The Marked (25 page)

“Conclusions about what?” Esther demanded. “What are you talking about? Is Hennie hearing those voices in her head again?”

At any other time that remark might have been considered a joke, but this time, no one laughed.

“Wait!” Catherine turned to listen to a distinct tone blasting from the emergency radio.

It was a sound we’d all heard from a radio before: three short blasts of sound followed by one long note. Then came a tinny voice, a recording from the National Weather Service. We knew what was coming before they said it.

Tsunami.

THEY ESTIMATED
twenty minutes before the wave hit. The quake had occurred along the Tacoma Fault, just north of the city of Tacoma, and had a magnitude of 7.1. It wasn’t the “big one” they always worried about along the Cascadia fault, but the wave could be ten feet high or more, which would be devastating to the low-lying areas on some of the islands.

Obviously, we couldn’t evacuate. Our campsites were already on a bluff about thirty feet above the waterline, so the chances of a wave reaching the group were slim. But the island was small, and depending on the size of the wave, anything might happen. Our path was clear—we were to head for the highest point on the island, as quickly as possible.

“Trevor, we’ve got to do this now,” I said, “before the teachers start sending us away. Claire’s out of commission, at least until David gets to her, and they’ll need Kari and Geneva to help the injured people. We’re the only ones left.”

Though the sun was up now, the air was still cold. I rubbed the goose bumps that marched along the pale skin of my forearms.

Esther gazed directly at Trevor. She was one hundred percent Esther again: frizzy hair, dark brown eyes, round face. “Please, let us help.”

He caught her glance, and for just a minute, I thought I saw something in his eyes, some flash of emotion that he quickly disguised. “Go ahead, Dancia,” he sighed. “But make it quick.”

“You have to promise you’ll never tell another soul,” I said, remembering Cam’s warning to me last semester.

Esther nodded first. “I’m in.”

“You might as well tell me, too,” Catherine said. “It isn’t like I’ve got anything better to do.”

I boiled the story down to a few lines. I told them Delcroix had a special program for students with extraordinary powers—and they were all candidates. I told Esther she had the power to shape-shift, Hennie had the power to read minds, and Catherine had some higher-level math power I couldn’t even begin to understand.

I didn’t mention Jack or try to explain about the Irin—that would have taken too long. I did tell them there were some bad guys who had kidnapped Cam. And we needed help to rescue him.

At first, this unbelievable story elicited only a few blinks, and then some nods of acceptance around the circle. Hennie grabbed Esther’s hand and squeezed it. Esther began to cry. Catherine’s jaw tightened. She wrapped her arms around her body and looked out at the horizon. They knew, deep in their hearts, that I was telling them the truth. They had always suspected they were different. Now they were sure.

I outlined my plan. It was clearly risky, since it involved having each of them use a Level Three Talent before any training, but I figured that this was essential to rescuing Cam.

First step: I needed Esther to shape-shift into
me.
That was how I would fool Mr. Judan and the other teachers into thinking I hadn’t run off to find Cam. She’d have to stay toward the back of the crowd, but if she could even copy my hairstyle, I thought it would work. She’d have to imitate Trevor, too, if anyone looked for him, and maybe Anna, if we brought her with us.

Esther’s eyes got bigger and bigger as I spoke. “I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe I can imitate you, but not Trevor.”

I brushed aside her doubts. “You play guy teachers all the time. There’s no reason you can’t be Trevor.”

“Esther, you’re stronger and more powerful than you can imagine,” Trevor said. “I know. I’ve been watching you. You just have to trust yourself.”

There was a strange emotion in his voice. I looked at him with amazement. Was it possible that he
liked
Esther? I had always assumed he watched her because he had to—it had never occurred to me that he might actually have fallen for her.

They locked eyes.

Trevor grabbed her hand. “You can do it.”

“I’ll try.” She closed her eyes. A moment later, her hair began to change, growing lighter and lighter, curling into a mass of blond ringlets around her head. Her features stayed pretty much the same, but her eyes widened, and her mouth curved slightly to mimic mine.

I gaped at her, hardly able to believe how closely she now resembled me.

