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We get the first set of data: They’re co to the numbers, fifty-seven of the hundred can now track hty-three patients total exhibit soht, then better color, increased heart rate, and breathing that co as it took Ky to exhibit these initial i

"Seventeen aren’t responding at all," the head er than we previously thought There "

"Keep trying to get them back," I say "Give them the full two days of medication"

The medic nods I pick up the miniport and relay the information to the Pilot "What do you think?" he asks er," I say "I’ve trained the others here to make the cure They can oversee their own labs in other Cities if we set theured out how to synthesize it yet Do you have enough bulbs?"

"We’ve found enough to begin," he says "We need ," I say "Time matters"

"What do you think we should we do first?" he asks "Send it out to the other Cities now, or start here and then work outward?"

"I don’t know," I say "Ask Cassia She can sort it out best I’ back to the medical center to see the patients for myself"

"Good," the Pilot says

I walk over to the medical center There’s another patient I need to see whose data wasn’t included in the initial report They haven’t been tracking her because they don’t know about her The other medics nod to lad

The painting above her is the sa Lei stares up at the water, and I set out before her eyes htest bit and focus on me

She’s here

She sees me

CHAPTER 56

CASSIA

Don’t ask your ht away," Xander told me "Give her a little time I know everyone says we don’t have any tiot to be careful"

So I take his advice I ask her no questions, I a her we love her And the cure works on lad that I am here, and to see Bram, but she is in and out, a different return than Ky’s She was longer gone

But she is strong After a few days, she speaks, her voice a whisper, a little seed "You’re both all right," she says, and Bram puts his head down next to her on the bed and closes his eyes

"Yes," I say

"We sent soet it?" She looks at the e her line, and I can tell that she doesn’t want to speak too openly in front of him And she doesn’t mention my father Is she afraid to ask because she doesn’t want to know?

"It’s all right," I tell her "We can talk here And I did get it Thank you for sending theto rush her, but the tio lily, isn’t it?"

She smiles "Yes," she says "You re in the wild," I say "They’re as beautiful as you said they would be"

She is holding on tight to this talk of flowers, as I did before, when I was afraid and alone If you sing and speak of bloo winter-still, you don’t have to think about things that don’t

"You were in Sonoma?" she asks "When?"

"I wasn’t there," I say "I saw it growing someplace else Was it in Sonoma that you saw the flowers?"

"Yes," she says, no hesitation, no uncertainty "In Sonoma’s Farmlands, just outside of a small city called Vale"

I look back at the medic and he nods to me before he slips out of the room to relay the information The crop was in Sonoma My mother remembered

There is so lad you’re back," I say, and I put ether without him

"Do you still have the ain?"

"Yes," I say I pull my chair closer to the bed and hold up the datapod so that she can see the screen

There they are again, the pictures: Grandfather with his parents, with , as is customary, Samuel Reyesfamily members," the historian says

"The one he chose of his daughter-in-law, Molly, was the day they first met" The historian’s voice sounds full and proud, as if this is a confir, which I suppose in a way it is But it is also a confiro ofhim choose what he wanted

Tears streaone now, the others frorandmother, who said that randfather My father

"His favorite memory of his son, Abran, was the day they had their first real argument"