Lost in the Moment and Found (Wayward Children #8)(25)

“Just a shoe once, but that was when I was smaller, and it wouldn’t fit me now,” said the girl brightly. “I’m ready to go home.”

Antsy, whose own answer would have been much longer and much more painful, felt a pang of jealousy. This girl could go home. This girl hadn’t lost anything worth looking for; nothing larger than a kitten, anyway. This girl didn’t know what it was to be lost herself, to feel like the world was set against her, to be hurt. This girl was innocent.

And just like that, Antsy’s anger burst. This girl was innocent. This girl could go home. She could be safe and comfortable and cared for and unafraid. That mattered. That was something important, something worth taking care of and protecting. “I’ll walk you back to your Door,” said Antsy, and turned, starting back the way they had come, Hudson riding along on her arm.

The girl followed with her kitten. They had only gone a few steps when the sound of the animals behind them cut off, replaced by silence. There was no tapering off, no fading, just abrupt absence. Antsy smiled. The shop didn’t think they needed the menagerie anymore, and had put it back wherever it was that it went when they forgot to look for it. Well, good. She didn’t have time to take care of a pet, anyway.

The girl kept up a steady stream of nonsense conversation as they walked, commenting on everything they passed with the wide-eyed wonder of one who never expected to see anything quite so grand ever again. Antsy nodded and made accommodating noises, letting the words wash over her and not quite listening, not really. None of it mattered. The girl was going to go back to her life and her world and be safe and loved and cared for, and Antsy was going to stay here, where the lost things belonged.

When they got back to the counter, the girl’s Door was still there. It hadn’t disappeared the way Doors usually did when no one was looking at them. The girl bounced and waved with her free hand before running to pull the Door open, revealing a slice of green-grassed countryside on the other side. Then she ducked through, and she was gone.

Antsy looked at Hudson. “Does that happen often?”

“How often has it happened since you got here?”

“Fair enough.” Antsy stepped back behind the counter. Hudson hopped off her arm and onto his perch. “You were going to show me how to work the register?”

That night, she went to bed tired but feeling oddly accomplished, like she’d done something truly important, and when she woke up in the morning, two of her baby teeth were lying on the pillow, bits of tarnished ivory, leaving empty holes in her mouth. She looked at them for a long and quiet moment before sweeping them into her hand and shoving them under the pillow, getting out of bed.

It was time for another day.

That day, they found two Doors. One led to a world filled with flowers, some of which talked, all of which were happy to accept coins of pressed fertilizer in exchange for jars of honey and pellets of nectar. Some of them sold their own perfume, and those ones delighted Vineta most of all.

The other Door led to a dark and gloomy world, with a single red moon hanging in the sky like the eye of a baleful giant, and they did their shopping at an outdoor market built in the shadow of a terrible, looming castle like something out of a Scooby-Doo cartoon. Antsy couldn’t bring herself to look at it directly, which seemed to please Vineta; none of the villagers looked directly at the castle, either, and staring would only have attracted attention.

They had been there a few hours, no more, when two girls who looked several years older than Antsy appeared, identical and opposite as sunrise and sunset. Both had golden hair and pale, pinched faces, but one was dressed like a princess out of a fairy tale, while the other was dressed like the world’s youngest funeral director. The strange pair made for the stalls, and Vineta’s hand clamped down on Antsy’s shoulder.

“We’ll be leaving now,” she said, voice a quick hiss. “Come along, Antoinette.”

“Are we done shopping?” she asked.

“Oh, yes. We’re absolutely done.” And away they went, back to the Door that led to the shop, which was hidden in a fold of shadow along the city wall. Vineta didn’t relax or let go of Antsy’s shoulder until they were through the door and it was shut behind them for good measure. Then she sagged, exhaling heavily.

“What was that?” demanded Antsy.

“Those were other Door-touched,” said Vineta. “I don’t know what world they came from, or whether it was anywhere near to yours, but you mustn’t linger where the children of the Doors are already gathered. It isn’t safe.”

“Why not?”

“Because there aren’t many nexuses like ours,” said Vineta. “And most of the Door-touched want nothing more than they want to go home. They would change the world, if it meant they could go home. They’re as likely as not to think they’re on some sort of grand storybook adventure, and for them, saving the world and destroying it mean the same thing, as long as it comes to the same end.”

Antsy blinked slowly. “But you said the Doors came for people who would be better on the other side than they were where they’d started.”

“A thing being good for you doesn’t make it a thing you want,” said Vineta. “Did you like being told to eat your broccoli because it was good for you?”

Antsy frowned but had to shake her head. “No, not at all.”