California(113)

“Please stop crying,” he said as soon as they were on their way.

Frida was sniffling behind him, sucking in her whistling breath.

“It was either her or us, Frida.”



He quickened his pace, pointing the flashlight into the trees beyond. Frida was right to be crying—what he’d done to Anika was brutal. He meant to slow her down to protect his wife and child, but in the moment he hadn’t thought about what would happen to Anika after tonight.

“Please,” Cal said, but he wasn’t sure what he was asking for. Some forgiveness maybe, or just some space to focus. He had to focus.

From the Tower, he’d realized how small this stamp of woods was. They’d hit the Forms soon enough, as long as they kept walking in the right direction. He would not think of what had just happened, what he was capable of. He pointed the flashlight ahead of them and walked carefully forward.



The first Form had been built into the woods so that, from afar, it looked like another tree. It had even been built straight up, rather than curved, and it resembled a thick and sturdy trunk. When they got close enough to see what it was, Frida reached for Cal, and they stopped. The Form was filled with crushed rusty soda cans and other trash. It smelled vaguely of metal and sour milk.

“Not much of a Form,” Cal said.

“You mean Spike,” Frida whispered. She squeezed Anika’s bag between her hands.

He nodded. “Spike.”

They made their way carefully around the base of it, and as they did so, Cal said, “I saw a map of this place. Sailor showed it to me.” Frida didn’t reply, but she continued walking behind him, as if she trusted him to lead. She had stopped crying.

The second Spike came a few feet beyond where the woods stopped. Cal knew the broken-glass border wouldn’t begin until they were a third of the way through, and he hoped by then he could get a handle on where they were. They just had to move forward—he was pretty certain they were moving west.

He didn’t know what they would do once they’d escaped. Where could they go? He imagined Anika lying unconscious in the tree house.

“Just walk,” Frida whispered.

The Spikes hulked over them. His flashlight shined on a bald bicycle seat, then a rocking chair with only one curved leg. Miniblinds, dented and bent.

He pictured them back in the Millers’ house. It would feel empty without the things August had brought for them in the duffel bag. Frida would realize she no longer had her father’s sweater or her abacus or her favorite dress. And then what? She would walk around the room with its metal table and crowded shelves, her eyes roaming. She would seize upon something new to treasure. They both would. Cal remembered his pillow, waiting on the bed in the Hotel, and something in him sagged. One more thing, lost.

It was cold and their breath was visible in the air. Cal had the gun in the pocket of his coat, and he felt its weight, and hated it.

They were walking fast, too fast, and Cal realized he didn’t know where they were. Somehow they’d been on a descent, and now he couldn’t see anything but what was right in front of them. A wall of Forms. Of Spikes. He didn’t care what was in them, or what they were called. They didn’t look familiar, they were built just inches apart, and suddenly Cal wasn’t sure which way to go.

He grabbed Frida’s hand. He was unable to admit that he’d probably taken a wrong turn. Even now he was a coward and a liar. “This way,” he said, and turned them around.

They circled a smaller Spike, just taller than Frida, its tip capped with a saw, teeth sharp in the moonlight. He tried to see the maps in his mind, but there was only blankness. Maybe Micah had unwittingly told everyone the truth—he’d sent Cal and Frida out here to die.

“Frida,” he said.

“I know,” she said.

He knew she was just as scared as he was, and yet neither stopped walking. They had been lured into this labyrinth; they were under its spell.

Someone cleared his throat.

It was a man, Cal could tell by its gruff animal quality. Whoever it was, he was nearby, watching them, waiting. He would pounce.

Cal did not grab for his gun. Instead he said, “Run,” and pulled Frida away from the sound.

They ran between the Spikes, turning one way and then another. The Spikes seemed to grow taller, and he thought he saw them swaying in a wind he didn’t feel, bending to its will like trees and skyscrapers.

Frida was saying his name, but he didn’t listen, he was dragging her as far as he could from that man.

They ran until Cal’s arm caught on something sharp. Barbed wire. He felt like a piece of paper, torn in half. Frida cried out as if she, too, had felt the sting.

“Calvin.” It was a man’s voice.

He stopped, and looked behind them.

August stood with his arms crossed. He wore his sunglasses, even in this darkness. He didn’t look cold. He looked like he had never been cold in his life.

“You’d better come with me,” he said, and Cal knew it was over.



He gave up his gun and the flashlight, and Frida finally surrendered Anika’s purse. In silence, August led them away, his own larger flashlight bobbing up and down with each step.

At first Cal thought they were headed back to the Land—for what, Cal didn’t want to imagine—but when a few of the Spikes began to look familiar, he realized he and Frida had encountered them the day they’d arrived. So August was taking them away from this place.