“Wow. That’s really—er—creepy,” Catherine said. “Dancia’s hair on Esther’s body.”

“You’ll have to put on some baggy clothes and stay close to Hennie,” Trevor said. “They’ll be able to tell what’s going on if they get a direct look. But that’s pretty amazing.”

Esther blushed at the praise. I realized her skin tone had lightened, and her neck even sprouted a few blotches as we continued to stare at her, just like mine did when I got nervous.

Buoyed by our first success, I continued on. “Hennie, you’ve got to try to make contact with Cam, just like you did with me a few minutes ago. We need you to figure out where they’re taking him.”

“Picture him in your mind,” Trevor instructed her. “Close your eyes if you need to. Remember everything you can about him. Dancia, what was he wearing?”

I thought for a moment. “Dark blue T-shirt and boxers.”

We trained our stares on Hennie. Her face turned pink under the scrutiny, but she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. There was a long pause, and then she jumped. When she opened her eyes they looked dazed. “I never thought…Oh, my goodness!”

“What?” I demanded. “What is it?”

“It worked.”

“Of course it worked,” I said impatiently. “You’ve been doing it for months. You were just trying to pretend it wasn’t happening. Now, tell us what you saw.”

“He’s watching them. They’re still in the harbor. Something happened to the engine, and they had to fix it. But it’s running now. They’re getting ready to leave.”

“They probably got water in the engine when Dancia swamped the boat,” Trevor said. “At least we’ve got a chance of catching them.”

“Is he okay?” I asked Hennie.

She shook her head. “I’m sorry. That’s all I got. But he’s conscious. That’s got to be a good thing.”

“They must be headed for Orcas,” Trevor said. “It’s less than a mile away and has an airport.”

“Are you crazy?” Catherine asked. “There’s a tsunami headed in our direction. A
tsunami
. Nobody’s going anywhere.”

“There’s sixty of us and ten of them. They know they’ll be dead if they stay here,” Trevor said.

“They still won’t go to Orcas,” Catherine said. She planted herself in the middle of us, completely comfortable taking over the group. “People will be in a panic. The roads will be jammed and the airport even worse. If the quake cracked the runway, it will be unusable. I bet they head for open water. That way, the wave will pass under them.”

“How do you know that?” I asked her.

“I read some geology books while I was home over spring break,” she said. “This whole area is riddled with faults, so I thought I’d do a little research before our trip. It’s quite interesting, on a mathematical level, how tidal waves work.”

I rolled my eyes. I knew it was Catherine’s talent, but still, it was hard to imagine getting excited about math.

“They got it started,” Hennie suddenly exclaimed. “They’re leaving the harbor.”

“Can you tell which way they’re going?” Trevor asked.

“The sun’s on Cam’s right side, and he’s looking at the front of the boat,” Hennie said. “So, I guess they’re going north.”

“If they’re headed for open water, then we’re following them,” Trevor declared.

“There’s something weird, though,” Hennie said. “The water. It’s receding. All along the coast.”

“What?” We ran openmouthed to the edge of the bluff. Just as Hennie had said, water was slowly pulling away from the shore—it looked like a giant bathtub being drained—leaving behind dark brown sand littered with debris, giant rocks, and huge clumps of seaweed. Our boat, moored a good forty feet offshore, was still floating, but not by much.

“It’s the wave,” Catherine said softly. “It’s coming.”

“At least we won’t have to swim far,” Trevor said. “I’ll go find Molly. She can get us the keys.” I noticed that Trevor was still holding Esther’s hand, and a pink blush had colored her cheeks. It was definitely disturbing to see him touching someone that looked surprisingly like me. “We’ll meet down at the shore. Or rather, where the shore used to be.”

I nodded, feeling a fresh wave of panic. Trevor stopped and pulled Esther close, whispering something in her ear, then let her go, disappearing into the crowd. Esther just stood there, blinking.

“How sweet,” Hennie breathed.

I grimaced. Not that I didn’t want Esther to be happy, but did it have to be with Trevor? I turned to Catherine, blocking the thought of the two of them together from my mind. “You’re telling me we can’t follow them because of the wave, but what would you do? Leave Cam out there to die?”

