Agnes thought of Glen. Of his shrug and his twisted leg and of how he had been protecting them even then. She shook her head. “Don’t,” she said.

Jake, angry and ashamed, untangled himself quickly and threw Carl’s leg down. He couldn’t look up at the faces around him. He just ran toward the woods, yelling, “Agnes, come on!”

Now Agnes saw that some people had already run. Linda and Dolores and Joven were pulling whatever gear they could and running full-armed into the wooded slopes. Celeste was pulling Patty toward the woods, Patty blubbering, her arm reaching toward her mother and father, while her legs were fleeing with Celeste. Helen and Frank and Patty’s mom screamed for their daughters, but they did not follow. Once the Twins’ bags were slung over their shoulders, the girls never looked back. Debra had slipped out with Pinecone, but Sister and Brother were cowering behind Juan, who was standing shocked behind Bea. Val and Baby Egret were calmly walking away, not fearful or panicked. Egret was cradled sideways, nursing, and Val wouldn’t want to jostle him.

Agnes knew she too was moving, but she couldn’t feel it. She felt stuck, immobile. Her silent mother looked stuck too, her face morphing like storm skies while Carl rolled around on the ground behind her, perhaps already damaged beyond repair. Her mother stood offering empty palms, her shoulders at once tense and slumped, like the curve of a boulder. Agnes watched her mouth twitching, as though wishing to open and scream Ranger too so that Agnes would be captured. She watched her mother’s hand twitch, and Agnes imagined it reaching out to keep her there, or, maybe, just say goodbye. Agnes took a tentative step backwards, watching all this emotion inside her mother that she would not release. Few members of the Community remained. The people who chose to run had run.

The ones who remained, Agnes saw herself in their eyes. She was too wild, something uncontrollable and wholly selfish, and while that had served them well in the past, now her survival instinct seemed to disgust them. She looked again at her mother, and felt a longing that almost knocked her down, to be curled up with her, not under skins around the fire, not with her hand clamped around her mother’s cold ankle. She wished to be curled up in her mother’s lap in her own small bed, or in her mother’s bigger bed, on the sofa by the window, peering out any window at the white sky, living their life in that City apartment because they had never known life anywhere else. If she’d never come here, if she’d known nothing else, couldn’t she be happy with what they’d had?

“Mom,” Agnes said, taking another step back.

Her mother’s mouth settled in a hard thin line, and she stepped urgently toward Agnes, reaching.

Agnes ran.

? ? ?

Agnes came to a clear outcrop and looked down at the land below, angry, bewildered, and terrified that she had lost contact with everyone. Where had Jake gone? Dolores and her mother and brother? The Twins? Val and Baby Egret? How could everything have changed so suddenly? The tangled cinder cone forest hugged the Caldera like a parasite. And beyond she saw a set of lights traveling across the desert toward the Caldera. A vehicle. A large one. Then a hand slipped over her mouth.

“Don’t let them hear you,” her mother hissed in her ear. Agnes felt a flush of relief until her mother dragged her into the trees.

Agnes tried to dig in her heels. “Mom,” she hissed.

“Don’t speak.”

“Mom,” Agnes screamed, and her mother stopped in shock.

“Are you trying to get caught?”

“Where are we going?” Agnes hissed.

“We have to get to the eastern foot of the Caldera.”

“Why?” Agnes’s voice shook. She was disoriented and enraged by her mother’s hand shackled around her arm.

“We are meeting Bob.”

“No way. I’m not going to a Ranger.”

“We have to. It’s all planned.”

“What do you mean, it’s all planned?”

“Getting to the Private Lands. We were trying to get dropped close to the border before we made a run, but thanks to you, now we’ll have to stow away in some truck. Make the long trek from here. It certainly won’t be pleasant. But I don’t think we’ll get caught.”

“What are you talking about?”

“My plan!” Her mother made fists and looked wild. “The plan I had with Bob. He was going to take us to the border and get us across and to the Private Lands.” She scowled. “Don’t look at me like that. It was a good plan, Agnes.”

“And that’s why we’re at the Caldera? To meet with Bob?”

