Do you know when the next train to Yass is coming? I had asked.
Go to hell, he said, but there was a desolate fear in his eyes and I couldnt look away.
Been there. Trust me. Its so overrated.
And for reasons I will never understand, I received a smile from Jonah Griggs, and there was a yearning in it, touching a nerve inside me that still freaks me out to this day. On that train something was unleashed in both of us. He didnt say much about himself except that it was his first time away from his mother and brother and he had a desperate need to know that they were all right without him. And I told him everything. About my first memory, sitting on the shoulders of a giant who I know can only be my father. Of touching the sky. Of lying between two people who read me stories of wild things and journeys with dragons, the soft hum of their voices speaking of love and serenity. See, I remember love. Thats what people dont understand. And what I also remember is that in telling that tale to the Cadet on the train I got a glimpse of peace.
When the train derailed and we decided to hike, there was never a question that we wouldnt stick together and find my mother. Except on the third night he had a dream and betrayed us.
What do I say to him? Ben asks, bringing me back to the real world.
What should he say to the Cadet? Ask him why he called his school to come and get us when we were so close to wherever both of us wanted to be. Ask him why he had made that call when he knew I was two hours away from my mother.
Tell him we want to make a deal.
I walk past the year-seven and-eight dorms, where Jessa McKenzie has already taken over. The others hang off her every word and I havent seen them this animatedactually ever. The Lachlan House leaders were always strict. Commandments number one to ten ranged from No Fun to No Fun. But down here, Jessa McKenzie and her posse are either giggling hysterically or spooking one another out. The rest of the girls are engrossed in her tale and I even notice Raffaela amongst them, sitting on one of the beds, intrigued.
Hes killed ten people in twenty years, I hear Jessa say.
But nowhere near here? That comes from Chloe P. who, in all probability, will now be paralysed with fear all night.
Those kids who went missing a couple of years ago were from Truscott, which is halfway between here and the city, one of the year eights says. Thats close enough.
Lights off, I say.
They look my way. Scrubbed little faces of kids who dont really know who I am. Just that Im in charge.
Im telling them about the serial killer, Taylor, and how he
Is nowhere near us, I interrupt.
I walk over to her as they begin to disperse. I catch a glimpse of the newspaper clippings spread out all over her bed. The faces of the dead or missing, so young and happy that all I can think of is, how can they be dead? Toothy grins, mostly those school photos that you keep hidden.
But the worst photos are those of the parents. Their faces are so drawn and grief-stricken. They want their children back. I look at the faces of the girls around me and wonder who would look that grief-stricken for half of them. If something happens to me, whose face will be on the front page of the paper begging for me? Is a person worth more because they have someone to grieve for them?
I look at Jessa
McKenzie and I wonder what type of warped person carries around newspaper clippings of dead kids and despairing parents. What kind of a freak is this kid whos giggling hysterically with the girls in the neighbouring beds, each with a crush on the other for being the same age when the rest of the world seems so old?
The three of them are snuggled up together, talking like they havent seen one another in years. Sometimes I look at the girls in my form, in my very own house, most of them now on the third floor with me, and I realise that I hardly know them.
For the first time since they made me leader of the community, I realise why I told Hannah I was thinking of leaving. Its fear. Not of having to negotiate territory, fight a war, and make sure we come out of it with more land than when we started. I can do that blindfolded.
Its this that scares me.
My seniors have left the House.
Im in charge of fifty kids who dont give a shit about the territory wars. They just want to be looked after.
And I have no idea how.
Chapter 5
He went missing on one of the prettiest days Narnie could remember in her whole sixteen years. One of those days when she woke up and actually wanted to be alive.
Over the next twenty-four hours the four of them called his name, first with annoyance, then urgency, hysteria, rage, grief.
And then with despair.
By the third day everyone else at the school joined in, as well as the Townies and the Cadets.
But the birds still sang and the river still flowed and the flowers were in full bloom.
And then their voices stopped and their souls stood still and they ceased being who they had been.
Because who they were had always been determined by him.