Island of Dragons (Unwanteds #7)(16)

“Not in Quill,” Lani said. “No storytelling allowed. Or writing things down.”

Kaylee shook her head. “That’s right,” she muttered. “What a strange place.” She looked at Sky. “How about you on your island?”

Sky pointed to the scars on her neck. “We didn’t exactly have a chance to talk a lot, and we didn’t have school like the children in Quill did—we just worked from the time we were able. But I know my mother and her parents were born on Warbler. You’re the only one I know who just showed up here and survived.”

“Well,” Kaylee said, “there are the scientists, too.”

“Oh yes,” said Sky, “I forgot. They never told us, though—you did.”

“And Talon, maybe,” suggested Lani. “He said he didn’t remember how he arrived on Karkinos, but he’s been there for thousands of years.”

“Well . . . ,” Kaylee said, screwing up her face a little as she was about to object, but then didn’t see the point in it.

“And Issie,” Alex said, sitting up. “She’s been looking for her lost baby for seven hundred years, remember? I wonder if she was swept into our world while she was looking?”

“And now maybe she’ll never find her child,” Sky said sadly.

They were silent and thoughtful for a long while as they contemplated the origins of everyone they’d met in their tiny, seven-island world.

Lani’s interest returned to the map. “What’s the name of your . . . of the place you came from?”

Kaylee found the spot for her. “My family is here in a city called Manchester-by-the-Sea. It’s part of the state of Massachusetts.” She glanced at Lani, who seemed enormously interested. She added, “But my ancestors are actually English—from here, across the Atlantic Ocean.” She pointed to a piece of land to the right.

“I wonder where my ancestors lived,” said Lani. “Do you think they were English too?”

Kaylee studied Lani. “Well, if I had to guess, I’d say you’ve got some Asian roots, or maybe Polynesian or Hawaiian. . . .” She shrugged, but then searched for and pointed out the locations she was mentioning.

Lani turned to look at Kaylee, incredulous. “How in the world would you know that?”

“Because of the way you look, I guess,” said Kaylee, almost apologetically.

“No way. Seriously?” asked Lani.

Kaylee nodded.

This was a foreign concept to all the Artiméans.

“That is so cool!” said Lani. She brushed her fingers over the Hawaiian Islands, and then did the same to the tiny Polynesian islands below.

“So,” interjected Alex, “people look different depending on where their ancestors came from?”

“Yeah, I guess,” said Kaylee. She was shocked that there were intelligent humans who didn’t understand this. But it was true that the people of Artimé didn’t have a specific look about them—they had a variety of skin tones and hair and eye colors. Which made sense when she thought about how their ancestors must have come from all over the world.

“Where do you think my ancestors are from?” asked Alex, leaning over the map.

Kaylee frowned. “I’m not sure about you. You’re sort of ambiguous. Maybe southern Europe, like Italy.” She pointed out the area on the map. “But your sisters have different skin and eye color than you and Aaron.”

“They look like our mother,” said Alex.

Kaylee had never seen Alex’s mother. “They definitely look more distinct with those black eyes, but I don’t know—I’m not actually an expert on this or anything.” She chuckled nervously, feeling weird about declaring people’s heritages without having any information about them.

“Yes, but what do you think?” asked Alex. “It’s not like we’ll be mad at you if you’re wrong. We’re just curious.”

“Well,” said Kaylee, giving in, “maybe your mother’s ancestors are from Tahiti or somewhere tropical. Or northern Africa, like Morocco.” Kaylee soon realized Alex was right, and they’d probably never know the truth, so she began to take the whole topic a bit less seriously and started to have fun with her predictions. “I’d guess that Sean Ranger has Irish roots, and Carina looks Eastern European—maybe Russian. And Samheed has a pretty clear Middle Eastern look.”

“What about my ancestors?” asked Sky.

“Mexico or South America,” Kaylee guessed. She pointed the places out. “You know, there’s a good chance all of you have ancestors from a bunch of different countries.” She paused thoughtfully. “Most people in America are like that too, actually. People from a lot of different countries moved to America in the past few hundred years, so there are a lot of Americans today with combined heritages.”

The friends began to imagine a similar scenario in their world—people from the seven islands meeting others on different islands and falling in love, and somehow they ended up in a silly conversation about what Florence and Talon’s children might look like if they ever had any.

When the fun died down, Alex was quiet for a minute, and then he frowned and turned toward Kaylee. “You said no one ever returns to your world from the triangles. But your world is so huge—how would you know if one returned or not?”