ONE OF the smaller kids there happens to have deer legs, and she drops to all fours and goes sprinting up the hill so fast I see her as a red blur weaving through the brambles. She’s off to tell everybody that Rowan and I are safe, and that means I’ll have to face Gabriel soon, but I barely bother to watch her run. Ophelia’s still hugging me, and little Indigo is clinging to my right leg and crying, saying, “You couldn’t be dead, you couldn’t be, you couldn’t, I won’t ever let you die!” over and over again. I reach down to stroke her dusk blue cheeks, which don’t sting.
Maybe a dozen kids are crowded around me and Rowan, and I stare out at the moon-speckled sea and let him do the talking. I don’t like to think of Soraya out there by herself; wouldn’t she rather be with all of us?
“It’s really crazy,” Rowan is saying. “I sat down in that cave to wait for Ada and Ms. Stuart to come back and rescue me, and—I guess I felt a little lightheaded, but I really thought I was fine. Anyway I must have fainted, and when I came to I was at the edge of the water, right over there, feeling the sand suck out from under my hands. I have absolutely no idea how it happened. I was still catching my breath when Ada came crawling out of the sea and splatted down right beside me. I mean, there’s obviously a tunnel through to the ocean in there, because that’s how Soraya was able to save Ada. I must have gone through it, too.”
Everyone’s nodding. So they all knew about Soraya, but nobody told me. But do they know the really important thing?
“I couldn’t believe how much she looks like me,” I say, to check how everyone reacts.
“She does?” Ophelia sounds genuinely surprised, at least. She leans her head on my shoulder. “How could she look like you, though? Though I guess none of us but Rowan have ever seen her up close. She doesn’t usually come—anywhere too near the fence—except to visit him. She’s kind of a mysterious loner type. Soraya, lost princess of the whispering waves. Like that.”
If Ophelia is telling the truth, then that explains why Rowan was the only one who really jumped when he first saw me.
But did Rowan truly keep that a secret even from Gabriel—that Soraya and I are obviously some kind of sisters? Maybe it makes a little more sense now that Gabe had such stupid ideas about her. He doesn’t know her at all, and he just assumed she must be as cruel as he is.
“I mean, Soraya looks more like Ada than you’d expect, considering she’s mostly squid.” Rowan’s voice is lazy, but he flashes me a warning look over Ophelia’s head. “I guess their eyes are similar. The same color, anyway.”
“How did you get back over the fence?” someone asks.
“Soraya threw me over the top. I hit the water pretty hard. Maybe she threw Rowan, too, while he was unconscious? And I was facing the wrong way to see it?”
Rowan’s aware that I know about the hole in the fence, but nobody else has to realize that. He beams at me, to let me know I said the right thing.
They’re coming. A long trail of bodies like hazy red torches dots the hillside. I imagine how Gabriel must be practicing the words in his mind as he walks toward us: Ada’s crazy, she’s lying, she’s not one of us . . . He can almost count on everyone believing his word over mine, but from the way Ophelia’s been hugging me and Rowan is gazing at me, not quite.
Rowan believes me. That’s really sinking in now. He didn’t like what I was telling him, but he took it to heart anyway.
“So if Soraya caught you,” Indigo asks out of nowhere, “why didn’t she just put you back with Gabriel?”
Like most little kids, she’s always listening even when you think she’s spacing out. “Who knows, Indigo? She doesn’t talk. At least, not in a way I can understand. Rowan, can you tell what she’s saying?”
He hesitates. “Soraya and I have our own language. We invented it together when we were small.” Then Rowan seems to make up his mind about something. “I wasn’t sure if we could trust you, Ada. Soraya’s incredibly sensitive, and I was afraid of how hurt she’d be if you didn’t react well when you saw her. And—you know, it would be way too dangerous for her if the normals ever found out she exists. But I’m actually relieved that you know all our secrets now, because it proves you’re really part of the family.” He says it a little too loudly, too decisively: it’s not for me, it’s for everyone listening.
All your secrets? Really, Rowan? I think.
But instead I say, “So can Marley know, too? I can see why you might be worried that Soraya would freak her out, but it seems weird not to tell her. Does she count as part of the family yet?”
I don’t actually care that much about the answer. I’m mostly talking to cover the drumming of my heart as Gabe gets closer to the beach. But everyone except Rowan shoots nervous looks at one another.
“What?” I say. “Nothing happened to Marley, did it?”
“We weren’t going to bring it up yet, Ada. Because you and Rowan went through a lot already today, and we thought . . . you don’t need any more crazy news just now. Right?” Ophelia says. She pulls back and gives me a strange smile, like she’s afraid I’ll get mad.
Rowan stares. “Ophelia, tell us right now what’s going on with Marley! Is she okay?”
“Um, she’s okay. Don’t worry. At least, she’s not feeling too good right now. We’ve been trying to calm her down. But she will be okay. You know, in a while.”
