"Yes. She's doing well at the moment. Your father and sister are, too."
Cordero says this with a trace of warmth but it smacks of professional training.
"What does that mean, they're 'well'?" I ask. Does she know about Mom's depression? Does this mean Mom isn't having an episode right now?
Natalie Cordero taps her manicured fingers on the leg of her slacks as she gives me an assessing look. I know exactly what she's thinking.
Can she handle this?
"It means that, by my standards at least, they're all relatively content. Your sister is in her second year at Yale, but she goes home most weekends to see your parents. Your mother is training for a marathon and she's planted bulbs for the year. Twice, it seems. Your father is working long hours, which seems typical. Four weeks ago at a fund-raiser, he bid on a puppy and won. Apparently it likes to dig and is quite good at it. They're installing a dog run, well away from your mother's flower beds." Her eyes sharpen on me. "Perhaps I shouldn't have-"
"I wanted to know. I asked." I look out the window. My God, I miss them. I've missed so much. Josie is a sophomore. Mom is training for a marathon? She always hated running. She never understood how I loved it. And a dog? They never let Josie and me have one. Why now? Do they even want it? I try to picture muddy paw prints on our rugs and can't do it. "What did they name the puppy?"
"Chief. He's a rescue. The breed is unknown but the veterinarian believes he's a blue heeler –boxer mix."
"Helluva mix," Low mutters.
"Right?" says Maia.
I'm not sure what they mean but I don't ask. I feel turned inside out. Everything sacred and secret about me is viewable and open for discussion. And the things that I should know are all mysteries. Only Isabel understands. She clings to my hand, giving me roots, connecting me to something. I would float away without her.
Cordero steers the conversation away from my family, asking me to clarify some of the things I told her yesterday. I don't want to tell her any more than I already have. She's prying into every little part of my life. But I make myself do it.
In the sparkling blue-sky morning my answers sound unbelievable. "I felt this extreme emptiness looking into its eyes," I hear myself answer. "I don't know-it looked harrowing. That's why I called it that. And yes, the flowers rose like a wave over her and she disappeared." It sounds absurd and cringeworthy. I'm so self-conscious about it that I only notice where we've arrived as we're pulling up.
"Here?" I ask. "The site of the battle against the Kindred?"
"To start." Cordero shuts the yellow pad where she's been jotting notes on my replies and slips it into her bag. Up ahead, a tall cyclone gate on wheels is set into a grove of trees. A man in cargos and a black sweatshirt pulls it open and we drive through.
I've wondered about this place-twice daily, since I drive right by it going to and from work. The fence went up right after the battle and there's always someone in a car parked in the trees just inside, day and night. The rumor I heard was that there's a complicated lawsuit going on between the landowner and the US government, but I'm pretty sure they're one and the same. And that the "lawsuit" is really just a decoy.
Less than a quarter mile in, the trees thin and the landscape changes. The grass is withered and dry, and the trees look brittle, like the area has been affected by drought. Then it's like we've driven onto the surface of the moon. The closer we get to the place where I opened the portal, the more extreme the desolation.
Low drives right to the spot where I stood when Bastian was stung by Ronwae, the Kindred that could transform into heinous scorpion-like creatures. My heart begins to thump a quick beat in my chest.
We get out of the car without a word. The earth here is a husk. No trace of blade or bug. Even the dirt is ashen, leached of every nutrient. There were a series of cabins in a horseshoe arrangement around this field once-they're still here but they're mere piles of timbers. Shipwrecks.
"This is the epicenter," says Cordero. "The damage began here about twelve hours after the portal was opened. It spread for approximately two weeks and it's been slowly restoring since then. Believe it or not, what you see today is a vast improvement over a few months ago.
"I call this a signature-a unique mark left by the opening of the portal. I believe the energy from that realm bled through when it was open and left its mark here." She looks at me. "The same thing is happening at yesterday's location. I have the team working on containment there now."