The Gift (28 page)

And suddenly the breath’s gone out of me, and some of the others actually collapse to the ground from the effort, or the power
surge, or whatever it is that’s happening.…

Because, to be honest, we’re not exactly sure what’s going on.

The planes definitely start tipping, then spiraling downward. The wings seem to be… missing?

“They’re going to crash!” someone cries out. “Into us!”

“Again!” I scream. “We need to say the words again! Everybody together!”

The bombers are careening sideways toward us, and we don’t have the energy left to find cover—not that there’s any cover in
this flattened wasteland. A bunch of us manage to clasp our hands together and recite the spell all over again.

The bombers are now grotesquely distorted. They’re, like, half machine, half creature. And they’re still coming for us.

“Look straight at them!” I yell. “And let’s chant one more time!”

One
last
time, that is, because if this doesn’t work, right now, we’re all roadkill.

There’s a plane fewer than a hundred yards from flattening me, and I close my eyes as I say the last line.

When I open them, I’m ravenously hungry.
I see nothing in the sky
… except a whole bunch of wheeling ravens. Apparently we just turned their bombers into birds.

Wisty

IT’S TOTALLY, TOTALLY MINDBLOWING. That was a real military battle, wasn’t it? We’re unarmed. And we won? A bunch of kids beat the N.O.?

The thrill of victory is followed by another and yet another success. We’ve seriously upped the Freeland raven population,
and
our confidence is sky-high.

We’re clearly running on adrenaline for a while as we triumph through several similar battles. Eventually, though, we’re running
on empty. The magic has consumed every calorie from that bacon-and-waffle breakfast. Everyone’s basically curled up on the
ground, trying to recoup some steam.

“Another squadron on the way!”
Sasha suddenly shouts, pointing into the distance. I think that if I ask them to join hands one more time, everybody is going
to start crying. Even bouncy Emmet has dark bags under his eyes. “Wisty,” he says, “shouldn’t we come up with another plan?”

My eyes follow the planes. “They’re not coming our way. They’re veering off toward —”

“Where we came from,” finishes Whit with a shudder. “Garfunkel’s.”

We don’t know if someone got their intel messed up on the New Order side, but they must think we’re still there. Because they
proceed to drop what seems like their entire N.O. arsenal on the center of the town behind us. Right where Garfunkel’s is.

Or
was.

Where some of the Resistance kids were still hiding out, after refusing to leave with the rest of us. They’d thought our quest
was a suicide mission.

I look at Whit, and he’s squinting hard, obviously holding back tears. We watch as the store—and maybe even those kids—all
go up in flames.

We’re mesmerized by the twisted fireworks finale until Sasha calls out again. He’s pointing toward the horizon—a horizon that’s
disappearing under a black cloud… that isn’t a cloud at all. It’s still
more
New Order planes.

And under the black cloud are gray curtains, the way you can sometimes see rain falling beneath a distant thundercloud. Only
in this case it’s not rain—
it’s bombs.

As they hit the ground, there are eye-stinging flashes of blue light. We can feel the earth shaking, even from however many
miles away we are.

Is it the beginning of the end? Or just the end?

Whit

“LET’S GET EVERYONE UNDERGROUND!” I shout to Wisty. “I saw a manhole a while back. Maybe we can hide there.”

We manage to get the group to the manhole, and, as luck would have it, it’s an old steam tunnel rather than a sewer. Not the
freshest air in the world, but the tunnel should be far enough underground to make us safe from explosions and flying shrapnel.

Once everyone’s in, Wisty pulls me aside.

“Unless you have any better ideas, I think you and I need to go to Mrs. Highsmith’s,” she tells me. “She’s powerful. She might
be able to…” I don’t think she’s even sure what the woman can do for us.

“Give us options?” I finish the thought.

“Exactly.” Wisty nods. “Maybe even give us info about Mom and Dad. I just have this feeling she knows where they are…”

Just then Janine walks up to us, her eyes still tinged with red from watching our longtime home bite the dust. “What’s next,
guys? Any bright ideas? Any dim ones?”

“Listen, Janine, we’ve got to go to Mrs. Highsmith,” I tell her. Then I put my hands on her arms. “You okay here with the
group?”

“Yes, but…” Janine looks down at her black combat boots. I think she’s trying to hide that she’s getting choked up again.

I lift her chin gently and force her to look at me with those sage-green eyes.

“Why do I have this awful feeling that this is
it?
It’s the last time I’m going to say good-bye to you, isn’t it?” She speaks in a whispery voice. It sends a shiver rushing
up my spine.

“The last time you’re going to say good-bye, yeah,” I acknowledge. “But not the last time you’ll see me. I promise.”