I scramble to my feet, ready to run up the hill. I can deal with Gabriel later. “Where is she?”
“Ada, it’s really all right. Don’t go, okay? She’s in her room, and you can . . . At least, I think you’ll be able to talk to her tomorrow. It’s just that she’s, um, she’s building a chrysalis.”
“What!”
“She’s physically okay, really. Or she will be. But she’s going through some heavy emotional drama because she wasn’t expecting anything like this. Mr. Chu says it’s not compatible with her self-image. Her instincts just took over, and she couldn’t stop herself.”
“A chrysalis?”
“So she’s going to be a way bigger part of the family than she ever wanted to be,” Rowan murmurs. If someone else had said that it might have seemed like gloating, but he sounds genuinely sad for her. “Poor Marley. She must be in complete shock.”
I look out at the twilight-blue grass, the red-glowing bodies just above us now, the rising white blot of the mist-smeared moon. So is Marley going to be some kind of butterfly girl, or maybe a moth?
“Rowan!” Gabriel yells. He’s glowing silvery white; there are moments when his skin lights up in a way that everyone can see. Bioluminescence is usually so beautiful, but on him it just gets on my nerves. Normally he’d jump dramatically off the grassy shelf, but he’s limping pretty badly, and instead he sits down to slide onto the beach.
“Gabe!” Rowan gets up and runs to hug him. “Ada told me how you tried to grab her when she slipped into that pit in the cave. I guess you didn’t see Soraya waiting there under the water? Anyway we’re both fine. Soraya took care of Ada and got her back here safe. I can’t remember anything that happened, so maybe she helped me out, too.”
Gabriel turns to stare at me. He’s trying to settle his skin, but blurts of magenta keep interrupting the silver glow. Ms. Stuart and maybe twenty of the kids are jumping and climbing down right behind him. He knows he can’t say, You told him what?
“Don’t feel bad, Gabe,” I say loudly enough that everyone will hear. “You tried your hardest to reach me. I could hear you yelling for me as I was going down. And I really thought I was going to die when I hit the water, but then Soraya was right there and she caught me. I was terrified for a few seconds, but then she started sharing her air with me and I realized she was a friend.”
I’m almost ready to laugh at the savage, bewildered look on his face. Then he gets a little bit more of a grip on himself.
“That was so great of Soraya, then. When I saw you go under, I was sure you weren’t going to make it.” His voice sounds so fake. Is he really fooling everyone?
“Right,” I say. “So you had to go back and tell Ms. Stuart there was nothing you could do. That must have been awful.”
“Ada!” Ms. Stuart says, walking across the sand. “And Rowan! I was afraid to believe it until I saw you both for myself. This could tempt me to adopt an irrational faith in miracles.”
She hugs me. I don’t hug her back, but she doesn’t seem to notice.
“Ada, you seem to be covered in—what is it? Some kind of mucus?”
“Soraya’s spit. She took my head inside her mouth so I could breathe.”
Anywhere else people would flip out at that, but Ms. Stuart gives a wooden laugh. “Then a shower is in order. And both of you must be famished.” I am, in fact.
She flashes Gabriel a hard-edged look and reaches for Rowan, who hugs her like he means it. “I can’t imagine what we would have done if we’d lost you, Rowan. You’re the living heart of this community.” It’s the first sincere thing anyone’s said in a while.
We head back up the hill, and after we get cleaned up, Rowan and I sit in our pajamas with big bowls of spaghetti in our laps. They let us eat on the sofas in the lobby as a kind of reward for being alive, and after dinner there’s a huge, flat chocolate cake that Mr. Chu baked in a hurry while we were showering. Rowan and I tell our lying stories over and over again, inventing new details when we have to. Everyone has so many questions. Indigo won’t stop clinging to me, and Corbin is sprawled across Rowan’s lap. It’s after midnight, but nobody sends the small kids to bed, and they start drifting into sleep with their frosting-smudged noses in the carpet.
Rowan keeps beaming me warm, secretive smiles, and Gabriel sits cross-legged on the floor and watches me. I have to add a few parts to match the story he told while he thought I was dead: Oh, right, I did catch hold of a ledge inside that hole, and Gabriel was just throwing me the rope when my hand slipped. Totally. So much happened afterward that I forgot to mention that.
I ask to see Marley, but they tell me she’s asleep, or at least in some kind of trance, and that I shouldn’t disturb her.
My head falls against the leather back of the sofa. I’m going to let my eyes close just for a moment. Just one, and then Ophelia and I will get our group of little kids ready for bed. We’re being irresponsible, letting them stay up so late.
I’m dreaming about Indigo brushing her teeth when I half wake: just long enough to feel someone lowering me into my own bed.
When I found Rowan on the beach earlier, why was he crying? I really should have asked.