“Really?” I said, turning away from the ocean to look at her. I was going to get my wish and enter this new program alone? I waited to feel the rush of relief, but it didn’t come. Instead, a knot of anxiety tightened in my stomach. Faced with all this brand-new territory, I wanted nothing more than my mom at my side, and if I didn’t care so much about Elliot thinking I was a baby, I would have said as much. But as it was, I just nodded and squeezed a little tighter when she wrapped her arms around me for one last hug.

“You’ll be fine,” she whispered in my ear. “More than fine. You’ll be great. You’re my girl, after all.”

I nodded again and bit my lip.

“Good morning,” said Callaway. “How are my newest recruits?”

“Surprised,” I said.

He chuckled. “I was too the first time I left the Academy, but you’ll love the mountain. So if you’ve said your goodbyes, it’s time for us to be off.” We nodded and followed him onto the dock. The wind whipped off the water and almost took my breath away as it brought with it the salty smells of the sea. I looked back at the Academy walls, feeling like a turtle suddenly deprived of its shell. Resigned, I stepped onto a real boat for the first time in my life.

Chapter Seventeen

Elliot

The Academy was all that I knew. All I’d ever known, and now it wasn’t much more than a spot on the horizon.

“Do you see it!” called Callaway over the roaring of the wind. Regan and I turned to see the small speck of brown in the distance that was getting larger by the minute. “It’s much smaller than the Academy,” Callaway said. “But that makes it easier to secure and hide.”

Five minutes later we were coasting up to a small dock on an island that was almost completely taken up by a large craggy mountain. Where the Academy had the polished and manicured look of a college campus, this looked every inch the uninhabited wilderness.

“Where’s the wall?” Regan asked, and I turned to her in surprise. Why in the world hadn’t that been my first question? Where was the wall?

“We don’t need a wall,” Callaway said, coming to stand next to us.

“I don’t understand,” Regan said. “Mom said the security here was just as good as at the Academy. How do you not need a wall?”

“Because we have a mountain,” Callaway said.

“I’d still like a wall,” I said under my breath, glancing around at the vast ocean surrounding us on all sides.

Callaway chuckled and motioned with his hand for us to follow him as he climbed out of the boat and onto the rock-covered shore. Regan followed, looking just as leery about all this as I felt.