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"What do youones in the sky, with men inside"

Emma’s face darkened "Show us"

We followed the around a bend in the beach and cli a small embank as obvious as hot air balloons, until we crested a hill and I saw thes you see in wall calendars and motivational posters ("The sky’s the li-shaped sacs of gas with skeletal cages hung below thele pilot The craft were ss, and the noise of the surf had covered the subtle whine of their propellers Erass and we dropped down out of sight

"They’re sub the question before anyone had asked it Millard ht’ve been the authority when it cas military "The best way to spot enemy subs is fro so close to the ground?" I asked

"And why aren’t they farther out to sea?"

"That I don’t know"

"Do you think they could be looking for … us?" Horace ventured

"If you hts are with the Gerhts are allied homever it suits their interests to be allied with," Millard said "There’s no reason to think they haven’t infiltrated organizations on both sides of the war"

I couldn’t take e contraptions in the sky They looked unnatural, like s

"I don’t like the way they’re flying," Enoch said, calculating behind his sharp eyes "They’re searching the coastline, not the sea"

"Searching for what?" asked Bronwyn, but the ansas obvious and frightening and no one wanted to say it aloud

They were searching for us

We were all squeezed together in the grass, and I felt Emma’s body tense next to mine "Run when I say run," she hissed "We’ll hide the boats, then ourselves"

We waited for the balloons to zag away, then tu ere too far away to be spotted As we ran I found ued us at sea would return again to hide us It occurred to me that it had very likely saved us once already; without the fog those balloons would’ve spotted us hours ago, in our boats, e’d had nowhere to run And in that way, it was one last thing that the island had done to save its peculiar children

We dragged our boats across the beach toward a sea cave, its entrance a black fissure in a hill of rocks Bronwyn had spent her strength coe to carry herself, led to pick up the slack, groaning and straining against hulls that kept trying to bury their noses in the wet sand Halfway across the beach, Miss Peregrine let out a warning cry, and the two zeppelins bobbed up over the dunes and into our line of sight We broke into an adrenaline-fueled sprint, flying those boats into the cave like they were on rails, while Miss Peregrine hopped la in the sand