A Map of Days (Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children, #4)(14)

Aside from these occasional field trips, Miss Peregrine explained that she and the other ymbrynes had made a mighty effort to create a stable environment for their wards. Like my friends, most had been torn away from the loops where they’d lived much of their lives. In some cases those loops were now collapsed, gone forever. Many had lost friends in the hollowgast raids, been injured, or endured other traumas. And though Devil’s Acre, with its filth and chaos and its history as the center of Caul’s evil empire, was not an ideal place to recover from trauma, the ymbrynes had done their best to make it a sanctuary. The refugee children, along with many peculiar adults who had fled the wights’ campaign of terror, found new homes there. They had founded a new academy, where daily lectures and discussions were held, taught by ymbrynes when they were available, and by peculiar adults with areas of special expertise when they were not.

“It can be a bit dull, sometimes,” said Millard. “But it’s nice to be among scholars.”

“It’s only dull because you think you know more than the teachers,” said Bronwyn.

“When they aren’t ymbrynes, I usually do,” he replied. “And the ymbrynes are nearly always busy these days.”

They were busy, Miss Peregrine said, with “a hundred thousand unpleasant tasks,” most of which had to do with cleaning up after the wights.

“They left a frightful mess,” she said. There was the literal mess—the wights’ battle-scarred compound, the loops they had damaged but not quite destroyed. More troublesome was the tide of damaged and compromised people they had left behind, like the ambrosia-addicted peculiars of Devil’s Acre. They needed treatment for their addictions, but not all would accept it voluntarily. Then there was the thorny question of who among them could be trusted. Many had collaborated with the wights, some under duress, others willingly and to a degree that seemed clearly malicious, even treasonous. Trials were required. The peculiar justice system, which had been designed to handle at most a few cases per year, was being rapidly expanded to deal with dozens, most of which had not yet begun. Until they did, the accused sat cooling their heels in the prison Caul built for the victims of his cruel experiments.

“And when we aren’t dealing with all of that unpleasantness,” Miss Peregrine said, “the Ymbryne Council is holding meetings. Meetings all day, meetings into the night.”

“About what?” I asked.

“The future,” she replied stiffly.

“The council is having its authority challenged,” said Millard. Miss Peregrine’s expression curdled. Millard went on, oblivious. “Some people are saying it’s time for a change in the way we govern ourselves. That the ymbryne system is outmoded, better suited to an earlier era. That the world has changed, and we must change with it.”

“Ungrateful sods,” Enoch said. “Throw them in jail with the traitors, I say.”

“Now, that’s exactly wrong,” said Miss Peregrine. “Ymbrynes govern by popular consent. Everyone must be allowed to air their ideas, even if they are misguided.”

“What do they disagree with you about?” I asked.

“Whether to go on living in loops, for one thing,” Emma said.

“Don’t most peculiars have to?” I said.

“Yes—unless we were to attempt a large-scale loop collapse event,” said Millard, “like the one that reset our internal clocks. That certainly raised some eyebrows.”

“Made people jealous, is what it did,” said Emma. “The things people said to me when they heard we were coming here for a long visit! Green with envy.”

“But we could have died in that loop collapse,” I said. “It’s too dangerous.”

“That’s true,” said Millard, “at least, until we can understand the loop collapse phenomenon more completely. If we can make a proper science out of it, it might be possible to re-create what happened to us safely.”

“But that could take a long time,” said Miss Peregrine, “and some peculiars are not willing to wait. They’re so tired of living in loops, they would risk dying.”

“Absolute madness,” said Horace. “I had no idea how many muddle-brained peculiars there were until we were all thrust into the Acre together, cheek by jowl.”

“They’re not half as crazy as the New World crowd,” said Emma, and just the mention of their name made Miss Peregrine sigh. “They want to engage with normal society.”

“Don’t get me started on those lunatics!” said Enoch. “They think the world has become such an open and tolerant place that we could simply come out of hiding—Hello, world! We’re peculiar and proud of it!—as if we wouldn’t all be burned at the stake, just like old times.”

“They’re young, that’s all,” said Miss Peregrine. “They’ve never lived through a witch hunt or an anti-peculiar panic.”

“Dangerous is what they are,” said Horace, picking at his hands anxiously. “What if they do something reckless?”

“We ought to jail them, too,” said Enoch. “That’s what I think.”

“And that’s why you’re not on the council, dear,” said Miss Peregrine. “Now, that’s quite enough. Politics is the last thing I want to discuss on a such a fine day.”