“Of course not,” she said. Her eyes sparkled with intensity, and her usually dour face was so animated she actually looked pretty. I had the sudden realization that for someone as isolated as Catherine, life must not have a lot of moments like this, where she was part of a group with everyone working together. Of course she’d created a lot of her own problems by being so difficult, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t feel a little sorry for her. Or be happy that, for once, she was truly part of the team.

“Just stop and think a minute before you rush out after him,” she continued. “They’re starting to call everyone together, and you’ve got a clone standing next to you, so we’d better split up. Esther and Hennie, you head for the back of the group. Dancia, come with me. I’ve got charts in my tent.”

Hennie and Esther and I gripped one another in a quick hug. I swallowed convulsively as it occurred to me that I might be saying good-bye to them for the last time.

Then I ran with Catherine to her tent, even as Mr. Judan and Mrs. Callias began herding a line of people into the woods away from shore. One injured girl rode piggyback on somebody’s shoulders. Another limped, with help on either side.

A distant voice yelled, “No one goes back to their tents!”

Catherine ignored it. She pushed aside the fabric opening and knelt on the tent floor, rummaging around under her sleeping bag and withdrawing a heavy plastic bag that held a number of charts. “Your best hope is to go like hell toward British Columbia. Head north and a few degrees west, and shoot between Flattop and Waldron islands. If they’re smart, they’ll do the same. And avoid the spring passage. The currents will be unusually strong from the receding water. Keep to the west side of Jones.”

I nodded gratefully. “Thanks, Catherine.”

She pushed me away. “Just make sure you come back. I don’t want to have to train another roommate.”

I exited the tent and crawled around the back, out of sight of the rest of the group. I heard Catherine’s voice receding in the distance as she called, “Dancia, is that you?”

She must have been talking to Esther. Praying that our plan would work, I darted out and headed for the beach.

The water looked so quiet and peaceful it was hard to believe a tsunami was forming. I waded out across the rocky bay toward our emergency motorboat. The radio back at camp continued to play that horrible sound—the emergency alert—and I cringed every time I heard it. I wondered what kind of panic was taking place on Lopez, where the land was pretty flat, and San Juan Island, where so many people lived near the beach. Surely they’d be okay. They had to be okay.

It couldn’t have been more than two minutes later that Trevor and Anna appeared. Anna didn’t look me in the eye. Her hair was a tangled mess, her gray T-shirt ripped at the hem. A dark streak ran across her arm. Blood, I assumed. Maybe Claire’s.

Trevor flashed the keys. “Ready?” he asked.

“I always wanted to swim in the Pacific,” I said.

Anna tore off her shoes and ran into the shallow water. Trevor and I flashed each other grim smiles and followed. The water was icy cold and sucked the breath from my lungs. I waded out until it reached my thighs, then swam awkwardly the rest of the way to the boat, holding the charts in one hand. We climbed on board, racked with shivers, panting as if we’d just run a mile. Trevor’s T-shirt clung to his impressive six-pack, while Anna’s slight form was outlined by her wet T-shirt. For once, I didn’t waste time being jealous of her figure; all I cared about was the steely determination in her doelike eyes. If I wanted anyone by my side during a fight, it would be Anna.

Trevor started the boat. It had a pointy front and a small deck in back, with room for three or four people. An open bay beside the steering wheel must have led into a cabin below the front deck. I held out the bag with the maps to Trevor. “Catherine suggested we stay on the west side and shoot north.”

“Sounds good,” Trevor grunted.

He went slow until we entered deeper water, then slammed the boat up to top speed. I sat down on a cushioned seat in back and watched the shore, shocked to see so much ground exposed. I imagined the water being pulled in like a slingshot. How in the world would we survive when it came shooting back into the inlet?

In the quiet that followed, I found my head spinning. Thaddeus’s kick to my stomach had left me badly bruised, and the sustained use of my talent had exhausted me to the core. I focused on my breathing and tried to collect my thoughts. I had to tell them. I had to tell everyone. But how? Who was going to be branded a traitor? The only evidence I had against him was Jack’s word, and the deep conviction that I was right.