As I gave Angel a quick good-bye hug, I noticed that a thick branch connected my home to another tree house. I shimmied across it, wondering which member of the flock’s butt I’d have to kick in the mornings, weighing the pros and cons of waking up to Nudge’s sugary pop music versus being downwind of Gazzy’s infamous morning emissions.
Instead, the bold, black letters staring back at me from the wooden plaque on the door caused a helpless little squeak to come out of my mouth: DYLAN.
Does. Not. Compute.
That name on the door was like a hard fist to my stomach, and I felt all the stuff I’d been so good at swallowing come back up: Anger that he’d almost killed Fang in front of all of us. Hurt and confusion over his complete freak-out. Shame for all the stupid, fluttery feelings I’d felt when he looked at me with those ocean eyes of his. Clearly he was not my perfect other half. Everything came spewing out like some sort of emotional vomit.
Romantic, huh?
And because the universe just loves to screw with my emotions, I felt a hand on my shoulder right then, and I nearly jumped out of my skin. Was he…?
“Don’t worry, Max,” my mom said, striding past me.
I exhaled. The ladder—I’d left it down.
With one hard wrench, she pried the nameplate off the door and tossed it out of the tree like yesterday’s garbage. “That sign will be replaced.” Mom sighed.
“Uhhh,” I groaned, totally incapable of any other response. I clenched my jaw and concentrated on pushing every stupid thought of Dylan back down again.
“Fang! Up here! Come see your house,” Mom called from the balcony. She looked back at me with… what? Pity? “I’m sorry, honey,” she said, giving my arm a squeeze. “He wasn’t… expected.”
76
“THERE’S SOMETHING ELSE you need to know,” my mom said when we all met up again, and Fang’s eyes flicked to mine.
Was it all too good to be true?
“What?” I asked uneasily.
“Let me show you,” she said, and then she called the rest of the flock to join her.
After a short, brisk hike through the jungle, during which my anxiety steadily grew, the flock finally emerged to face the spectacular cliffs we’d seen from our houses. My heart leaped. I couldn’t wait to dive over the edge and weave through all those crazy crevices, the wind surging through my feathers.
But before I could take off, my mom put two fingers to her mouth and let out a crisp, high-pitched whistle. A signal. The flock looked around, confused. The place seemed abandoned.
Then slowly, tentatively, people started emerging from the surrounding trees and from fractures in the rocks. I remembered what Angel had said about my mom earlier, that she was a traitor, and had a moment of panic. Hostiles?
I immediately took a defensive stance and the flock followed suit, ready to attack, but then I realized something.
“There aren’t any adults,” I said, relaxing. “It’s all kids.”
Their expressions were serene, welcoming, and as they came closer I saw scales, tails, metal arms.
“They’re mutants!” Gazzy squeezed Iggy’s arm.
“Yes,” my mother answered. “All enhanced kids. Just like you.”
As if to punctuate her words, a girl who looked about eight years old unfurled a pair of speckled black and gray wings, laughing to her friends. They all soared upward ten, twenty, thirty feet.
“Just like us,” Nudge whispered, echoing my mom.
Even Fang was grinning. It was impossible not to. After so many years of being experimented on, of doing what everyone else wanted us to do, of running, running, running, we were finally in a place where we belonged.
“Max,” Mom said, and I followed her gaze to the jungle behind us.
There, with a ginormous grin on her face, was my half sister.
“Ella!” I squealed as she barreled into me for a bear hug. I hadn’t seen her since our mom had her rescued and squirreled away from the 99% cult, who almost had her brainwashe