Where the Drowned Girls Go(Wayward Children #7)(39)

Sumi smiled.





17?THE LONG ROAD HOME


THEY LEFT THE SCHOOL like thieves fleeing the scene of a crime, quickly, quietly, and with only what they could carry. Sumi left her shoes behind.

They ran, five students and two teachers, across the field behind the institute, into the borders of the wood. Regan was waiting for them there, leaning against a tree with a blissful expression on her face, arms laden with owls and feet surrounded by raccoons. She opened her eyes at the sound of footsteps, straightening, gently shaking her woodland companions away.

“Did you find it?” demanded Cora.

Regan nodded.

They ran on.

At the edge of the wood, where the wall cut the Whitethorn Institute off from the rest of the world, was a deadfall, branches and fallen trees piled together by the wind and the weather until they reached a point almost as high as the wall itself.

“We’ll have to jump,” said Regan apologetically. “I tried to explain to the stag who led me here that humans aren’t that good at jumping, but he didn’t understand.”

“It’s fine,” said Cora. “All those laps around the athletic field had to be good for something.”

“I don’t understand,” said Miss Lennox.

“He doesn’t just take away names,” said Sumi, beginning to climb the deadfall. She moved quickly and efficiently, seemingly without fear. “All the doors want is for us to be sure. They want us to know where we belong. This many students, in this small a space, with this many rules and regulations designed to make us miserable? Half of them must know they don’t belong here. So where are the doors? They’re being kept out, that’s where.”



“There’s no magic in this world,” said Emily.

“Of course there’s magic. Look at Cora’s hair. The magic’s smaller, and sometimes it’s borrowed, but it’s here. The headmaster has magic. He takes names and he somehow keeps the doors at bay, and if you hit the magic number without being sure this world is where you belong, he keeps you on campus, where your door can’t ever reach you. Once we break the boundary of the grounds, we’ll see what happens then.”

“And if no door comes?” asked Stephanie.

“We find a pay phone and I call Eleanor-Elly and tell her she needs to send a bus.” Sumi laughed, wild and bright and utterly delighted with herself. “We’re leaving. One way or another, we’re leaving.”

She reached the top of the deadfall and leapt, landing light as a leaf atop the wall. She danced experimentally, then beamed at the group.

“No electricity,” she said. “Come on!”

One by one they climbed, even Cora, until Rowena was alone on the ground, looking up at them. The nameless girl waved impatiently.

“Come on,” she said. “Come with us.”

“No,” said Rowena. She grabbed one of the biggest branches from the deadfall and began to yank, trying to pull it free. “Run. All of you, run. Go far, far away, and don’t look back.”

“Rowena,” whispered the nameless girl.

Rowena smiled. It was wavering and small and brave, all at the same time. “Run,” she repeated. “Go find your name. Find your door. When you see Bright again, tell her you knew me. Tell her I was cool.”

“You were,” said the nameless girl.

“Time to go,” said Sumi, and the group turned away, sliding down the far side of the wall to land with a thump in the brush on the other side. Sumi was the last to move. She met Rowena’s eyes, and nodded, and then she was gone, and Rowena was alone.

She set herself to dismantling the deadfall with all the strength she possessed, ripping it out one branch at a time, making it harder and harder for anyone to follow. When she heard footsteps running through the wood she stopped, looking down at her chapped, torn-up hands, and didn’t turn. Whatever was behind her, she didn’t want to see.

“Where did they go?” demanded a half-familiar voice. She thought it might be one of the janitors.

“Why do you lock the doors?” Rowena asked.

“This world has magic,” he said. “It would have more if it wasn’t lured away, carried in the hands of foolish children. We lock the doors and we preserve our natural resources. We keep what’s meant to be ours. Where did they go?”

“Away from you,” said Rowena. She closed her eyes. “They got away from you.”

When his hands landed on her shoulders, she didn’t scream.

She was proud of that.

Then she wasn’t proud of anything at all.





EPILOGUE


GINGERBREAD AND BONE

THE DOOR OPENED OUT of nowhere and disgorged its contents onto the driveway in a pile of limbs and bodies, tangled together like puppies. A short, slightly pudgy teenage girl stepped out last, right onto the bodies of her traveling companions, not seeming to notice when she stepped on their heads or hands. She was dressed in a patchwork vest of countless colors, laced shut with a rope of licorice, over pink leggings that looked to have been knitted out of candy floss. Her hair was pulled into two pigtails and studded with sugar candies. She smiled as she gazed at the house in front of them, which was large and sprawling in the way of homes that had been less “designed” and more simply constructed.