“Here,” he says. His voice is gentle, the voice of the old Alex, the Alex of my memories. “I brought you some water. Don’t worry. It’s clean.”
“Thanks, Alex,” she responds. The name sounds wrong in her mouth and makes me feel off-kilter, the way I used to feel as a kid at the Strawberry Festival at Eastern Prom, standing in the hall of fun-house mirrors: like everything has been distorted.
Tack, Pike, and some of the others come pushing out of the woods just after Alex, elbowing their way through the weave of branches. Julian is one of the last to emerge, and I stand up and find myself running toward him, barreling into his arms.
“Whoa.” He laughs, stumbling backward a little and squeezing me, obviously surprised and pleased. I am never this affectionate with him during the day, in front of the others. “What was that for?”
“I missed you,” I say, feeling breathless for no reason. I put my forehead on his collarbone, place one hand on his chest. Its rhythm reassures me: He is real, and he is now.
“We did a full sweep,” Tack is saying. “Three-mile circumference. Everything looks good. The Scavengers must have gone in a different direction.”
Julian tenses. I turn around and face Tack.
“Scavengers?” I ask.
Tack shoots me a look and doesn’t answer. He has stopped in front of the new girl. Alex is still sitting beside her. Their arms are separated by only a few inches, and I start to fixate on the negative space between their shoulders and elbows, like one-half of an hourglass.
“You don’t remember what day they came?” he asks the girl, and I can tell he’s struggling not to seem impatient. On the surface, Tack is all bite—bite and rough edges, just like Raven. That’s why they go so well together.
The girl chews her lip. Alex reaches out and touches her hand, gentle and reassuring, and I am suddenly filled, head to toe, with the feeling that I am going to be sick.
“Go on, Coral,” he says. Coral. Of course she would be named Coral. Beautiful and delicate and special.
“I—I don’t remember.” Her voice is almost as low as a boy’s.
“Try,” Tack says. Raven shoots him a look. Her expression is clear. Don’t push it.
The girl draws the blanket a little tighter around her shoulders. She clears her throat. “They came a few days ago—three, four. I don’t know exactly. We found an old barn, totally intact. . . . We’d been crashing there. There was just a small group of us. There was David and Tigg and—and Nan.” Her voice breaks a bit, and she sucks in a breath. “And a few others—eight of us total. We’ve stuck together since I first came to the Wilds. My grandfather was a priest of one of the old religions.” She looks up at us defiantly, as though she is daring us to criticize her. “He refused to convert to the New Order and was killed.” She shrugs. “Ever since then, my family was tracked. And when my aunt turned out to be a sympathizer . . . well, we were blacklisted. Couldn’t get a job, couldn’t get paired to save our lives. There wasn’t a landlord in Boston who would rent to us—not that we had any money to pay.”
Bitterness has crept into her voice. I can tell that it is only the recent trauma that has made her seem fragile. Under normal circumstances, she is a leader—like Raven. Like Hana.
I feel another stab of jealousy, watching Alex watching her.
“The Scavengers,” Tack prompts her.
“Let it go, Tack,” Raven breaks in. “She’s not ready to talk about it.”
“No, no. I can. It’s just . . . I hardly remember . . .” Again she shakes her head, this time looking puzzled. “Nan had trouble with her joints. She didn’t like to be alone in the dark when she had to use the bathroom. She was worried she might fall.” She squeezes her knees closer to her chest. “We took turns walking with her. It was my turn that night. That’s the only reason I’m not . . . That’s the only reason . . .” She trails off.
“The others are dead, then?” Tack’s voice is hollow.
She nods. Dani mutters, “Shit,” and toes some dirt into the air, aiming at nothing.
“Burned,” the girl says. “While they were sleeping. We saw it happen. The Scavengers surrounded the place and just—phoomf. It went up like a match. Nan lost her head. Went hurtling straight back toward the barn. I went after her . . . after that, I don’t remember much. I thought she was on fire . . . and then I remember I woke up in a ditch, and it was raining . . . and then you found us. . . .”
“Shit, shit, shit.” Each time Dani says the word, she toes up another spray of dirt.
“You’re not helping,” Raven snaps.
Tack rubs his forehead and sighs. “They’ve cleared out of the area,” he says. “That’s a break for us. We’ll just have to hope we don’t cross paths.”