Page 71 of Backpacking through Bedlam

“Really?” The question was asked with heartbreaking hesitance as the air shimmered in the chair, and Sarah appeared. No—that makes it sound like she became visible as she entered the room, the way it worked with Mary. She had been there all along. She just hadn’t been something we could see before that moment.

As always, she was skinny and pale, with long, dark hair and shockingly blue eyes, dressed in a sweater at least three sizes too large for her. It bunched around her waist, engulfed her hands, and generally threatened to swallow her completely. Her skirt was almost ankle-length, and she was wearing thick leggings underneath it. Compared to her, I was underdressed. Compared to her, Thomas was underdressed, and he had his sleeves buttoned to the wrist.

“You’ve really missed me, and you’re not mad?”

Sally jumped. “How the fu— Where did she come from?”

I smiled. “Sarah, meet your newest . . . I genuinely have no idea what her relation to you is, and we’re probably going to need a flowchart at this rate, but Thomas adopted her while he was lost in a murder dimension, and she’s going to be sticking around. Her name’s Sally. Sally, this is Sarah. She’s a cuckoo.”

“Hi,” said Sarah, hesitantly. She stood, swaying a little, her hands still covered by the sleeves of her sweater. I opened my arms in invitation, and managed not to stagger as she flung herself into them, clinging to me tightly—careful, I noticed, not to touch even a centimeter of my skin. That was interesting.

One thing Johrlac and cuckoos have in common: their powers work better when they’re making skin contact. Sarah had always been reluctant to touch people, but she’d never been this armored against the very possibility. It was like touching me was the worst thing she could imagine. Added to her ability to shield herself from me effectively while we were in the same room, it painted a slightly unnerving picture of her current situation.

“Sweetheart, are you all right?” I pushed Sarah out to arm’s length, looking at her carefully. She’d lost weight since the last time I’d seen her, and there were dark shadows around her eyes; she hadn’t been sleeping well. I frowned. “You need to eat something.”

“Can that wait until after we find the missing dragons?” she asked, a little anxiously.

“I think it may have to,” said Thomas. “Our hosts are very upset about the loss of their children, as well they should be. People who interfere with the young are the worst kind of predator, and if some of those taken were young males, they’re in extreme danger.”

“Verity already asked me to look for them,” said Sarah. “Unfortunately, the Covenant equips their field operatives with anti-telepathy charms, and I can’t track them. Wherever they’ve taken Cara and the children, it’s a shielded location.”

“Meaning you don’t even know whether they’re dead or alive,” I concluded. I glanced to Sally. “Telepathy has limitations. It can be blocked.”

“And every telepath has an effective range,” Sarah added. “I used to be able to scan an area of about five square miles if I wasn’t trying to look too closely and overwhelming myself. I can do more than that now, but I still can’t punch through strong charms. Thankfully. I know it’s selfish when there are kids in danger, but if I could push through charms, I’d never be able to sleep again.”

“You need to sleep in warded rooms?” asked Thomas.

Sarah nodded. “Or I just pick up on the dreams of everyone around me, and that’s not usually a good thing.”

“What’s your current range?” I asked.

Sarah glanced down at her feet and mumbled something. I frowned.

“I didn’t quite catch that. Try again?”

“I said, I can scan most of the tri-state area if I really try, and I’ve never picked up on a single Covenant agent.” She glanced up again. “We know they’re here, so they’re all protected.”

I didn’t want to ask her how she’d expanded her range to cover that kind of distance, not in the presence of two people who might be her family, but were also relative strangers. So instead, I blinked slowly, then nodded. “Got it. You can’t be much help, then.”

“Not yet,” she said. “I can keep my mind open in case they slip up now that they have the asshole dragon-slayer holy grail in their custody—they might get sloppy with their shielding, but it’s unlikely that’ll happen. It’s good to see you, Grandma. It’s nice to be near someone I can read who’s not freaking out.”

“I think my freaking-out days are mostly over,” I said, putting a hand on Thomas’s shoulder. “I found what I was looking for.”

“I always hoped you would,” she said gravely. Flicking her attention briefly to him, she added shyly, “Hi, Mr. Price. I know . . . I know you’re not related to the Healy side of the family by blood, but—”

“I should hope not,” said Thomas. “We’ve had several children, and that would be difficult to explain to them.”

“—I still can’t read you,” she finished. “Your thoughts are even fuzzier than Grandma’s. I know with her it’s because of who her ancestors were. Why is it like that with you?”

“I have anti-telepathy charms built into my tattoos,” he said. “They’re not as effective at close range as the removable kind, but they do well enough for situations like this one.”

“Oh,” said Sarah, looking oddly disappointed. She swiveled back around to me. “You should hurry and find the missing kids. The dragons are really upset. If you don’t find them soon, they’re liable to make you leave, no matter what they said just now, and they’ll make the rest of the family go, too. That would be bad.”

“Yes, it would,” I agreed, as she turned and walked out of the room without another word. I sighed, leaning against Thomas. “Okay, I guess it’s time for us to pull a miracle out of our asses.”

“Nothing new about that,” he said, and kissed the top of my head.

“No, I guess not,” I said.