“They know you’re gifted?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“That’s not important. What’s important is they don’t know you or Hunter. Hunter has never been out on a mission since he came here, and he told us that he didn’t go into the town on his way here. So are you okay with heading out tomorrow?”
“Yeah, okay. I’ll let you know once my friend messages me back.”
“Good. That’s settled then.” Li picks up her teacup and drains it. As she pours another cup, she says, “You are coming to the funeral, aren’t you? It’ll be a short ceremony in the pavilion.”
I sigh. “I guess I might as well. It’s not like I have anything better to do.”
Li smiles. “Then I’ll see you in an hour or so.”
Her words are like a dismissal, and she moves to take a cookie from the tray, but then she pulls her hand back and turns to me again. “Oh also, please tell Hunter about the mission tomorrow. And don’t be surprised when you return to your cabin, I sent Ana Maria there.”
“Yeah, she begged me to move to my cabin earlier.”
Li chuckles. “Ana Maria really seems to like you.”
“I really don’t think that’s it though. I just think she doesn’t want to be with other kids.”
Li just shakes her head, smiling. She leans over to take a cookie and dunks it in her tea. “Shikoba, have you prepared the curriculum for next semester yet?”
His eyes open wide, like a deer in headlights, but then he resumes his normal expression with his eyes in a slight squint as though he can’t see very well. “I’m almost finished. Shouldn’t be more than another day or two.”
Li eats the cookie.
They’re no longer paying attention to me so I get up. “Um, I guess I’ll get going now.”
“Sure, sure,” Li says, waving at me dismissively but her eyes still on Shikoba. “A day or two? That’s what you said a day or two ago and I know you remember that very well.”
Shikoba rubs the back of his neck with a nervous smile. “Of course I remember. I’m just putting on the finishing touches, I promise. It’ll be done in a day or two.”
I head out. As I go through the door, I notice the unmarked door across from Li’s office.
“Uh, Li,” I say, interrupting their conversation. They look over at me. “What’s behind that door over there?” I point at the door.
“It’s just a staircase,” Li says. “It leads to the second floor. That’s where our bedrooms are, and some other spare rooms.”
Li and Shikoba resume their conversation immediately so I close the door behind me. I hadn’t really noticed that the Main House has two stories but now that I think about it, it is a much taller building than the rest.
I walk down the hall and out of the Main House.
With my heart thumping in my chest, I walk across the field to the cabins, doing my best to skirt around the kids. Some of them give me sour looks and stare pointedly at my gloved hands, but they don’t say anything.
I enter the cabin.
Ana Maria, who was looking over Remington’s shoulder as he sat at his desk, runs over to me.
“Chrys! Li said it’s okay!” She beams.
“I noticed.”
“Remy is a great artist!”
She takes my wrist and pulls me over to Remington’s desk. I tug my hand away from her, making her let me go.
“It’s nothing much,” Remington says, as he shades in a blue salamander-like creature with six protrusions from its body, each one having a scary fan of spiky limbs. That same creature is on his desk in plushie form.
“What on earth is that thing?” I say.
“Isn’t it so cute?” Ana Maria says as she grips the edge of Remington’s desk to peer over at the drawing. “It’s a nudibranch called Glaucus atlanticus. It’s also known as blue dragon or blue angel because of their majestic appearance. They’re poisonous and carnivorous. So cool, right?”
“Oh, sure. Very cool,” I say, backing away a bit. I want to stop looking at it.
Remington holds up the drawing in front of him. “Done, I think.” He hands it to Ana Maria. “Do you like it?”
She bounces up and down on the balls of her feet as she looks at it. “It’s perfect.”
Remington turns around in his seat. “By the way, Chrys, Ana Maria is great at sewing, so she can teach you if you want. She made all her stuffed sea slugs by hand.”
“All her sea slugs? There are more?” I say.
He points at the bunk across from his. I look over. On the desk, there are eight small plushies, all different shapes and colors, including the bunny sea slug she had been holding earlier. They’re all sea slugs, I guess, but they all look like alien or fantasy creatures.
Ana Maria looks up from the drawing. “I can introduce you to them.”
That passionate smile of hers is dangerous, I know it. I’ll end up being stuck here for hours hearing about sea slugs.
“Maybe some other time.” I look around the cabin. “Where’s Hunter?”
“He said he was going for a walk,” Remington says, “but that just means he’s sitting outside behind the cabin somewhere. You might have to go a bit in the forest to find him.”
I nod and go outside. As I expected, Remington is doing a good job of keeping Ana Maria entertained. He probably actually listens to her talk about sea slugs too. I shake my head as I walk around the cabin. I don’t know how he does it.
I reach the back of the cabin but don’t spot Hunter. I hear the faint sound of a somber flute melody coming from the forest. I go towards it. It feels kind of dangerous to follow it, like I’m walking straight into some sort of elvish trap.
The trees in this part of the forest have trunks so large I
