She had a different white cylinder in her hand, a thinner bottle with a pump rather than an aerosol top.
She puffed a cloud of mist into the air above my face. I sucked in a breath. The mist tasted like mint.
“And this is Heal,” Knits Fire continued, twisting the cap off the next canister, revealing a small pouring
spout. “It encourages your tissues to rejoin, to grow the way they should.”
She dribbled a tiny bit of the clear liquid into the wide cut on my arm, then she pushed the edges of the
wound together. I could feel her touch, but there was no pain.
“I’ll seal this up before I move on.” She opened another container, this one a pliable tube, and then
squeezed out a line of thick, clear jelly onto her finger. “Like glue,” she told me. “It holds everything
together and lets the Heal do its job.” She wiped it over my arm in one swift pass. “Okay, you can move
that now. Your arm is fine.”
I held it up to look. A faint pink line was visible under the shiny gel. The blood was still wet on my arm,
but there was no source anymore. As I watched, the Healer cleaned my skin with one quick pass of a
damp towel.
“Turn your face this way, please. Hmm, you must have hit those rocks just exactly wrong. What a
mess.”
“Yes. It was a bad fall.”
“Well, thank goodness you were able to drive yourself here.”
She was lightly dripping Heal onto my cheek, smearing it with the tips of her fingers. “Ah, I love to watch
it work. Looks much better already. Okay… around the edges.” She smiled to herself. “Maybe one
more coat. I want this to be erased.” She worked for a minute longer. “Very nice.”
“Here’s some water,” the older woman said as she came through the door.
“Thank you, Cerulean.”
“Let me know if you need anything more. I’ll be up front.”
“Thanks.”
Cerulean left. I wondered if she was from the Flower Planet. Blue flowers were rare—one might take a
name from that.
“You can sit now. How do you feel?”
“That’s just how it should be. Okay, let’s dust on a little Smooth.”
She twisted the last cylinder’s top and shook an iridescent powder into her hand. She patted it into my
cheek, then patted another handful onto my arm.
“You’ll always have a small line on your arm,” she said apologetically. “Like your neck. A deep
wound…” She shrugged. Absentmindedly, she brushed the hair back from my neck and examined the
scar. “This was nicely done. Who was your Healer?”
“Um… Faces Sunward,” I said, pulling the name from one of my old students. “I was in… Eureka,
Montana. I didn’t like the cold. I moved south.”
So many lies. I felt a twist of anxiety in my stomach.
“I started out in Maine,” she said, not noticing anything amiss in my voice. As she spoke, she cleaned the
blood from my neck. “It was too cold for me, too. What’s your Calling?”
“Um… I serve food. In a Mexican restaurant in… Phoenix. I like spicy food.”
“Me, too.” She wasn’t looking at me funny. She was wiping my cheek now.
“Very nice. No worries, Glass Spires. Your face looks great.”
“Thank you, Healer.”
“Of course. Would you like some water?”
“Yes, please.” I kept a grip on myself. It wouldn’t do to bolt the glass down the way I wanted to. I
wasn’t able to stop myself from finishing it all, though. It tasted too good.
“Would you like more?”
“I… yes, that would be nice. Thank you.”
“I’ll be right back.”
The second she was out the door, I slid off the mattress. The paper crackled, freezing me in place. She
didn’t dart back in. I had only seconds. It had taken Cerulean a few minutes to get the water. Maybe it
would take the Healer just as long. Maybe the cool, pure water was far away from this room. Maybe.
I ripped the pack off my shoulders and wrenched the drawstrings open. I started with the second
cabinet. There was the stacked column of Heal. I grabbed the whole column and let it clatter quietly into
the bottom of my pack.
What would I say if she caught me? What lie could I tell?
I took the two kinds of Clean next, from the first cabinet. There was a second stack behind the first of
the Seal, when the label of the next row of cylinders caught my attention.
Cool. For fevers? There were no instructions, just the label. I took the stack. Nothing here would hurt a
human body. I was sure of that.
I grabbed all the Seal and two cans of Smooth. I couldn’t press my luck any further. I closed the
cabinets quietly and threw my arms through the straps of the pack. I leaned against the mattress, making
another crackle. I tried to look relaxed.
She didn’t come back.
I checked the clock. It had been one minute. How far away was the water?
