Call Spirits in Your Past **Book Two**

Chapter 12 (Saturday)

Dryda woke with the sun. She stretched her toes to the bottom of the bed and couldn't even reach the bedposts. She opened her eyes and turned toward the faint yellow light spilling toward her. Like something tugged her, she crept to the window, wood and leaves unfurling. She frowned only slightly at the glass pane. Lots of houseplants did just fine, she reminded herself.

She tapped a smudge on the glass. Why didn't everyone always wake up near a window? Surely they'd all be happier that way.

"Dryda?" a voice mumbled behind her.

She spun around, startled. "Oh, Ana," she breathed in relief. "I...forgot you were in here."

Ana blinked slowly from the smaller bed near the wall. "Why are you up already?"

Dryda shrugged, hands fluttering to the sun outside. "The sun..."

Ana grumbled and rolled over. "It's bright."

Dryda bit her lip, glancing between her bed and the window. She shook her head and tiptoed to the door, slipping quietly outside.

***

Dryda listened to that part of her that knew what it was doing. She didn't know anything about this strange ghost town, except that the people who lived here had fed them and given them water and thrown a feast around a big campfire, near the wide tunnel--like a hole through a hillside--they'd walked through to enter the town.

All the buildings looked like ramshackle messes from the outside. When the curly-haired woman had shown her and Ana to their cottage, Dryda had frowned at the dusty door and broken window. But inside...she smiled. Ana's expression at the illusion had been something between a startled owl and a gaping fish. Especially when the woman had shown them the little box near the door that maintained it.

Dryda's feet creaked on the stairs of a rickety porch. She reached a woody hand through the house's illusion until she bumped against a smooth door. She knocked. She waited. Teremki stepped out, disturbing the illusion like rippling water.

"Hi," he said hesitantly. Then grimaced. "Talking's still so weird."

Dryda nodded, seating herself on the porch. Between the rain and the explosion and then...she shook her head. She wasn't sure when their connection had weakened, but none of them could speak telepathically anymore. Sometimes she caught...impressions from Teremki, but that was it.

"I don't think that's going to fade," Teremki said.

Dryda glanced up. "You understood that?" she asked.

He blushed slightly, and shrugged. "I pieced it together."

Teremki sat across from her, the desert ghost town silent around them.

"So...now what?" she retracted her leaves, her skin going smooth again.

"We're alive," Teremki shrugged. "We're here."

"Wherever here is."

"But we're not just going to stay here, right? I mean, the houses are nice, but..."

"What else do we do?"

"You said you got a letter," Teremki said slowly. "To another school."

"Verspri still has the folder. We could find those ones."

"But do what? The same thing as..." he trailed off.

Dryda cupped her hands in front of her. Her home, for two years. She didn't know if she'd ever had anywhere to call home before. "We tried," she whispered. "We did our best to help our school."