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Despite the long day, I felt restless and unable to relax. When I whispered as much to Max, Polly and Castor overheard and agreed that they felt the same.

“Let’s go up to the third floor, so we don’t bother the others,” Max suggested and motioned to the wooden staircase.

Samara had been sitting on her bedroll next to her father, but when she saw us going upstairs, she hurried after us. As did Ripley, but she followed me everywhere I went.

Max brought a candle, and a little of the fading sunlight made it through the third story window. The attic was empty, aside from a few old boxes, cobwebs, and rat droppings.

I went over to the window and looked out at the waterwheel in the river at the back of the mill. To thenorth was a cemetery. Before we’d gone inside the mill, I had mistakenly thought it to be a park, but now I could clearly see the headstones all over. In the very center, among broken gravestones, there were the burnt remnants of a pile of bodies. Human skeletons blackened and stacked on top of one another.

“Make a wish,” Polly said behind me, and I nearly jumped.

“What?” I asked.

“The first star is out.” She pointed to the bright light in the bruise-colored sky. “If you make a wish on it, it will come true.”

I shook my head. “I hadn’t heard that before.”

“Star light, star bright/First star I see tonight/I wish I may, I wish I might/Have this wish I wish tonight,” Polly said.

I repeated her words, and I put my hands on my belly as I wished silently in my head.I wish that the baby is born happy and healthy.

“Come sit down,” Max said, patting a spot next to him on the floor. “You should still rest.”

My body ached, and I eagerly sat down beside him. Samara and Castor were already sitting across from us, their knees brushed up against each other, and Polly sat between her brother and me.

“So…” Samara said, eyeing us. “You two really aren’t brother and sister?”

“No!” Max and I both shouted in unison, appalled.

“Remy is my only sibling,” Max elaborated.

“Are you Boden’s sister then?” Polly asked me.

I shook my head. “No, the rest of us aren’t related by blood. But we’re still family.”

“So it isn’t weird for you two to be hooking up with someone in your ‘family?’” Samara asked with airquotes aroundfamily.

Max bristled. “No. I mean, Remy and Boden are each other’s family, and they’re in love.”

“Are they?” Polly asked dubiously.

“Yes,” Max insisted. He was always quick to defend his sister against perceived criticisms, sometimestooquick. “Family has many different forms, and this is ours.”

“I guess I can understand that,” Samara finally conceded. “My sister died first, and then my mom died a couple years ago, but it hasn’t really been just me and my dad since then. We’ve always found other people.” She smiled over at Castor when she said that, and Max squeezed my hand.

14

Remy

After a morning scavenging around the mill, we headed down to the docks. Most of the town had been picked over, the way most everything was after so long, but we’d managed to find a large dog collar and leash. The dog it had once belonged to was long gone, but the pictures in the house showed some kind of gigantic mastiff with a thick neck and slobbery smile.

That proved lucky for us, because Stella had been worrying about how we’d get Ripley into Emberwood. After the way that Garrison and Lillian had initially been ready to kill the lioness, it didn’t seem unreasonable. Lately, Ripley had been glued to Stella’s side, but a heavy-duty collar and leash would go a long way to making the townsfolk and any guards feel safer with her presence.

The collar fit Ripley, but I didn’t try using a leash just yet. I wanted her to get accustomed to the collar first, and she seemed to be tolerating it with only mild annoyance.

After the foraging had concluded, our group – now containing the six of us, and the five others – convened outside the mill. Once we were all together, we followed the street signs painted with faded ink that pointed the way to the Historic Landing District.

Before we even reached the dock, Garrison let out a loud whooping sound, startling nearby birds to takeflight.