“It wasn’t me, Lucy,” I say. “It was all of us, working together.” She is still so beautiful with her dark hair and eyes, although her skin is not as white as it was before, due to her time in the sun. “I was so worried about you. I am so glad you made it out.” I look around. “Where is Jilly?”
“She’s inside helping Sally with the children’s lessons.” Lucy takes my hands in hers as we step apart. “I have something to ask you,” she says. “David and I are to be married. Will you stand up with me? Harry is going to stand with David.”
I smile. “I would be honored.” Then I ask. “Who is going to marry you?”
“Lyon says that all ship’s captains have the legal right to marry people. So Captain Manning will do it. We are planning on having it tomorrow if you feel up to it. We’re also going to build our own cabin close by, as are Rosalyn and Colm.”
“That’s wonderful news,” I say, genuinely happy for her. “How is Adam, by the way? Last I saw him he was recovering from his injuries.”
“He is fine,” Lucy assures me. “His arm is still in a sling and he wasn’t able to participate in your rescue, which made him angry, but he is out with the men today, learning how to work that giant war machine and teaching David and Harry how to shoot.”
“I heard that more shiners were saved when you went through the tunnels.”
“Yes, my cousin, Joe, and his wife, Nell. Their little boy was with the children. Little Joey. They are building also.”
“That’s wonderful news,” I say. “We will have our own little village here. Was there anyone else?”
Lucy shakes her head. “That’s it, except for all these chickens. We came upon them and just herded them out before us once James found the way. Oh, and the canaries.”
I had forgotten about the canaries. I have gotten so used to Pip, especially after Pace tamed him. But there were several more, all kept in cages in a chamber close by our village so they could be picked up and taken to whatever tunnel was needed.
“I freed them,” Lucy says. “Those that were still alive. Some of them had starved, poor things, but the rest … After knowing that Pip was the reason you came back in, I couldn’t stand the thought of abandoning the rest, so when I saw that we were close by I just turned them loose. The last we saw of them they were flying up out of the place where the dome caved in.”
“And hopefully they made it outside. The only birds I recall seeing when we went back in were some pigeons. I bet the bees have all left the dome too.” Bees were kept on one of the rooftops to keep our gardens pollinated. “I bet my father doesn’t even realize it.”
“He’ll realize it when they don’t have any fruit or vegetables,” Lucy says.
I look around the yard, at all the progress that’s been made in the two and a half weeks that we were gone, and I am amazed. We shall do well here. I know it. We can plant gardens and build homes and grow strong on our own. We don’t need the dome, and as long as we can stay away from the rovers we’ll be fine. But I can’t forget the faces of the scarabs who were held prisoner, or the workers who are deemed worthless because of someone else’s actions. Or the fact that my father is holding Zan prisoner. These things cannot go on.
Rosalyn comes to me and gives me a hug. “I knew my Colm was alive,” she said. “If you had not gone in, we might never have found him.” Rosalyn, along with Adam, was on the council that governed us when we lived in the tunnels.
I realize now that our trip inside, even though disastrous for the three of us, and Zan, was a godsend for Colm and Tobias, Lucy, David, and Harry. Perhaps even Jilly, if she is happy now. “I’m so glad,” I say to Rosalyn. “What are they doing?”
“Making a cover for our wells,” she explains. “I believe the water comes from the underground river. It tastes the same.”
“It could run beneath us for miles,” I say. “It’s hard to even imagine how many.”
“Here’s hoping we never have to find out.”
“Wren!” Jilly calls to me from the door of the cabin. Rosalyn gives me another quick hug and goes back to her work with Lucy. Colm grins at me before I turn to go to the cabin with Jonah in his usual spot, trailing after me.
“Thank God you’re up and about,” Jilly says as she hugs me also. “I was afraid we’d lost you.”
“How is Pace?” I ask. “Where is he?”
“Digging a grave for his mother,” she says. I follow her as she limps into the cabin. She’s dressed in some of Zan’s clothes also. “James is with him.”
“James?” I ask.
She nods. She’d seen the animosity between James and Pace herself. I look around the cabin. We stand in a large room with a two long tables and benches built from split logs. The children sit at one of the tables, intent on their lessons, while Sally, who was their teacher when we lived beneath the dome, works with them on their lessons. A stack of books sits on the table, courtesy of the Hatfields’ immense library.
The back wall is made of stone, and there is a fireplace built into it. A long shelf runs across it, and more shelves are built on either side and full of the things we managed to recover from our village, including some odds and ends of clothes. A spinning wheel much like the one we used in our village sits in the corner.
“I wonder where they found that?” I ask.
“In one of the ruins, I suppose,” Jilly says. “I cannot wait until I can go out exploring. As soon as this foot heals.”
“How is it?”
“Fine since Dr. Stewart cleaned it up. He put some sort of medicine on it, an herbal mixture, he said, and it started feeling better immediately. Didn’t even need a stitch to close it.”
On either end of the large room is a staircase that leads to an open area. Beyond the staircase are rooms with doors.
Jilly leads me to one of the rooms off to the left. “Pace went looking for a nice spot to bury her and said he found a church with a graveyard nearby. James went back with him to dig the grave. Ellen is in here,” she says, and leads me to the room off to the left.
Ellen lies in a box that is supported on two cross pieces of wood with legs attached to them. She wears the same dress she had on since we were captured, but it is clean now, and her hair is neatly combed. Someone took great care with her.
“Jane helped him ready her,” Jilly says.
“It should have been me that helped him,” I say.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Wren,” she replies. “You could have just as easily died.”
“What happened after I fainted?” I ask. “Where are Ragnor and Janna?”
“They just disappeared. One minute they were there and the next gone. I just know they didn’t go back to the village. Pace wouldn’t leave Ellen, so David and James went down to help him while Levi and that big walking machine gave them cover. The Quest swooped down and took some of us while the rest came back on the cycles and the machine.”
“Lyon calls it a tank.”
“The tank,” Jilly says with a smile.
“Where is it now?”
“Somewhere behind us,” Jilly says, pointing behind the stone. “The men all act like it’s a big toy to be played with. They are all learning how to drive it and such.”
“What about the scarab children and Bess?”
“Jon took them out with those two big dogs to give them a day to recover from everything.”
“Belle and Beau are the dogs.” I walk over to Ellen’s coffin to look closely at her. She looks so much younger now; her face is relaxed and not twisted up with tension and hatred. I am so happy that we had the chance to talk things out and she did not die hating me. I am especially glad that she told me about my mother. The fact that she knew her gave us a connection that I am so sorry we did not get to explore more. We both love Pace. Surely from that common ground we could have built a relationship.