His voice was not harsh, but neither was it warm. He kept it low, though, following my cue.
“Leaves Above,” I said, using the name from the last hotel. Would he want to check my story? I might
need someplace to refer him to.
“Upside-down Flower?” he guessed. His eyes flickered around their course.
“Yes, I was.”
“My partner, too. Were you on the island?”
“No,” I said quickly. “The mainland. Between the great rivers.”
He nodded, perhaps a little disappointed.
“No!” he interrupted me in a louder voice.
I jumped, startled, and the little pill slipped from my fingers. It dropped to the metal floor with a faintly
audibleclink. I felt the blood drain from my face as though a plug had been pulled.
“Didn’t mean to startle you,” he apologized quickly, his eyes repeating their restless circle. “But you
shouldn’t linger here.”
“Why?” I managed to whisper. My fingers twitched anxiously at the empty air.
“There was a… disappearance recently.”
“I don’t understand. A disappearance?”
“It could have been an accident… but there might be…” He hesitated, unwilling to say the word.
“Humans may be in this area.”
“Humans?” I squeaked, too loud. He heard the fear in my voice and interpreted it the only way he could.
“There’s no proof of that, Leaves Above. No sightings or anything. Don’t be anxious. But youshould
proceed on to Phoenix without unnecessary delay.”
“Of course. Or maybe Tucson? That would be closer.”
“There’s no danger. You can continue with your plans.”
“If you’re sure, Seeker…”
“I’m quite sure. Just don’t go wandering off into the desert, Flower.” He smiled. The expression warmed
his face, making it kind. Just like all the other souls I’d dealt with. He wasn’t anxiousabout me, butfor
me. He wasn’t listening for lies. And he probably wouldn’t recognize them if he was. Just another soul.
“I wasn’t planning on it.” I smiled back at him. “I’ll be more careful. I know I couldn’t fall asleep now.” I
glanced at the desert out Jared’s window with a wary expression, so the Seeker would think that fear
was making me alert. My expression tensed into a taut mask as I caught sight of a pair of lights reflected
in the side mirror.
Jared’s spine stiffened at the same time, but he held his pose. It looked too tight.
My eyes darted back to the Seeker’s face.
“I can help with that,” he said, still smiling but looking down now as he fumbled to remove something
from his pocket.
He hadn’t seen the change in my face. I tried to control the muscles in my cheeks, to make them relax,
but I couldn’t concentrate hard enough to make it happen.
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.
“You should not use this often,” the Seeker went on, searching the other pocket now. “It’s not harmful,
of course, or the Healers wouldn’t have us give it out. But if you use it frequently, itwill alter your sleep
cycles.… Ah, here it is. Awake.”
The lights slowed as they approached.
Just drive by,I begged in my head.Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop.
Let it be Kyle at the wheel,Melanie added, thinking the words like a prayer.
Don’t stop. Just drive. Don’t stop. Just drive.
“Miss?”
I blinked, trying to focus. “Um, Awake?”
“Just inhale this, Leaves Above.”
He had a thin white aerosol can in his hand. He sprayed a puff of mist into the air in front of my face. I
leaned forward obediently and took a sniff, my eyes darting to the mirror at the same time.
“It’s grapefruit scented,” the Seeker said. “Nice, don’t you think?”
“Very nice.” My brain was suddenly sharp, focused.
The big moving truck slowed and then idled on the road be-hind us.
No!Mel and I shouted together. I searched the dark floor for one half second, hoping against hope that
the little pill would be visible. I couldn’t even make out my feet.
The Seeker glanced absently at the truck and then waved it forward.
I looked back at the truck, too, a forced smile on my face. I couldn’t see who was driving. My eyes
reflected the headlights, shot out faint beams of their own.
The truck hesitated.
The Seeker waved again, more broadly this time. “Go ahead,” he muttered to himself.
Drive! Drive! Drive!
Beside me, Jared’s hand was clenched in a fist.
Slowly, the big truck shuddered into first gear and then inched forward through the space between the
Seeker’s vehicle and ours. The Seeker’s spotlight outlined two silhouettes, two black profiles, both
facing straight forward. The one in the driver’s seat had a crooked nose.
Mel and I both exhaled in relief.
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”
“Alert,” I told the Seeker.
“It will wear off in about four hours.”
