I look where she’s standing, wishing she were visible so I could read her expression. “Could you imagine if every night were like this, living your life without having to worry about what or who might be lurking out of sight, without always having to peer over your shoulder to see if you’re being followed? Wouldn’t it be amazing to be able to forget, just once, what’s peeking over the horizon?”
“Of course it’d be nice,” she says. “And it
“I hate what we have to do. I hate the situation we’re in. I wish it were different.” I look for Lorien in the sky and release her hand. She makes herself visible. I grab her by the shoulders and turn her towards me.
Six inhales deeply.
Just as I duck my head towards hers, an explosion rocks the back of the house. Six and I scream and tumble to the ground. A plume of fire lifts up over the roof, and flames instantly spread inside.
“Sam!” I yell. From fifty feet away I rip the front windows out. They shatter against the concrete walkway. Smoke comes billowing out.
Before I know it I’ve burst into a dead sprint. I take a deep breath and leap, crashing into the house and splintering the door from its hinges.
Chapter Fifteen
EACH NIGHT LATELY I LIE AWAKE FOR HOURS, MY eyes open, ears attuned to the sounds of silence around me. Every so often I lift my head when I hear a distant noise-a drop of water hitting the floor, a person shifting in her sleep-and sometimes I crawl from bed and go to the window to be assured there’s nothing out there, an obvious attempt to feel some semblance of security, however flimsy it might be.
Each night passes with less sleep than the night before. I’ve grown weak, exhausted to the point of delirium. I have trouble eating. I know worrying doesn’t do me any good, but no amount of willing myself to rest or eat does anything to change how I feel. And when I finally do sleep, nothing keeps away the terrible dreams that wake me up again.
There’s been no sign of the mustached man in the week since I saw him in the cafe, but I can’t dismiss the notion that just because I haven’t seen him doesn’t mean he isn’t out there. I keep returning to the same questions: who was in my cave; who
The questions of the cave and book aside, I’ve come to two conclusions. The first is that nothing was done to me because of my number. For the time being, it’s keeping me safe, but for how long? The second is that the crowd of people in the cafe kept the Mogadorian from making a move. But from what I know of them, a Mogadorian wouldn’t let a few witnesses deter him. I’ve stopped rushing to and from school ahead of the others and have instead attached myself to their large group. To keep Ella safe, I’ve stopped walking with her in public. I know it hurts her feelings, but it’s for the best. She doesn’t deserve to be mixed up in my problems.
But there’s one thing that has given me a shade of hope in all this. A noticeable change has occurred in Adelina. Worry creases her forehead. There’s a nervous twitch to her eyes when she thinks nobody’s watching, and they dart from one section of a room to another like a scared, threatened animal, the same way they used to years ago when she still believed. And while we haven’t spoken since I fell into her arms after rushing from the cafe, it’s these changes in her that have me thinking I might have my Cepan back.
Darkness. Silence. Fifteen sleeping bodies. I lift my head and glance across the room. Instead of seeing a small lump in Ella’s bed, the covers are thrown aside and her bed is empty. It’s the third night in a row I’ve noticed her missing, and yet I never hear her leave. But I have bigger things to worry about than where she’s gone off to.
I drop my head on the pillow and glance out the window. A full moon, bright and yellow, hangs just outside. I stare at it for a long time, entranced by the way it hovers there. I take a deep breath and close my eyes. When I reopen them, the moon has turned from bright yellow to bloodred and it seems to shimmer, but then I realize it’s not the moon I’m staring at, but rather its reflection, shining brightly in the dark waters of some great pool. Steam rises off its surface, and the air reeks of pungent iron. I lift my head again, and only then do I see I’m standing amid a ravaged, bloodied battlefield.
Bodies are strewn everywhere, the dead and dying, the aftermath of some war in which there are no survivors. I instinctively bring my hands to my body, feeling for puncture wounds or cuts, but I’m unscathed. That’s when I see her, the girl with the gray eyes I’ve dreamed about, the one I painted on the cave’s wall beside John Smith. She lies motionless at the base of the shore. I rush to her. Blood gushes from her side and soaks into the sand and is carried out to sea. Her raven hair clings to her ashen face. She’s not breathing, and I’m completely and utterly anguished to know there’s not a single thing I can do about it. And then behind me comes a deep, mocking laugh. My eyes close before I slowly turn around to face my enemy.
My eyes open and the battlefield disappears. The familiar bed in the darkened room has returned. The moon is normal and bright yellow. I get up and walk to the window. I scan the dark terrain, still and quiet. No sign of the mustached man, or anything else, for that matter. All the snow has melted, and the moon glistens on the wet cobblestones. Is he watching me?
I turn away and crawl back into bed. I lie on my back, taking deep breaths to calm myself. My whole body is tense and rigid. I think about the cave and how I haven’t been back since the boot prints appeared. I roll to my side with my back towards the window. I don’t want to see what’s out there. Ella still isn’t in her bed. I try to wait up for her to return, but I fall asleep. No further dreams come.
When the morning bell rings I raise my head off the pillow, my body stiff and sore. A cold rain beats against the window. I glance across the room and see Ella sitting up, lifting her arms towards the ceiling, yawning deeply.
We shuffle from the room together, saying nothing. We coast about our Sunday routines and sit through Mass with our heads hung. At one point I nudge Ella awake, and twenty minutes later she returns the favor. I survive the El Festin lunch line, doling out food while looking for anyone suspicious. When everything appears normal, I can’t decide if I’m relieved or disappointed. What saddens me most is that I don’t see Hector.
Towards the end of cleanup, La Gorda and Gabby begin horsing around, spraying each other with the hose attached to the kitchen sink as I dry dishes. I ignore them, even when I get splashed in the face. Twenty minutes later when I’ve just finished drying the last dish, carefully placing it atop the tall stack, a girl named Delfina slips on the wet floor and bumps into me, causing me to fall into the stack and send all thirty plates back into the dirty water, where some of them break.
“Why don’t you watch what you’re doing,” I say, and I push her with one arm.
Delfina spins around and shoves me right back.
“Hey!” Sister Dora barks from across the kitchen. “You two, knock it off! Right now!”
“You’re going to pay for that,” Delfina says.
I can’t wait to be officially done with Santa Teresa.
“Whatever,” I say, still scowling.
She nods at me, a malicious look upon her face. “Watch your back.”
“If I have to come over there, Lord help me, you are going to regret it,” Sister Dora says.
Instead of using telekinesis to toss Delfina through the roof-or Sister Dora or Gabby or La Gorda, for that matter-I turn back to the dishes.
When I’m finally free I walk outside. It’s still raining and I stand under the eaves and look towards the cave. The mud will be thick on the mountainside, which means I’d get filthy. I use that as an excuse for why I won’t go, though I know that even if it weren’t raining I wouldn’t have the courage, despite my curiosity of whether or not new boot prints have been made in the mud.
I walk back inside. Ella’s Sunday duties require her to clean the nave after everyone leaves, wiping down
