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“Tea,” Laura said.

She poured some water into the cup and placed it on the small burner. The two strangers sat in solitude, watching the sky shift from turquoise, to golden-orange, to silvery purple, and finally black. Ava took out another packet of nuts and dried fruit. She poured out a handful and passed the packet to Laura. With their blankets wrapped around their shoulders, they passed the cup of hot tea back and forth. Ava was grateful for the company and the hot tea.

“How long have you been traveling?” Ava asked, breaking the silence.

“Been on my own for the last fifteen years.”

“So, you were around for the Repatterning?”

“Of course; we all were.” Laura looked at Ava a bit sideways.

Ava needed to be more careful with her words. “I mean, you’ve been on your own since the Repatterning?”

“Lost my mom and dad in the early phases. Had to run for the hills.”

“Which hills?”

“Blue Ridge Mountains. East of here.”

“That’s pretty far away.”

“Nothing is really that far away.”

“What’s your tattoo mean?” Ava asked.

Laura pulled her hair back. “Dragon Rising,” she said, then added, “Means I’ve risen up out of the depths. Now I see with courageous eyes.”

Ava wondered what she had seen. “How’d you lose your parents?” she asked.

“It’s a long story,” she said.

“It’s gonna be a long night,” Ava replied, pouring more water to boil for tea.

“When the Repatterning started out, like everyone we didn’t know what was going on because they masked it so well. North Carolina was in bad shape, and they really made it seem like they were gonna make things better, so we welcomed the change. But things only got worse. At the time, my father was a writer, well—a writer and an illustrator. A good one. He had a popular blog with a daily comic about a regular Joe who just wanted to be heard. It was called
Soap’s Box
. You might remember it?” She looked at Ava, eyebrows lifted, as if she needed some sort of recognition to validate her father’s existence.

Ava closed her eyes, feigning a memory. “Yes, I remember reading it from time to time. Quite witty, your father.”

“He was a gifted man and had millions of readers. The Planners wanted to bank on his equity. One night during dinner, there was a knock at the door. A man wearing a three-piece suit entered and asked to speak to my father, alone. I was about fifteen and my brother was seventeen, so we ignored my mother when she told us to stay at the table. Instead, we listened to their conversation through the air vent. The man told my father the country was about to go through a metamorphosis, or something like that, and that his blog would become extremely helpful in shaping social attitudes. All of this sounded great—especially to my father, who wanted to contribute to the greater good. After the man left, we all congratulated my father. My mother even brought out a bottle of Juyondai.”

“Juyondai?” Ava asked

“Her best sake, to make a toast.”

Ava nodded, assuming sake was some sort of alcohol.

“Everything at our house was looking good. Money was flowing in. Mom quit her job to get back to what she loved: painting. Then, after a couple of months, my father started spending more and more time locked in his study. Mom had to force him to come out for dinner, and he’d hardly eat. ‘They’re dictating my words,’ he’d whisper to my mother. She’d remind him that his work was licensed to him and he could write whatever he wanted. But the blog started to change. Not noticeably at first, just small things, like the main character, Soap, rallying behind some new law, even if the law was bunk. Soon, the simple social commentary started to sound more like propaganda. My father finally got tired of taking their orders and he tried to publish his own words, but when the posts went live, they had been altered. We had no idea how they had access to his website. Eventually they blocked him out and took over the entire site. The blog continued and they used his platform to manipulate millions of readers with false hopes about the Repatterning. Then they cut off his income and shut down all of his accounts. We had no one to turn to because it was like he ceased to exist, or more like he never existed. Eventually, he did cease to exist. He went out for a walk and never came home.”

“Did the Planners get him?” Anger rooted in Ava’s chest.

