Chapter 12
They send me and Max outside while they argue it out. Some of the townspeople are still hanging around. No sign of Burly or Margery Wingard, but Tara and Taper are there, looking to make trouble, no doubt.
“What’s going on?” Tara asks us. Neither of us really know how to answer her. “Come on,” she says, “there are rumors flying all over town now, and it’s not like I don’t want an answer to these dreams either.”
“This wasn’t about the dreams,” Max says. “Or only partly.”
“What’s it about, then?” Taper almost, but not quite, demands. “Our mom is really pissed at your mom, and that usually means she didn’t get her way on something.”
“Not that that’s always a bad thing,” Tara says, which is a surprise I’ll have to come back to later.
“The Land brought us a warning,” Max says.
“A warning?” Taper seems genuinely shocked.
“Warning of what?” Tara says.
I exchange glances with Max. It’s a little hard to explain, I type out on the comm.
“Try,” Tara says.
Something is coming.
“What is?”
Max shrugs. “Something dangerous. Something that’s been here before but not for so long even the Land don’t have a name for it. They just know it’s bad, and it’s to do with the dreams.” Max takes a breath. “And the gods.”
“You were being serious about seeing gods?” Taper says.
“Have you guys seen any?”
“Any gods?” Taper’s expression says really very clearly how he hasn’t seen any.
Ask Arrow, I type.
“Ask Arrow what?” Tara says.
“Right,” Pop says, coming out of the unit, Mom right behind him. “Max, you’re coming with me to help find your granddad. Ben, you’re staying here with your mom to continue classes.”
“We’re splitting up?” Max says, my face saying it at exactly the same time.
How does that make sense? I type.
“If you stay here,” Pop says to Max, “you’d have to be in the unit every hour of the day. No more wandering around on your own. You wanna do that? Or do you wanna help me?”
“And you,” Mom says to me, “will always be with someone. If it’s not me, it’s your classmates or your teachers. Got it?”
I start typing to complain about this but–
“Are we in danger?” Tara interrupts.
Mom and Pop look like they just noticed she was there.
“We don’t know, Tara,” Mom says. “Maybe. But your mom would not want you hearing any of that from me.”
“You know she won’t tell us herself,” Tara says. And this is also a surprise, to Mom and Pop, too.
Finally, all Mom can say is, “Keep your eyes open. Keep your minds open, too. Be watchful. We don’t know what’s coming, but something is. When we find out, we’ll tell you, I promise, no matter what your mother says.”
I don’t think we should split up, I sign to my mom. It feels like a bad idea.
“It does, actually,” Max says, “but I’d worry about Pop going out alone to find Granddad.”
Mom snorts. “Oh, your father can take care of himself. But if you’re with him, I know for one hundred percent he’s coming back.”
That’s what does it. We agree. Max will leave with Pop, I’ll stay behind with Mom.
And that turns out to be the worst mistake we could possibly make.