“Yes, so he could have a reason to bring us to the border quickly.”

“But why?”

“Because they were going to send us back to the City!”

“So there are no Trespassers to find?”

Bea’s eyes grew wide. “Oh, I didn’t say that. There are Trespassers here. The ones Adam told us about. The Mavericks. We don’t see them, but they see us.”

“So Adam wasn’t a part of this?”

“Oh no, Adam was a surprise. But a helpful one.”

“Did you tell Bob about Adam?”

“I had to.”

“But how? We haven’t been to Post in years.”

“We leave notes for each other.”

“Where?”

“In trees,” her mother muttered.

The grass lake. Agnes remembered her mother tucking something into a tree’s trunk. It had been for Bob. “For how long?”

“Since I came back. We’ve been communicating since then.” Her mother looked ashamed, unveiled. Her mother seemed unfathomably complicated and mysterious again. Briefly. Then she looked terrified.

“Why would he do something so risky for us?”

“Because we’re friends.”

“Mom.”

“He wants to be there too. It’s not just the study. The whole Wilderness State is ending. He needs somewhere to go.”

“So he’d come with us?”

“There’s nowhere else to go,” her mother said impatiently.

“Isn’t he married?”

“When did you become so old-fashioned?” her mother snapped.

“Is he married?”

“No,” she snapped. “Not anymore. And not that it matters.” Her mother blushed. “This plan is a good plan. A solid plan. You need to come with me.”

“Now?”

“Now!”

Agnes saw that what people had taken for strength and leadership in her mother might just have been desperation, a manic instinct to survive. She didn’t know if there was a difference. Shouldn’t there be?

“I’m not going.”

“Agnes. You’ll get found. You’ll get sent back. Or worse.”

“I’m staying here.”

“For what? With who? Everyone is scattered.”

“We can find them like you found me.” Agnes made the call to regroup. Her mother again clamped her hand over her mouth.

“I didn’t find you, Agnes. I tracked you. Easily, I’ll add. And so will the Rangers.”

Panicked, Agnes flipped through some thoughts. “But the Private Lands aren’t even real.”

“Of course they’re real.”

“How do you know?”

“Bob told me.”

“How does he know?”

“He’s been there!”

“He said that?”

“Well, he knows people who have been. Shit, I don’t know, Agnes. I just know we need to go.” Her voice was hushed hysteria.

Agnes ground her teeth. Of all the absurd plans. How could Agnes know something so clearly while her mother believed the opposite wholeheartedly? She tried to keep her voice measured. “I know you’re trying to protect me, but the City is right where we’ll end up if we go to him. They need us as bait. There’s no other reward for us other than this place right here. The Private Lands are not real. He’s lying to you.”

“He wouldn’t,” her mother said, and it was such a simple belief. It was the only thing to believe in. She’d probably believed in it for a long time. She’d probably been leaving notes in the trees for years, planning for the time when she would have to find another way to save Agnes, herself. She probably thought she had no other choice.

Agnes heard a call. She waited, listening. She heard it again. “See, there’s one of our own. We need to regroup.”

“No way,” her mother said and grabbed her again. And again Agnes wrenched away.

“I’m not going,” Agnes screamed. “This is my home.”

“Stop!” Her mother shook her by the shoulders desperately. “This is no one’s home.” She looked exasperated, as though Agnes didn’t understand something very simple about the world. “You can’t hide forever.”

Agnes shook her mother off. Tears sprang. Of course she could hide forever, she thought indignantly. She knew this land better than they did. She would not get caught. She was offended her mother thought otherwise.

“Why would I go anywhere with you? You left me.”

“This again?” her mother roared in frustration. “Why can’t you look at all the other times I was here? Why is our whole relationship that?”

“Because you left me alone.”

“You weren’t alone.”

“You left me in the Wilderness.”

“You LOVE the Wilderness.”

“Because mothers don’t do that.”

“Well, this mother did.” Her mother choked on her words they came out so fast. “How are you going to deal with that? This mother loves you. And this mother left. And this mother came back. And this mother will never be forgiven for it.”

“That’s right.”