Author: Jodi Meadows

“Do you think this is a smart idea?” Fayden scowled and finished loading his backpack.

“I don’t know. Maybe not.” Still, I had to try.

That afternoon, the three of us headed back to the Community—Stef to his aunts’ house, where he was helping pack the wagon we’d all be sharing, and Fayden and me to our father’s house at the far edge of the Community.

The walks would take longer than usual, because we had to go around areas that were consumed with riots. Even from here, I could hear the crackle and scream of fire, and smell the acrid smoke.

“Don’t be upset,” Fayden said, after a few minutes of walking in charged silence.

“Discussions that start like that never lead anywhere good.” I shoved my hands into my pockets as we ducked around a gaggle of children carrying baskets of supplies. With the riots not far off, it was incredible their parents would let them out. Unless they had fathers like Fayden and I did, who didn’t care at all.

My brother hesitated. “I’ve been wondering why Mother chose you. For music, I mean. Why did you get to see that part of her, but not me? And did Father know? Was I the only one who didn’t?”

I pressed my mouth into a line and shrugged. “I don’t know. She never told me whether anyone else knew. Her mother did, obviously. But I don’t know if her friends knew. I’ve never been able to bring myself to ask, in case they didn’t. In case they decided that selling the instruments for parts was more important than preserving them.”

“Preserving them for what?”

“For everyone?” I kept my eyes on the ground. “I guess— I guess there’s always been a part of me that’s wanted to share music. When you and Stef started listening to my playing, that was amazing. And just think about the fact that there’s a concert hall in the city, where people used to come from all over to hear music performed. Our grandmother was a performer. Mother said music was Grandmother’s job.”

“I can’t even imagine what her world must have been like.” Fayden shook his head.

I could, a little. The music parts, anyway. “I guess,” I went on, “there’s a piece of me that’s always hoped to do the same. To be like her—that one day the Community wouldn’t be focused solely on survival. That one day the Community would be able to take in something more. Like music.”

“That’s not a bad dream.” My brother smiled a little.

“Mother had the same dream, she said once.” I hesitated. “When I told her I wanted to be like Grandmother, she said she wanted the same thing. For me. For her.”

Tense silence stretched between us as we rounded a corner.

“I don’t think she chose me,” I said at last. “I think she saw me roaming through the forest one day, mimicking birdsongs. Or I saw her doing it, and copied. I’m not sure. I only remember a little of that day. She actually did take me foraging then, because I was too young to leave alone.”

Fayden nodded.

I’d never told anyone this before, except Mother: “I remember hearing this overwhelming sound, and it just filled me up. Like my heart was too big for my chest. I asked about it, why the forest sounds made me feel like that.”

“What did she say?”

“She said, ‘You have music in you.’”

Fayden lowered his eyes. “I was always jealous that she took you foraging, that she spent time with you and never seemed to care that you didn’t come home with much food. I didn’t realize what was actually happening, which makes me feel incredibly stupid.”

I released a weak chuckle. “I was always jealous that Father actually liked you, and that Mother didn’t have to make weekly appeals for your life.”

He scowled. “Was it that bad?”

“Seems like it.”

“And yet you want to make sure he comes with us?”

I shrugged. “I don’t think he should be left behind. He doesn’t deserve to die.” And I couldn’t stop thinking about what Fayden had said, that grim proclamation that everyone left here would die without the Community.

“All right.” He didn’t say whether he agreed, though I wished he would. His expression stayed thoughtful the remainder of the walk, and too soon, we stood before Father’s house.

Heart pounding, I knocked on the door.

It took several minutes before he answered, and he clutched the doorknob as though it was the only thing keeping him upright. He listed to one side, eyelids drooping, and his mouth pulled into a sneer when he recognized us.

“What are you doing here?” His words slurred, and his breath reeked of alcohol, enough to make me want to stagger back.

Fayden was a pillar of strength beside me, though when he spoke, his words were clipped and his eyes were hard. “We came to find out whether you’re going with the rest of the Community to find Janan.”

Father’s slowly shifting expression was the hush before a thunderstorm.

“And,” I added quickly, “whether we can help you pack or . . . or if you need anything.”

With a withering look, Father took a shaking step toward us. “What I’m going to do is no longer your business. You abandoned me here. First your mother left, and now you.” He turned on me. “And you! Why would I want your help with anything? You useless boy.”

I steeled myself and tried to keep my voice steady, but the edges cracked like glass. “Father, we need to know. Are you going with the rest of the Community?”

“No.” He spat a brown glob that landed at my feet. “No, I’m not going with the rest of the Community.”

I glanced at Fayden, but his jaw was set and his fists curled behind his back.

“Why won’t you go?” I’d always thought Father was as devoted to Janan as anyone else, what with him wanting to send me on Janan’s quest. If I’d gone, I’d be one of those warriors no one cared about—as long as the Community found Janan.