She can’t help the tears from spilling out of her eyes. My hands cup her face, and I wipe the streams away with my thumbs.
Her hands slide down my arms to my wrists, as if she doesn’t want to let me go.

I’m not exactly sure what I feel for Janine. But I do know what I have to do right now.

So I kiss her sweetly. Long enough to tell her everything without words—some crazy, mixed-up jumble of admiration, appreciation,
attraction. I feel all of those things for her right now. Deeply.

I don’t stop kissing her until Wisty’s finished saying her good-byes, and she tugs my shirt gently. “C’mon, Whit.”

I let Janine go, and she just nods. There are no more good-byes as Wisty and I climb the metal rungs up the manhole shaft
to the war zone above.

Whit

“YOU’RE LATE,” Mrs. Highsmith says through the intercom, buzzing open the building’s front door even before we can press her button.
How did she know?

“We didn’t have an appointment, did we?” I ask Wisty, still mystified as we hurry up the stairs and find her apartment door
open. And, in the kitchen, there’s that little old ninja lady, definitely looking more poet than ninja as she stands over
a massive oil barrel that’s almost as tall as she is. She’s stirring something that smells pretty rank. She takes a sip and
totally gags on her own brew.

This
is the lady who’s going to be our game changer? Who can help save us?

“So we get to talk at last, Whitford. My crystal always revealed you to be a fairly good-looking young man, but now that I
can get a nice, close-up view, I see you’re what they call a ‘hottie’ these days.”

Can I just confirm for you that it’s
unbelievably
creepy
to be ogled by an old witch? I shift uncomfortably from foot to foot.

“Except you could learn to stand up a bit straighter, dear. Adds inches. Now, how did you two find the trip, by the way?”
she asks as if we’ve just taken a little jaunt to Grandma’s house.

“Um, it was sort of… like, there’s a
war
going on out there?” I offer weakly.

Wisty sums up the hellacious journey of the last three and a half hours. “Let’s just say, Mrs. H., if you ever have the opportunity
to sprint for your life ahead of a curtain of bombs that explode and burn so hot that the buildings and sidewalks and streets
and the very dirt itself melt into glass… well, see what your other options are
and embrace them with all your being!
”

“Oh, I shall, Wisteria.” She laughs. “These old bones don’t sprint anywhere anymore anyway.”
Can this lady be serious?
“Yes,” she says, looking at me as if to warn me she might be able to read my mind. “It showed some real chutzpah, making
the decision to come here through all of that. Your parents are very proud of you.”

“How do you know that?” Wisty blurts.

“Have you heard from them?” I ask at the same time.

“I
have.
And you are about to, my dears. I’ve been practicing my holographic technique and, wouldn’t you know, your parents just popped
up!”

Wisty and I look at each other. “Isn’t that the same thing The One was talking about back at the BNW Center?” I
exclaim, first with surprise, then with horror. For all we know, this strange little lady might be partners with the guy.

“But it’s not…
real,
is it?” Wisty’d hoped that the twisted hallucination of our parents was just The One’s theatrics.

“Oh, it’s real, all right,” Mrs. H. says, and I frown.
What does “real” mean anymore anyway?
“Come here, and I’ll show you. Come quickly. I don’t know how long my magic will last.”

We weave our way around the barrel and settle down at a table cluttered with stacks of books, pens, paper, candles, matches,
and the odd pot and pan.

“Now, where did it disappear to? Oh, here we go.” She lifts up a dirty dishcloth to reveal—as if she’s just itching to make
her whole witchy image complete—something that looks like a
glass ball
.

This can’t be where the answers to our problems lie.

“How does it work?” Wisty asks.

“Ask your brother.” Mrs. H. looks at me and smiles knowingly. “Here, Whit. Put your palm on the glass.” She picks up my hand
and places it on the ball along with hers. The globe feels really warm, like a coffee pot that’s only just starting to cool
down.

There’s a flash of light as soon as my hand makes contact.

“Whoa!” I say. I definitely felt something surge from me—something powerful—but I’m too freaked out to let on. I’m
so
not ready to accept this new gig as a fortune-teller.

“Ben? Liz? You still there?” Mrs. H. shouts as if she’s yelling into a phone with a bad connection. “Your children decided
to show up. I gather the bombings slowed them down a bit.”

I can’t believe what I’m seeing play out right under my hand. Clouds and shapes swirling and then coming together—as the faces
of my parents suddenly appear.

“Mom! Dad!” Wisty and I shout together.

They still look eerily gaunt, but this time Dad’s eyes are open, thank God, and they both smile when they hear our voices.

“Whit! I see you so clearly!” Mom says. “Can Wisty come a little closer? We need to talk.”