeeling, India, gets turned on its head.

It all begins on the night Rea turns twelve. Can she overcome the odds and save her brother before it's too late? By Grade + Interest - K to 1st By Grade + Interest - 2nd to 3rd By Grade + Interest - 4th to 5thĪn ordinary girl.