“My brother and I searched the neighborhood for days. No one had seen him. Neighbors didn’t even remember what he looked like. People knew the main character from the blog, and they’d go on and on about how much they loved good ol’ Soap, but they didn’t remember my father. He had been erased from existence. We were out of money. My mother tried to go back to her previous job, but the company had gone under. Most companies were bankrupt by that point. Only the big names were still in business, and they didn’t care about anyone. So she started cleaning houses for cash. One day we came home to find our house boarded up. We barely had enough money to rent a crappy studio apartment in one of the low-income neighborhoods. My brother, a genius in his own right, started making a drug using elements of kombucha tea and cleaning products. I’d babysit for rich families while my mother cleaned their homes. We were able to scrape by. When the military started showing up at people’s doors and taking away the boys, as young as fifteen, we knew we had to get out.”

Ava sipped her tea and waited quietly until Laura was ready to continue. The cold chill coming off the ocean seemed to be the perfect accompaniment for the tale.

“Mom came home one night, exhausted and worn to the bone from cleaning houses all day, and broke down the plan. My brother was to make a huge batch of what he was calling Haze, because she had found a major distributor. He said he could have it brewed and bottled by morning. She’d take the stuff to the distributor and get cash. With the cash, my brother was to buy a bunch of camping and survival supplies. ‘Buy out the store,’ she told him. The second part of the plan was acquiring items for bartering, since cash was rapidly losing its value. She had been casing the houses she had been cleaning and knew where to get the best loot. If we could get through two or three houses, we’d be in good shape. While my brother was buying supplies, the two of us would go to the houses and take their jewelry, guns, and collector’s items like books, coins, and wine. We’d meet my brother at Morehead Elementary at 3 p.m. and drive east into the Cherokee National Forest.

“The first two houses were easy. While she scrubbed the floors, I went around collecting items and dropping them into my cleaning bucket. I’d grab a few things, run out to the crappy van she had borrowed and place the stuff into the oversized suitcase. We had enough time for one more house. I thought we should take what we had—it was plenty—and go to the meeting location. I was worried the neighbors would catch on and warn the other neighbors. But Mom said we were fine; they only talked to each other at events. When we got to the third house, I sensed something was off. The door to the study was locked. So was the door to the wine cellar. Mom told me to go upstairs, grab the jewelry, and get the hell out of there. We went to the master bedroom and she started digging around in the drawers while I went to the closet—apparently the woman left her jewelry strewn everywhere. I walked into the enormous closet—which was bigger than our studio apartment—and I stood in front of the mirror, shocked by my skinny and sickly reflection. There were black circles under my eyes, and my hair was thin and dull. It’s so cliché, I know, but I just couldn’t stop myself from touching the elegant gowns. I held up a magnificent cream-colored sparkly dress, and for a second I felt special. My mom entered the closet, and her face was white. Behind her was a man in a tuxedo, pressing a gun into her back. We were busted.

“The man’s shadowy eyes lit up when he saw me. Without hesitation, he bashed the back of my mother’s head with the butt of the gun, and she collapsed. I let out a cry and tried to run over to her, but he pointed the gun toward me. ‘Go ahead, put it on,’ he said, grinning with the most wicked intentions. ‘No thanks,’ I whispered. He stepped closer and pushed the gun into my cheek. ‘I insist,’ he said. I tried to be modest about removing my clothes, but he forced me to stand there naked for a few minutes while he rubbed himself. He told me to continue putting on the dress. Though I filled out the top part, it was too long. He pointed to the racks of shoes, and I put on a pair that matched the dress. Then he told me to fix my hair, so I pulled it back away from my face. He tossed over a diamond necklace that must have weighed five pounds and told me to put it on. The smile on his face morphed into something evil. He pointed to the master bed. My stomach shrunk to the size of a raisin. I had no way to defend myself against this lecherous old man. And my mother was still passed out.”

Laura took in a deep breath. Tears glistened in her pretty almond-shaped eyes. Ava didn’t know what to say, so she stayed quiet and listened to the wind whip around the side of the mountain.

After a few minutes, Ava said, “You don’t have to continue if it’s too much.”

“No, I need to remember. I don’t ever want to forget. My memories, no matter how depressing, are the only things I have left of my family.”

“And the love. Nobody can ever take that away.”

