You are in a cool place. You are in Alaska. It’s freezing. Cool air in your lungs… I saw Fang emerge from the steam, a dark figure carrying a large dog. Everyone else was across now, but I veered back over the river of lava to do one final sweep, make sure we had everything.…

My neck snapped sideways as a red-hot rock smacked into my head, and before I knew it I was careening down again toward the smoking, burping mouth of hell. I managed a strangled scream and then felt my whole body jerk as a hand yanked me upward.

“Gotcha.” Fang smirked at me with that crooked smile of his and held me in his arms. “What do you say we get outta here?” Even with the chaos swirling around us, my heart skipped a beat at that smile.

Our feet sank into the far bank just before the mudslide surged into the river. It sent lava shooting up hundreds of feet like a fizzy explosion of orange soda, but we were already out of its reach. And even though my feathers were smoking and my eyebrows were singed and I was gagging on ash, I was grinning as I ran.

We made it. We’ve all—

“Wait.” I skidded to a stop and turned around.

“What is it?” Fang asked, still tugging at my hand.

The hot air pressed in and sweat dripped down my face, but cold horror gripped my stomach like a fist.

“Where’s Dylan?”

3

HOURS LATER, THE swirling wind had turned into a pouring rainstorm. I squinted into the rain and billowing steam, scanning the horizon, searching for the silhouette of a kid with a fifteen-foot wingspan.

I began pacing back and forth across the rocky ledge on the northern side of the island, which was our go-to meeting place. All I saw was the volcano in the distance, still belching its plume of black smoke into the sky.

Just three months ago, this island had been a tropical paradise, a safe haven for dozens of mutant kids like us. That was before some kind of huge meteor had crashed into Earth and killed most everyone on it, as far as we knew. Then the resulting tsunamis arrived to flood our paradise, including the underground caves where the dwellings were.

Where my mom and half sister were.

We’d tried to leave, but the meteor’s impact had devastated everything within immediate flying distance. The neighboring islands? As black and crispy as toasted marshmallows. And part of me couldn’t just leave without some hope that my mom and Ella had somehow survived the floods. But now, with this erupting volcano as a strong motivator, we had to go whether I wanted to or not.

Dylan’s coming. He’s on his way. He’s fine.