My teeth grind, and my eyes narrow, and I do not move.
Dr. Franklin sighs, and his gaze skims over the rest of us. Harold will never speak in public; he looks like he’s about to throw up right now, just standing here. Since this has nothing to do with him, Ryan doesn’t give a shit about being here. But Gwen trembles beside me, the words inside her boiling like water about to rattle the lid off a pot. She wants to speak, I know it. But she glances at me and then shakes her head just a little, and the Doctor nods, accepting our silence.
We move around the table that the staff set up for us. There are five paper lanterns, each a pale white. Gwen reaches forward first, her fingers sparking with light, but Dr. Franklin covers her hand with his, pulling her back. There are parents here, people not a part of the school. Can’t let them see. The staff light the lanterns with the long matches they use for the fireplaces, then they hand one to each of us. Dr. Franklin looks like he’s about to say something else, something poetic, but before he can break out into a full-on dirge, I let my lantern slip from my fingers, and it rises into the gray sky without any more ceremony. The others follow suit, Dr. Franklin releasing his lantern only after he mumbles something to himself, his eyes closed and his head bent. Everyone looks up. A gust of wind knocks Harold’s lantern down, punching at the inflating paper balloon, but it staggers back, following the others as they drift in the direction of the ocean.
No one notices me as I leave.
That’s something I learned from Sofía. Being invisible is easy.
I step further into the garden—which is basically just some stubby trees and scraggly bushes—and then round the academy and head back out to the edges of the property. Not toward the ocean—not where the lanterns are fighting through the winds to float higher—but back toward the gate and the ruins on the edge of Berkshire’s grounds.
Back to the last place I last saw her.
It’s such bullshit, this memorial with its empty words and fragile lanterns. All of this mourning is totally pointless.
Because Sofía’s not dead.
CHAPTER 2
I hear her before I see her. I’m not surprised that she’s the only one who bothered to find me after the memorial service.
“Hey, Gwen,” I say, as she plops down beside me.
She gives me a sullen look. She’s pissed I left the ceremony. “You’re not the only one who misses her, you know.”
“I know.”
She glares at me, but then the fight leaves her. “This was my place first,” she says, her voice softer now. “I’m the one who showed it to Sofía.”
I didn’t know that. I’d always sort of thought of the chimney as my place on the island. I discovered it my first week here, after doing some research on Berkshire and finding out that the island held one of the oldest remaining houses built by the colonists. My eyes drift to the black-and-bronze plaque adhered to the crumbling bricks near the border of the academy’s grounds: REMAINS OF THE CEDRIC MOOREHEADE HOUSE. DESTROYED IN A FIRE IN 1775. ORIGINALLY BUILT IN SALEM IN THE 1660S, LIKE THE ISAAC GOODALE HOUSE OF IPSWICH, AND MOVED TO PEAR ISLAND IN 1692.
“Why’d you come out here?” I ask Gwen.
She flicks her fingers, a burst of flame dancing out. “I like chimneys.”
“Oh. Right.”
I like history, so of course I’d sought the ruins out, but all that was left was the chimney. Still, I like this place for what it used to be—a house built before America was a country—and for what it might have been—someone’s dream, someone’s birthplace, someone’s safe haven. Pear Island hasn’t been used for much. In the early days, settlers grazed livestock here. But at some point, a family decided that this island, with its biting flies and harsh winds and terrible weather . . . this island would make a perfect home. The chimney is all that’s left of a family. Real people who stood here centuries ago, with lives lost to time.
But Gwen doesn’t care about the history. She likes it simply for what it is now. She stares into the blackened center of the chimney, where hundreds of fires must have blazed over the years. Now there’s just green moss and a few plants trailing up the center. Gwen cups her palm, rubbing her thumb over air, and a tiny ball of fire appears in the center of her hand. She tosses it toward the grass and plants growing in the chimney, but the ground is too wet and the foliage too young for the flame to catch. A thin wisp of smoke trails up the bricks, then dies.
That’s Gwen’s power. Pyrokinesis. The ability to make and control fire.
Gwen stares at the smoke. The trees’ shadows reach toward us, and the air is damp and cool and slightly salty.