Miig acknowledged their guests with a tilt of his chin. “Come in, join us.”

“Miig, sorry, brother. We wanted to bring some people who just arrived to meet you, Wab especially. Is that okay?”

“Yes, yes, of course.” Wab sat up a little straighter. Chi Boy eyed them with suspicion.

Clarence waved two newcomers forward and introduced them. They were nurses. Theo was from Boston and had been working in the schools for the past year. Rania came from Pakistan before the closures had begun of the North American borders and had been transferred from a Toronto senior care facility to the schools shortly thereafter.

“I didn’t know what was happening—none of us knew. We just thought, hey, here’s an opportunity to keep working in health care when so many others have lost their jobs, you know?” Theo explained.

“I stayed on once I saw what was going down.” Rania looked tired, the kind of tired that takes years to build. “I figured I could help, first just by being kind inside, and now by organizing the network to get people out.” She sighed, passing a hand through her short hair. “There’s not enough kindness in the world to make what’s going on better. We need to do more. We’re trying.”

Clarence put a hand on her shoulder. “We know. We see what you’re doing, and it’s working.”

“I’m proof of that,” Isaac said. “You’re the only hope any of us has while we’re in there. The network is the reason I’m out, the reason I’m alive.”

A single tear escaped down her cheek, and she wiped it with the back of her hand. “Thank you. It means a lot.”

“We brought Theo and Rania to you because they have some information that directly affects your family,” Bullet explained. “It concerns those who are with child.”

Chi Boy instinctively put his arm around Wab’s waist. Even though she hated public affection, especially in front of newcomers, when it was important to look tough, it was clear his concern went beyond her and to their shared child. She allowed him that.

“Right.” Rania took a deep breath. “Things are changing. The schools are changing. And we need to get you out of reach.”

“How far out of reach?” Tree asked, driven to uncharacteristic questions by a new urgency in the air. “We’re pretty safe here.”

“As far as we can get,” she answered. “Over the border.”

“Into the States?” Zheegwon reached for the hat Tree was already pulling off his head, a gesture that revealed their unease. The twins shared the hat like a teddy bear when they were nervous. “We’re already talking about going farther into the bush. Maybe to the north.”

“Yes, into the States. The government is still enforcing the no-harvesting law there, and they’re making headway into synthetic dream cures. There’s an opportunity to get across before the real danger hits too close, but we’d have to leave pretty much now.”

“Besides,” Theo added, “the north is going to be crowded soon. There’s new construction planned—big construction, covering acres at a time, like farmland.”