For the first time, she hadn't referred to me as a grub. And I vowed at that moment never again to call her people pinchworms.
I took her hand in mine. "It can't be you and me against each other anymore. It must be you and me against the Scourge." Or against the wardens and Governor Felling, who I was beginning to think were the far greater dangers here.
She squeezed back, as well as she could. "Agreed."
After a sideways glance at Weevil, I said, "You shouldn't stay in the old prison anymore. Come with us, Della. There's another place we can sleep tonight."
She shook her head. "My father will come for me in the old prison."
"He's not coming. I know he wants to, but they won't let him come."
Her mouth pinched together. Then she said, "If your father knew where you were, how far would he go to get you out of trouble?"
Tears welled in my eyes to think of him. "He'd split the earth to save me," I said. "If he knew."
"That's what my father is doing too," Della said. "He does know where I am. I'll wait in the prisons until he comes."
She lumbered away. Weevil took my arm and nudged me along with him. "We'll see her tomorrow, but for now, we should go," he said. "No one's watching." And we slipped away.
Our plan for finding the caves wasn't particularly complex: go north. Eventually we'd find the caves or hit seawater. But no matter what we found, we were both firm that we would not stay in the prison. Aside from the fact that it was utterly depressing, I had a feeling that avoiding the infirmary required us to avoid the prison too.
The infirmary. That's where Della was headed soon, and nothing I could do would stop it. Maybe if I got back inside the wardens' barracks and searched the rest of the trunks. Maybe all the medicines were kept in one trunk and I hadn't found it yet.
Weevil seemed to be thinking the same thing, only in a far less dangerous way. "As I was searching for their herbs today, I tried to figure out which one was the most important for making their medicine, and I think I know which it is. It's the one ingredient I hadn't heard of before, spindlewill."
I wrinkled my nose. "We don't have spindlewill in the river country, at least not by that name."
"It probably can't grow in the higher lands. But if I could find some and sneak some away, we might be able to offer it to Della. Maybe in a more concentrated tea, the medicine would help her. We could make our own medicine."
"We don't know anything about spindlewill."
"No, but the wardens were very insistent on how much we needed to find it. If they do have a stronger medicine, I'm guessing it involves spindlewill."
"I'm sure another medicine exists. When we were together in the physician's office, Della's father accused Governor Felling of giving that medicine to her favorites. And Sir Willoughby tried to take the governor's job in the last election, so let's assume his family is not amongst her favorites. By withholding that medicine from Della, the governor is punishing her father."
Weevil grunted. "Get better, Ani. Get better and we'll take this fight right to the governor's front door."
I pretended to be shocked. "Ever since coming here, I've done everything I can to stay out of trouble. Are you trying to corrupt me now?"
Since he had accused me of the same thing only yesterday, he seemed to enjoy the retort. "Every chance I get."
My hope was that once we reached the north shore, it would become obvious where the caves should be, but the reality was just the opposite. From where we stood, nothing could be seen except for sea, the shore, and the sharp rocks beneath our boots. Certainly there were no signs of a place where people could live, hidden from the eyes of the wardens. Everything was rocky here and I guessed the cave entrance was where the waves crashed, but guessing wrong could get us carried out with the tide. The shoreline was wider than expected, and the caves could just as easily be anywhere along this northern coast. It was already getting dark, and the evening breeze was picking up. I didn't like the idea of being out here overnight. Except for the caves, there was nowhere here to take shelter.
Weevil touched my arm. "How are you feeling?"
"I'm all right." His brows pressed together but I nodded. "Really, Weevil, I feel good." Maybe it was only my growing hope to leave this Colony one day, but I hadn't felt this good since leaving the river country.
Then, from the corner of my eye, I saw movement to my left. It was quick, and my eyes might have been deceiving me, but I could have sworn I saw a head poke up from the rocks, right at the beach.
I pointed it out to Weevil, and we went in that direction, crawling over the wind-carved rocks to get to the beach.
When we were nearly there, Weevil pointed to a wisp of smoke drifting out to sea. It was very windy now, with competing currents coming inland and then out again. But the breeze carrying the smoke was our clue.
We followed the smoke to an overlook with the beach a long way below us. Weevil lay on the rock and dipped his head down, then raised it again with a smile. "It's here," he mouthed, pointing right below us.
Looking around, I saw a ladder made of uneven sticks lashed together with beach grasses. We climbed down the ladder and stood at the entrance of a cave. The entrance to our new home, if they would have us.
"Marjorie!" I called inside. "Is Marjorie here? She invited us to come."