“Thank you.”
The Seeker chuckled. “Thankyou, Leaves Above. When we saw you racing down the road, we thought
we might have humans on our hands. I was sweating, but not from the heat!”
I shuddered.
“Don’t worry. You’ll be perfectly fine. If you’d like, we can follow you to Phoenix.”
“I’m just fine. You don’t need to trouble yourself.”
“It was nice to meet you. I’ll be pleased when my shift is over, so that I can go home and tell my partner
I met another green-first Flower. She’ll be so excited.”
“Um… tell her, ‘Brightest sun, longest day’ for me,” I said, giving him the Earthly translation of the
common greeting and farewell on the Flower Planet.
“Certainly. Have a pleasant journey.”
“And you have a pleasant night.”
He stepped back, and the spotlight hit my eyes again. I blinked furiously.
“Cut it, Hank,” the Seeker said, shading his eyes as he turned to walk toward the car. The night turned
black again, and I forced another smile toward the invisible Seeker named Hank.
I started the engine with shaking hands.
The Seekers were faster. The little black car with the incongruous light bar atop it purred to life. It
executed a sharp U-turn, and then the taillights were all I could see. They disappeared quickly into the
night.
I pulled back onto the road. My heart pumped the blood through my veins in hard little bursts. I could
feel the fierce pulse throbbing through to my fingertips.
“They’re gone,” I whispered through my suddenly chattering teeth.
I heard Jared swallow.
“That was… close,” he said.
“I thought Kyle was going to stop.”
“Me, too.”
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.
“The Seeker bought it.” His teeth were still clenched in anxiety.
“Yes.”
“I wouldn’t have. Your acting hasn’t improved much.”
I shrugged. My body was so rigid, it all moved together. “They can’tnot believe me. What I am… well,
it’s something impossible. Something that shouldn’t exist.”
“Something unbelievable,” he agreed. “Something wonderful.”
His praise thawed some of the ice in my stomach, in my veins.
“Seekers aren’t all that different from the rest of them,” I murmured to myself. “Nothing to be especially
afraid of.”
He shook his head back and forth slowly. “There really isn’t anything you can’t do, is there?”
I wasn’t sure how to respond to that.
“Having you with us is going to change everything,” he continued under his breath, talking to himself
now.
I could feel how his words made Melanie sad, but she was not angry this time. She was resigned.
You can help them. You can protect them better than I could.She sighed.
The slow-moving taillights did not frighten me when they appeared on the road ahead. They were
familiar, a relief. I sped up—just a little, still a few miles below the limit—to pass them.
Jared pulled a flashlight out of the glove compartment. I understood what he was doing: reassurance.
He held the light to his own eyes as we passed the cab of the truck. I looked past him, through the other
window. Kyle nodded once at Jared and took a deep breath. Ian was leaning anxiously around him, his
eyes focused on me. I waved once, and he grimaced.
We were getting close to our hidden exit.
“Should I go all the way to Phoenix?”
Jared thought about it. “No. They might see us on the way back and stop us again. I don’t think they’re
following. They’re focused on the road.”
“No, they won’t follow.” I was sure of this.
“Let’s go home, then.”
“Home,” I agreed wholeheartedly.
We would take both vehicles right to the caves and unload quickly so they could be hidden before
morning. The little overhang by the entrance would not hide them from view.
I rolled my eyes as I thought of the way into and out of the caves. Thebig mystery I hadn’t been able to
solve for myself. Jeb was so tricky.
Tricky—just like the directions he’d given Mel, the lines he’d carved onto the back of her photo album.
They didn’t lead to his cave hideout at all. No, instead they made the person following them parade back
and forth in front of his secret place, giving him ample opportunity to decide whether or not to extend an
invitation inside.
“What do you think happened?” Jared asked, interrupting my thoughts.
“What do you mean?”
“The recent disappearance the Seeker mentioned.”
I stared ahead blankly. “Wouldn’t that be me?”
“I don’t think you would count asrecent, Wanda. Besides, they weren’t watching the freeway before we
left. That’s new. They’re looking for us. Here.”
His eyes narrowed, while mine widened.
“What have they been doing?” Jared suddenly exploded, slapping his hand loudly against the dashboard.
I jumped.
“You think Jeb and the others did something?”
He didn’t answer me; he just stared out across the star-bright desert with furious eyes.