Two minutes.
Three minutes.
Had my lies been as obvious to her as they were to me?
Sweat started to dew up on my forehead. I wiped it away quickly.
What if she brought back a Seeker?
I thought of the small pill in my pocket, and my hands shook. I could do it, though. For Jamie.
I heard quiet footsteps then, two sets, coming down the hall.
CHAPTER 45
Succeeded
Healer Knits Fire and Cerulean walked through the door together. The Healer handed me a tall glass of
water. It didn’t feel as cold as the first—my fingers were cold with fear now. The dark-skinned woman
had something for me, too. She handed me a flat rectangle with a handle.
“I thought you would want to see,” Knits Fire said with a warm smile.
The tension flooded out of me. There was no suspicion or fear. Just more kindness from the souls who
had dedicated their lives to Healing.
Cerulean had given me a mirror.
I held it up and then tried to stifle my gasp.
My face looked the way I remembered it from San Diego. The face I’d taken for granted there. The
skin was smooth and peachy across my right cheekbone. If I looked carefully, it was just a little lighter
and pinker in color than the tan on the other cheek.
It was a face that belonged to Wanderer, the soul. It belonged here, in this civilized place where there
was no violence and no horror.
“What do you think?” the Healer asked.
“I look perfect. Thank you.”
“It was my pleasure to heal you.”
I looked at myself again, seeing details beyond the perfection. My hair was ragged—dirty, with uneven
ends. There was no gloss to it—homemade soap and poor nutrition were to blame for that. Though the
Healer had cleaned the blood from my neck, it was still smudged with purple dust.
“I think it’s time I called the camping trip quits. I need to clean up,” I murmured.
“Do you camp often?”
“In all my free time, lately. I… can’t seem to keep away from the desert.”
“You must be brave. I find the city much more comfortable.”
“Not brave—just different.”
In the mirror, my eyes were familiar rings of hazel. Dark gray on the outside, a circle of moss green, and
then another circle of caramel brown around the pupil. Underlying it all, a faint shimmer of silver that
would reflect the light, magnify it.
Jamie?Mel asked urgently, beginning to feel nervous. I was too comfortable here. She could see the
logic of the other path laid out before me, and that frightened her.
I know who I am,I told her.
I blinked, then looked back at the friendly faces beside me.
“Thank you,” I said again to the Healer. “I suppose I’d better be on my way.”
“It’s very late. You could sleep here if you’d like.”
“I’m not tired. I feel… perfect.”
The Healer grinned. “No Pain does that.”
Cerulean walked me to the reception area. She put her hand on my shoulder as I stepped through the
door.
My heart beat faster. Had she noticed that my pack, once flat, was now bulging?
“Be more careful, dear,” she said, and patted my arm.
She smiled and went back to her desk.
I kept my pace even as I walked through the parking lot. I wanted to run. What if the Healer looked in
her cabinets? How soon would she realize why they were half empty?
The car was still there, in the pocket of darkness created by a gap between streetlights. It looked empty.
My breath came fast and uneven. Of course it should look empty. That was the whole point. But my
lungs didn’t calm until I could glimpse the vague shape under the blanket on the backseat.
I opened the door and put the backpack on the passenger seat—it settled there with a reassuring
clatter—then I climbed in and shut the door. There was no reason to slam the locks down; I ignored the
urge.
“Are you okay?” Jared whispered as soon as the door was closed. His voice was a strained, anxious
rasp.
“Shh,” I said, keeping my lips as still as I could. “Wait.”
I drove past the bright entrance and answered Cerulean’s wave with one of my own.
“Making friends?”
We were on the dark road. No one was watching me anymore. I slumped in the seat. My hands started
to shake. I could allow that, now that it was over. Now that I’d succeeded.
“All souls are friends,” I told him, using my normal volume.
“Are you all right?” he demanded again.
“I’m healed.”
“Let me see.”
I stretched my left arm across my body, so he could see the tiny pink line.
He sucked in a surprised breath.
The blanket rustled; he sat up and then climbed through the space between the seats. He pushed the
backpack out of the way, then pulled it onto his lap, testing its weight.
He looked up at me as we passed under a streetlamp, and he gasped.
“Your face!”
“It’s healed, too. Naturally.”
He raised one hand, holding it in the air near my cheek, unsure. “Does it hurt?”
