“He was F-7,” Arden said. “Forrester’s corridor.”
I looked at the number on my page, at the dash beside it where a name should be. Forty-Seven.
“He’s in the children’s room,” she said. “Sable has him. They’re calling him Sparrow, because he won’t pick a name for himself and they had to call him something.”
I nodded once.
“Anyone else?” I asked.
She recited them like an inventory of her own. Methodical. Complete.
Ruthie Hartwell, number One-Ninety-Three. Twelve years old when she went in, fourteen when she came out. She had braided strips of cloth from her mattress and kept them tied around her wrist because they were the only thing in the room that was hers.
A woman called Nell, number Eighty-Eight. No surname. She didn’t speak. Arden said it was trauma, but some said the scientists severed her vocal cords when they couldn’t stop her screaming.
Three children under the age of ten listed as numbers Thirty-One, Thirty-Two, and Thirty-Three. Brought in on the same truck. Different code: F-7. Separated on arrival. Two among the rescued. The third moved past the second set of doors eight months ago, the doors they didn’t bring people back from.
“That’s everyone I know,” Arden said. “There were more. The facility held over forty at any given time. I only know the ones who were there when I came in, the ones who came after, and the ones the older wolves told me about.”
I counted the names in my notebook. Nine entries. Five with names, four with only numbers. Two confirmed dead. One missing past the second doors. Six among those we recovered.
I closed the notebook and slid it into my jacket.
Arden nodded. Lachlan’s hand remained on her shoulder, steady and grounding. I stood and walked away, because I hadwhat I needed, and staying longer would have meant watching her sit with it.
I don’t have room for that.
A sound at the cabin door. I look up. Willow is passing on the path outside. She pauses, reading the open door as unusual, because it is. I keep my door closed. Always.
She sees me. Sees what I’m doing, the pack, the stripped room.
“Need something?” I ask.
“No. Just checking in.”
I don’t respond. She moves on. She doesn’t ask anything else.
I wait until her footsteps fade, then shoulder the pack and step outside.
I pass the children’s room on my way across the yard. The door is propped open—Sable’s new policy. No doors will ever be locked to these children again.
Inside, Mia is on her cot, sitting up with her knees drawn close, silent and watchful. She sees me in the doorway and holds my gaze.
She doesn’t speak. Hasn’t spoken since the facility. Maybe she can’t. Maybe she won’t.
But her eyes follow me, and after a moment she lifts a red rubber ball. She’s not offering it. Just showing me that it’s hers.
I give her a small smile and add a wink for good measure.
She doesn’t react, but she doesn’t look away either.
The rabbit shifts faintly in my pack when I turn, a small, soft weight that doesn’t belong to me.
It belonged to a child.
There’s no name attached to it. Just a code.
F-7.