Father’s tone grew savage and raw. “What care do I have for the Community? My wife is gone because someone let her die. My only son abandoned me when I needed him. He abandoned me for a murderer, a boy who’d just as soon let everyone around him die, as long as it meant he could stay safe.”

“I didn’t—”

Fayden jerked my arm, making me stumble backward just as Father’s fist flew through the air where my head had been a moment before.

“You did let her die!” Father’s rage crescendoed, drawing looks from neighbors and passersby. “You did nothing when you could have saved her. Her death is your fault, you stupid, selfish, useless boy. I wish it had been you who died.”

I staggered back as my brother stepped in front of me. “Don’t talk that way, Father,” Fayden said. “He’s still your son.”

“Neither of you are my sons.” The door slammed shut, and rattled in its frame.

I clenched my jaw so hard that my eyes watered.

“Come on,” said Fayden. “If he wants to stay, we can’t force him.”

“But he’s our father,” I whispered.

My brother shook his head. “We don’t have a father anymore. We have each other.”

9

WHEN STEF FOUND out what Father had said to Fayden and me, he’d wanted to march right over and—

But of course we all knew that none of us could change Father or his decision. It was enough to know that Stef was my friend, and Fayden was on my side. As long as I had the two of them, I wasn’t alone.

Fayden and I spent the remainder of the month with Stef, and Whit and Orrin—his aunts—next door, the five of us packing our wagon with everything we might need. Whit and Orrin loaded their side with book after book, most taken from libraries in the old city, while Stef struggled to find room for his gadgets-in-progress, and Fayden and I wondered where we would put the food.

There was a strange, uncomfortable, yet hopeful undercurrent that last day. Disgust that we were leaving so many behind, but excitement at the prospect of an adventure. Or, perhaps, fear of what would happen if they didn’t go.

“The exodus begins tomorrow,” said Whit, or Orrin, over dinner with the five of us. Stef’s aunts were twins, and I hadn’t yet learned how to tell them apart. “The scouts Meuric sent out after the meeting in the Center have returned. Sounds like it was dangerous, too. Rumor has it there were fewer who came back than left.” She shook her head.

The other aunt—Orrin, I guessed—looked over the three of us. “Glad you boys weren’t part of Janan’s or Meuric’s groups. You’d think the Council didn’t value life at all, the way they keep throwing people into the wilderness.”

“Keep throwing?” I asked. “Have there been others, besides Janan’s warriors and the scouts?”

Orrin nodded. “At least two other groups that haven’t come back yet.”

When everyone finished dinner, Fayden brought an old plastic box from the other room, and placed it in front of me. It was an instrument case, with two rusty metal clasps, and a handle that hung at an unfortunate angle.

“What is this?” But I knew what it was. I knew all the instruments kept in the concert hall.

“I know it’s not the piano, but we can’t fit a piano in the wagon. This was the smallest instrument we could find.” He flipped open the lid, revealing a disassembled flute, and nodded at Stef. “He cleaned it up and fixed the cracked pads on the keys. This way you can entertain us on the long journey.”

“With a flute?” I couldn’t stop my smile. “You know I barely know how to play this, right?”

“Better get practicing.”

“I—” I wanted to thank him, but he thwapped the back of my head and grinned.

“It’s not a big deal, so don’t start gushing. Just make it worth all the trouble we went through to find it and clean it. We need some kind of entertainment on this journey, right?”

I spent the rest of the night trapped in a sort of awe. My brother knew how hard it was for me to leave behind music, so he’d found a way for music to come with me.

Dawn broke over the valley, illuminating the immense road paved centuries ago, now cracked with age and weather and the forest reclaiming what land was stolen from it. The road was a black river, flowing north to lands unknown.

Fayden, Stef, and I watched from the rooftops as scouts spurred their horses ahead, just ten or twelve riders vanishing against the brightening horizon. They followed the wagons, departing district by district. People, livestock, and trailers loaded with building supplies rolled down the black river, while guards and warriors lined up along the road, herding everyone north.

Since Stef lived in the last district to be evacuated, we had a perfect view from the roof of his house. We could see the crumbling towers of the old city peeking just above the conifer trees of the forest, and the mountains rising like a wall in the west. The road cut alongside those mountains, giving the impression it was safe and protected. But trolls and other creatures lived in those mountains. Everyone in the Community had been armed with bows and arrows, knives, or spears.

Not that I knew how to use the weapons I’d been given.

With the steady stream of people moving along the black, the road seemed truly a river. Over the course of the day, we saw a few disruptions to the line, and some people fled to the old city as though it could save them, but most—when it was their district’s turn—just snapped the horses’ reins and began walking.

The evacuations took all day, and paused when dusk fell. After another long morning of watching groups heave their wagons onto the road, it was finally our turn. Whit and Orrin sat on the front seat of the wagon, big hats shading their faces while they drove. Meanwhile, Fayden took a horse and rode alongside our wagon, and Stef and I stood on the roof, scanning the landscape for danger of any kind.