I didn’t understand. Why would the Seekers be looking for humans just because someone had
disappeared in the desert? Accidents did happen. Why would they jump to that particular conclusion?
And why was Jared angry? Our family in the caves wouldn’t do anything to draw attention to
themselves. They knew better than that. They wouldn’t go outside unless there was an emergency of
some kind.
Or something theyfelt was urgent. Necessary.
Had Doc and Jeb been taking advantage of my absence?
Jeb had only agreed to stop slaughtering people and souls while I was under the same roof. Was this
their compromise?
“You okay?” Jared asked.
My throat was too thick to answer. I shook my head. Tears streamed down my cheeks and fell from my
chin to my lap.
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”
I shook my head again. I could see well enough.
He didn’t argue with me.
I was still crying silently when we got to the little mountain that hid our vast cave system. It was actually
just a hill—an insignificant outcropping of volcanic rock, like so many others, sparsely decorated with
spindly creosote and flat-bladed prickly pears. The thousands of tiny vents were invisible, lost in the
jumble of loose purple rocks. Somewhere, smoke would be rising, black on black.
I got out of the van and leaned against the door, wiping my eyes. Jared came to stand beside me. He
hesitated, then put a hand on my shoulder.
“Sorry. I didn’t know they were planning this. I had no idea. They shouldn’t have…”
But he only thought that because they’d somehow gotten caught.
The moving truck rumbled to a stop behind us. Two doors slammed shut, and then feet were running
toward us.
“What happened?” Kyle demanded, there first.
Ian was right behind him. He took one look at my expression, at the tears still running down my cheeks,
at Jared’s hand on my shoulder, and then rushed forward and threw his arms around me. He pulled me
into his chest. I didn’t know why this made me cry harder. I clung to him while my tears leaked onto his
shirt.
“It’s okay. You did great. It’s over.”
“Seeker’s not the problem, Ian,” Jared said, voice strained, his hand still touching me, though he had to
lean forward to preserve that point of contact.
“Huh?”
“They were watching the road for a reason. Sounds like Doc’s been… working in our absence.”
I shuddered, and for a moment, it seemed like I could taste silver blood in the back of my throat.
“Why, those —!” Ian’s fury robbed him of speech. He couldn’t finish his sentence.
“Nice,” Kyle said in a disgusted tone. “Idiots. We’re gone for a few weeks, and they’ve got the Seekers
on patrol. They could have just asked us to —”
“Shut up, Kyle,” Jared said harshly. “That’s neither here nor there at the moment. We’ve got to get this
all unloaded fast. Who knows how many are watching for us? Let’s grab a load and then get some more
hands.”
I shook Ian off so that I could help. The tears did not stop running. Ian stayed close to my side, taking
the heavy flat of canned soup I picked up and replacing it with a big but light box of pasta.
didn’t know this path well, but it wasn’t difficult. Straight down, then straight up.
We were halfway there when a familiar voice called out from a distance. It echoed down the tunnel,
fracturing.
“They’re back… ack… back!” Jamie was shouting.
I tried to dry my tears on my shoulder, but I couldn’t get them all.
A blue light approached, bouncing as the carrier ran. Then Jamie bounded into view.
His face threw me.
I was trying to compose myself to greet him, assuming he would be joyful and not wanting to upset him.
But Jamie was already upset. His face was white and tense, his eyes rimmed in red. His dirty cheeks had
rivulets through the dust there, tracks made by tears.
“Jamie?” Jared and I said together, dropping our boxes to the floor.
Jamie ran straight for me and threw his arms around my waist.
“Oh, Wanda! Oh, Jared!” he sobbed. “Wes is dead! He’sdead! The Seeker killed him!”
CHAPTER 49
Interrogated
Ikilled Wes.
My hands, scratched and bruised and painted with purple dust in the course of the frantic unloading,
might as well have been painted red with his blood.
Wes was dead, and it was as much my fault as if I’d pulled the trigger myself.
All of us but five were gathered in the kitchen now that the truck was unloaded, eating some of the
perishables we’d picked up on the final shopping trip—cheese and fresh bread with milk—and listening
to Jeb and Doc as they explained everything to Jared, Ian, and Kyle.
I sat a little space away from the others, my head in my hands, too numb with grief and guilt to ask