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”
His fingers brushed the new skin. It tingled, but that was from his touch. Then he was back to business.
“Did they suspect anything? Do you think they’ll call the Seekers?”
“No. I told you they wouldn’t be suspicious. They didn’t even check my eyes. I was hurt, so they healed
me.” I shrugged.
“What did you get?” he asked, opening the drawstrings on the backpack.
“The right things for Jamie… if we get back in time…” I glanced at the clock on the dashboard
automatically, though the hours it marked were meaningless. “And more for the future. I only took what I
understood.”
“We’ll be back in time,” he promised. He examined the white containers. “Smooth?”
“Not a necessity. But I know what it does, so…”
He nodded, digging through the bag. He muttered the names to himself. “No Pain? Does it work?”
I laughed. “It’s amazing. If you stab yourself, I could show you.… That’s a joke.”
“I know.”
He was staring at me with an expression I didn’t understand. His eyes were wide, like something had
deeply surprised him.
“What?” My joke hadn’t beenthat bad.
“You did it.” His tone was full of wonder.
“Wasn’t that the idea?”
“Yes, but… I guess I didn’t really think we were going to make it out.”
“You didn’t? Then why… ? Why did you let me try?”
He answered in a soft almost-whisper. “I figured it was better to die trying than to live without the kid.”
For a moment, my throat was choked with emotion. Mel was too overcome to speak as well. We were
a family in that one instant. All of us.
I cleared my throat. No need to feel things that would only come to nothing.
“It was very easy. Probably any of you could get away with it, if you acted naturally. She did look at my
neck.” I touched it reflexively. “Your scar is too obviously homemade, but with the medicines I took,
Doc could fix that.”
“I doubt any of us could act so natural.”
“I do trust you,” he whispered. “With all our lives, I trust you.”
And hehad trusted me with every single human life. His, and Jamie’s, and everyone else’s.
“Thank you,” I whispered back.
“You did it,” he repeated in wonder.
“We’re going to save him.”
Jamie is going to live,Mel rejoiced.Thank you, Wanda.
Anything for them,I told her, and then I sighed, because it was so true.
After reattaching the tarps when we reached the wash, Jared took over the driving. The way was
familiar to him, and he drove faster than I would have. He had me get out before he pulled the car into its
impossibly small hiding place under the rock slide. I waited for the sound of rock against metal, but Jared
found a way in.
And then we were back in the jeep and flying through the night. Jared laughed, triumphant, as we jolted
across the open desert, and the wind carried his voice away.
“Where’s the blindfold?” I asked.
“Why?”
I looked at him.
“Wanda, if you wanted to turn us in, you had your chance. No one can deny that you’re one of us now.”
I thought about that. “I think some still could. It would make them feel better.”
“Yoursome need to get over themselves.”
I was shaking my head now, picturing our reception. “It’s not going to be easy, getting back in. Imagine
what they’re thinking right now. What they’re waiting for…”
He didn’t answer. His eyes narrowed.
“Jared… if they… if they don’t listen… if they don’t wait…” I started talking faster, feeling a sudden
pressure, trying to get him all the information before it was too late. “Give Jamie the No Pain first—lay
that on his tongue. Then the Inside Clean spray—he just has to inhale it. You’ll need Doc to —”
“Hey, hey! You’re going to be the one giving the directions.”
“But let me tell you how —”
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”
“Jared —”
“Don’t panic. I’ll aim low, and then you can use that stuff to heal ’em back up again.”
“If that’s a joke, it’s not funny.”
“No joke, Wanda.”
“Where’s the blindfold?”
He pressed his lips together.
But I had my old shirt—Jeb’s raggy hand-me-down. That would work almost as well.
“This will make it a little bit easier for them to let us in,” I said as I folded it up into a thick band. “And
that means getting to Jamie faster.” I tied it over my eyes.
It was quiet for a time. The jeep bounced along the uneven terrain. I remembered nights like this when
Melanie had been the passenger.…
“I’m taking us right to the caves. There’s a place the jeep will be fairly well hidden for a day or two. It
will save us time.”
I nodded. Time was the key now.
“Almost there,” he said after a minute. He exhaled. “They’re waiting.”
I heard him fumbling beside me, heard a metal clank as he pulled the gun from the backseat.
