Did he?

Aaron looked up at the general. “All right,” he said, his words like ice.

Liam sat up straight. “But, High Priest—” he began.

Aaron held up a hand to the governor, shushing him. “Please,” he said with disdain.

Liam was silent.

“I’ll order it done,” Aaron said. “First thing in the morning, the stretch of wall nearest Artimé will come down.”

“That’s not good enough,” General Blair said. “We need the entire wall removed. All of it.”

Aaron scowled. “Why the entire wall, if the problem was in the area around Artimé?”

“Because,” General Blair explained with an air of annoyance, “think about it. If the wall stays up around part of Quill, the Artiméans can fan out around the perimeter of the island, behind it. They can use the wall as a bunker. They’d be able to hide behind the two ends of the wall and set up sneak attacks. And with their quick method of warfare, they’ll take us down every time. Our Quillitary fights better in the open. So it’s all or nothing, High Priest.” He leaned toward Aaron. “And if it’s nothing, then you may leave now, and good luck making it to adulthood.”

Aaron studied the general’s stony face. His lungs felt like they were squeezing all of the air out of him, and his heartbeat pounded in his eardrums. The entire wall? Under the table, Aaron gripped his kneecaps until his fingers were numb. “What about outside enemies?” The words came out almost in a whisper.

The general laughed. “Do you really think we have any? We haven’t been attacked in over fifty years. Anyone that Justine was guarding against fifty years ago is dead or extremely old by now. Whether the wall is partially standing or completely removed, enemies would get to us eventually anyway.” He coughed and cleared his throat. “But in the end, I’m simply not concerned about it. We have only one enemy, and it’s encroaching on our island already. Stop looking beyond it for more when the most offensive one is practically upon us! Let’s do the job and take them out. This is really simple, High Priest.” He rolled his eyes.

Something about what the general said made Aaron feel even more unsure. But he was stuck. He needed the Quillitary. “Fine,” he said with a small squeak in his voice. “We’ll take down the entire wall.”

General Blair didn’t give Aaron the satisfaction of witnessing his surprise—he hadn’t been expecting Aaron to go along with him. Instead he nodded stiffly. “Very well. I’ll send my troops to assist your Necessaries in tearing it down. We’ll make quick work of it.”

“We’d better,” Aaron said in a voice as calm as he could command. But his heart filled with more fear than he had ever known.

Island of Shipwrecks

Of the three, Alex flew the farthest. Experience had taught him to suck in a deep breath before he hit the water. Florence and Spike narrowly avoided crashing into one another, and all fortunately managed to miss the jutting rocks.

The water was cold and rough. Alex struggled against the weight of it, pushing toward the surface as soon as his downward momentum slowed. His thighs and lungs burned as he fought against the current, and then moved with it. Eventually, because of the darkness, and because he was unsure if he was swimming toward the surface or away from it, he stopped struggling to see if he would naturally right himself.

It wasn’t long before he felt a nudge, and soon Spike was solidly below Alex, pushing him upward. Alex grabbed on to the whale’s spike and hung on for the ride. They burst through the waves with a small jump, Alex hanging on tightly.

“Hello, the Alex. I am sorry about the jumping,” the whale managed to say before they were plunging back underwater. Alex accidentally inhaled water and choked. A moment later the whale took another jump and said, “This jumping is the only way for me to get to the island because of the current.”

Spike waited for Alex to cough the water out of his lungs. As soon as Alex could manage to eke out “Okay, go,” Spike obliged, and down they went again. Alex learned quickly to grab a breath of air the next time they surfaced, and as he figured out the whale’s pattern, he actually thought he might enjoy the ride if he weren’t so worried about the rest of his crew.

As they traveled through the water, more Artiméans found themselves sliding onto the whale’s back, for every time Spike saw someone struggling in the current, she swam under them and vaulted them to safety. By the time they reached shallow water, the whale had collected Fox, Sky, and Samheed in addition to Alex. As soon as they neared land, the load of passengers jumped off Spike’s back and staggered through the roiling water, and Spike went out again to rescue anyone else she could find.

The group waded to shore, guided by near-constant lightning. Alex could see the outlines of several shipwrecks on the rocks. And no wonder, the way the storm seemed to stay centered over this island. But right now Alex wasn’t looking for shipwrecks, he was looking for people, creatures, and statues. And he was hoping that daylight would come soon, and the storm would end.

“Lani!” he called, and Samheed chimed in.

“Over here!” she said. “There’s an overhang.”

Alex and the others headed toward Lani’s voice, and soon they saw her cast a highlighter spell, keeping its light low so as not to blind anyone. With her under a small, stone overhang they found Captain Ahab and Copper, delivered safely by the squirrelicorns, who had now gone out once more to search for others.