“So anyway, I had never worn high heels before, and I was having trouble inching toward the bed. The man shoved me forward, and I landed face-first on top of the comforter. I didn’t bother turning around; I knew he was coming for me. He took the bottom of the dress and ripped it straight up the middle, exposing my ass. That’s when I started fighting back, but he shoved the gun into my neck and told me to hold still. I sensed movement in the room and glanced over my shoulder to see my mother holding a heavy vase over his head. He turned, and she came down hard. The gun went off, and the bullet hit her throat. Blood splattered everywhere, all over the cream carpets, the cream comforter, and the cream dress. The man collapsed on top of my mother. She gurgled through the blood, ordering me to get the gun and go. As I went to get the gun, the man grabbed my wrist. I fired at him and missed. I fired it three times before I actually hit him. I got him in the stomach and he fell down next to my mom, who was already dead by that point. I bolted from the room, still wearing the bloodstained dress and those absurdly high heels. I tripped and rolled down the stairs. At the bottom, I curled up into a ball and cried until I could feel my body again. Then I remembered the van keys were in my jeans upstairs. I ran back up to the closet and tore off the dress and put on my clothes. The man was still moaning as I ran from the room. I hated myself for leaving my mother there with him.

“I drove the van to the school and parked in a far corner of the lot and waited for my brother. When he got there, I showed him the suitcase. He pointed to my neck. I was still wearing the necklace. I told him to hurry up and drive away, that mom wasn’t coming and I’d explain along the way. We drove all night until we reached Cherokee National Park. We followed the instructions Mom had given about where to ditch the van and how to get to the secret campsite where others like us were meeting.”

Laura brushed away a tear that had found its way to her cheek. “And that’s how I lost my parents,” she said, gently touching her Dragon Rising tattoo.

Ava had been mesmerized by Laura’s tale. “So, what happened? What about your brother?”

“That’s for another night,” she said, staring off toward the millions of stars sprinkled across the sky. She turned toward Ava. “What about you?”

Ava laughed. “I don’t even know where to begin . . .”

22

ALONG THE DRIVE to Seattle, Grace and Marion took turns stretching across the metal floor of the extremely uncomfortable sleigh mobile. Every pothole, rock, and tree root would send them airborne, and they’d come smacking back down hard. It seemed as if Blythe were deliberately trying to hit every single obstacle in the road.

“Goliath must have an ass of stone,” Grace yelled over the noise to Marion.

After a while, Blythe pulled over to the side of the road for a bathroom break. They had been driving since morning, and though they were close to their final destination, the break was welcome. Grace noticed Blythe struggling a bit as she made her way to some nearby trees to relieve herself. Maybe her ass wasn’t as hard as she had thought.

Grace took out her tablet to check the GPS tracker to make sure they were still synced up to her mother’s chip. The blinking light showed the location just about thirty-eight miles north.

“We’re passin’ through the bottom legs of the Sound. Got ’bout another hour. Depends on the road.” Missakian stretched his legs, using one of the giant tires for support. Marion stood by his side, rubbing his lower back as though she had done this before.

Grace chugged back some water, pondering their rescue mission. They were making good time. They still had all afternoon and night, as well as the following day to get into the city and retrieve her mother. She didn’t know how much time to factor for getting inside the center, or how long they’d be inside, but once they were closer she could get a better idea. She believed everything would work out—at least that’s what she thought for those few peaceful moments under the pines. That all changed when she saw Blythe coming up out of the forest with a group of natives aiming arrows at her back.

“At least they let me finish,” Blythe said.

The natives pushed Blythe forward, and she stood next to Grace.

“We don’t mean any harm,” Grace started speaking.

One of the female natives—maybe their leader—stepped toward Grace and aimed an arrow at her chest. Grace shut up immediately. The other natives surrounded them and began examining the sleigh mobile and scouring through their bags. Most of them wore pants made of brownish hide, loose shirts made from hemp, and choker necklaces made from stone beads. The woman aiming at Grace stood out among the others—not only because of her striking beauty, but her presence also permeated around the group like a strong wind. Grace had never seen anyone like her before. Her features were distinct and fierce, and her hair was cropped short and painted with a rainbow of colors. She reminded Grace of an exotic bird.