The Wandering (The Lux Guardians, #2) by Saruuh Kelsey Page A

the same creature.
I rest my forehead against Dal’s shoulder and decide that enough is
enough. We have all hurt too much, grieved too much. I tighten my
grip. I refuse to let anything else hurt my family.
     
    ***
     
    Miya
     
    22:42. 14.10.2040. The
Free Lands, Northlands.
     
     
    The building we’re
sleeping in tonight is a million miles from both the ship and the
green house in Harwich. The grey brick of it rises into the dark
clouds, decorative metalwork running up the side in an attempt to
cover up the fact that it’s a great eyesore. If the green house was
neat and pretty, this place is a clumsy mess.
    My
legs barely carry me into the lobby, tired feet slapping on white
floor tiles. The walls are painted white to match them. The
Guardians ought to love this place—aside from the odd flash of
purple and the beige of a wooden counter, it’s as blank as their
base was. A purple sign hanging crookedly from the wall over the
counter reads Premr Inn . Some of the letters must have fallen off because there are
irregular gaps between them. Like everything else in the diseased
lands, this building is only half of what it once was.
    Before we came in some
guy in a dress assigned us all to a room and explained that
although the furniture may be upside down and the rooms untidy, the
beds should still be useable. The building itself seems to
agree—the basic shape of it stands as it must have when it was a
hotel, but the top floors have slipped off and crumpled on the
ground. It’s the same with most of the tall buildings we see. Solar
flares, I guess, melted them right off.
    We traipse through the
entryway, following slumped Guardians up a staircase that smells of
dust and damp.
    Olive trips over her
feet, exhaustion beginning to get to her. I pick her up by her
scrawny arms and balance her on my hip, ignoring every one of her
complaints and insults. It surprises me how much she’s changed
since I left. Thomas is the same excitable, loving brother as he
always was, but Livy has changed. She’s become harsher, lost the
innocent softness she used to have. Her vocabulary has expanded to
twice its size, filled with curses and insults and God knows what
else. She’s had to grow up far too soon because of me, because I
left them behind with nobody but mum to care for them.
    Olive will have had to pick up my jobs—Thomas was always too
sensitive to survive in the world outside our front door, and mum
would do nothing but drink and throw things at the wall for sport.
Livy will have had to work, collect the family’s credits, and brave
the intimidating sight of Camberwell Zone on allocation day. I try
to picture her there, surrounded by people older and more dangerous
than her, but I have to force the image out of my head before it
can form. Anything could have happened to her. Anything might have happened to
her. No wonder she’s changed—she had to change to survive, just
like I did.
    She is so much like
me, it’s scary.
    Her head bumps against
my shoulder as I haul myself up yet another flight of stairs and I
realise she’s fallen asleep. Good. At least in her dreams she
doesn’t have to build walls around herself for safety.
    “Leah,” she murmurs in
her sleep and my heart jumps into my throat. It’s been years since
I’ve heard that name spoken aloud. I have a vague memory of Tom and
Livy saying it over and over after Yosiah jumped from the train but
my mind was too hazy to absorb it. Now I’m alert and the name cuts
right through me. It drags a shudder down my spine, terror through
my chest. Memories come in sharp, unwanted flashes—my mother
screaming my name, throwing a plate at my head; Thomas waking from
a nightmare and crying out for me; Officials in dark uniforms
framing a red haired man.
    “You give us
information or you die, Leah.”
    With a burst of new
energy, I scurry up the stairs until I’m level with Yosiah,
shifting Olive so my left hand is free to grab Yosiah’s wrist. I
squeeze him so hard