“As you know, many of our people died trying to escape the old world, and others were lost in the cold world during the long years that saw the creation of Gracehope. At times it seemed no one would survive to settle it.
“When Grace's granddaughter Sarah gave birth to the settlement's first child”—Lucian nodded briefly at Thea's bracelets—“it was a joyful occasion. The birth of Sarah's daughter was seen as a great victory, a promise that the Settlers could at long last build their civilization in peace. And the sign of the tree, a symbol of survival, became the sign of her bloodline.”
Thea nodded. “I—”
Lucian held up a finger. “I haven't yet answered your question. The map you speak of was drawn before the birth of Sarah's daughter. The sign of the tree was not yet associated with the first line, as no such bloodline had been established. The symbol appears on only one map from the Settlement era, and it has always been interpreted to mean, roughly, ‘survival.’ A logical guess, as the map shows the settlement that represented our people's hope for survival.”
Finished, Lucian looked down into his book again.
So there was no first-line mapmaker. Why had the map been left for her?
She stood awkwardly, thanking Lucian with a quick half-bow. Then, though the better part of her brain warned against it, she said, “Why do you think there's a tree-sign on that map?”
Lucian blinked and seemed to take an appraising look at Thea, if not an approving one. After a moment he said slowly, “ ‘Survival’ is a close-enough translation. The map's traditional interpretation is much more fundamentally flawed, though it is nothing I am prepared to share at the moment. Don't worry, if you write up a quarter of what I've said, Meriwether is sure to be impressed. It shouldn't take much,” Lucian snorted as he looked down again.
She would have to be satisfied with that. Thea turned to go.
And nearly fell back against Lucian's desk. Mattias's grandmother, Dexna, stood behind her with a large book tightly clutched in her hands. She was staring into Thea's face with a strange intensity.
“Oh!” Thea said. “Good afternoon. How are you?” She remembered too late that it wasn't polite to ask a question of someone who couldn't answer.
Dexna smiled briefly and nodded. She wore no fur, so she couldn't have just arrived. How had Thea missedher? She was dressed in a light green tunic and leggings, with her hair tied in its usual silver knot.
Dexna just held her book and continued to bore into Thea with her eyes.
“Well,” Thea said, “I was just leaving. Good-bye, then.”
Outside, Thea flipped down the blades of her skates and tried to remember everything Lucian had said about the tree-sign and the settlement map. Her head was swimming with questions when she turned off the pass onto the Mainway, and it took her several minutes to recognize that she was skating away from home. She laughed at herself; she was already halfway to Mattias.
Peter had only the vaguest idea what he was trying to do. He wanted the fluttering to come back, and then whatever came after it. He had spent the morning looking at things. First, he looked out his round window at the snow piled everywhere, then he looked up at the geebee geebee'sbright blue ceiling, then at a spoon he had placed in the middle of his bed. A comic book. A compass. A can of Jonas'sDanish tea from the kitchen.
He kept his eyes open until they watered. He blinked until he was dizzy. But for the first time in weeks there was no fluttering at all, not even for a moment. Whatwas this thing that crept up on him when he wasn't thinking about it, and then disappeared the minute he went looking for it?
He stood up from his bed and jerked back his curtain to see his mother writing at the table with a distant look on her face. She had her hair in its bun, and her hand moved steadily across the open page of the thick red notebook in front of her. She didn't look up.
Peter had been awakened that morning by the sound of Jonas trying to make coffee in the kitchen—something his mother usually did.
This was how her sadness, her “headaches,” always started: She stopped doing the things she had always done, shed her habits like clothes that were suddenly too warm. She should be pestering him about staying in the tent all morning, telling him that the sun was shining, he might at least take Sasha for a walk. But she just sat at the table, writing.
Abruptly, she stopped and stood up. She disappeared into the bunk area she shared with Peter'sfather, and emerged a minute later with a square box wrapped in pale green paper. She held it out to him. “I nearly forgot. Your Friday present.”
That green paper could only have come from one place. But still he couldn't quite believe it. “From Fonel's?”
She smiled. “Open it.”
He unwrapped the box and opened it, revealing many,many chocolate eggs, wrapped in foil of every color. They were Ruby Fonel'sspring eggs, his favorite. She made them day and night for a week in March, and then she didn't make any more, even if people came in and begged.
They each took one from the box—Peter a blue egg, his mother dark pink—and then she returned to her red notebook. She wrote intently for some minutes before breaking off and staring into space.
Peter had a few more eggs. It was weird how just seeing the familiar colors could make him feel so homesick for New York. He wondered what Miles was doing. Sasha raised her snout from the floor and sniffed. He kept her mostly inside with him now.
“They look pretty darn good, don't they, Sasha?” Peter said. He was testing: The mother in his mind called out from the table, “Chocolate is poison to dogs, Peter. Don't even let her lick your fingers!” But the one at the table was silent.
He sat up and stuffed his feet into the boots that sat on the floor next to his bed. Sasha looked up at him hopefully. “No chocolate for you, girl. Wanna take a walk?”
Outside, the sky was nearly cloudless and the glare hurt his eyes, but he decided not to go back for his goggles. He stopped at the research tent, where his father and Jonas sat in their coats at a small folding table, typing on two laptop computers.
“Hey, Pete.” But his father had hardly looked up before he was typing again.
“Shouldn't you guys be out looking at some ice somewhere?” Peter asked. “I'm pretty sure you could be doing this in New York.”
Jonas smiled and waved his fingers at Peter. “But in New York we wouldn't be wearing gloves.”
“Right,” Peter said. “Well, Sasha'swaiting for me outside.”
“Looking for the Second Volkswagen Road again?” Jonas asked.
“No, just a walk.”
“Don't give up,” Jonas said, squinting at a sheet of numbers. “It'sout there.”
“Okay.” Peter unzipped the tent flap to go out.
He walked west, toward the ice wall. Sasha trotted along beside him, her tail waving happily. Then she stopped, tensed for a moment, and tore ahead. Peter saw her freeze again, then turn around and streak back to him. She galloped around him, tearing off into the distance and then circling back before running hard again. She ran, circled back to him, ran, circled back.
At first he thought she was running for the joy of it. But then he saw that each time she took off, she ran in the same direction, covering her own tracks in the snow with new prints: She was trying to lead him to something.
“Sasha?”
She ran ahead again, then circled back to him.
“What is it, girl?” Peter shaded his eyes with one gloved hand and looked in the direction of the not-yet-visible wall. There was nothing to see but blue sky meeting shining white snow. He squinted.
It started in just a few seconds: a shimmering that could have been sunlight playing tricks, but wasn't. Peter'sheart gave a quiet leap. He stayed as still as he could, and Sasha held still next to him. He kept his eyes on the horizon, drew it toward him.
A moment later the ice wall was in front of him, gleaming in the sunlight. His eyes found the red ring, no bigger than a quarter, and focused on it. The ring came closer until he could see it
clearly, twisting strands of color suspended in the ice. He stared at it, careful not to bring it too close this time.
And then, just to the side of the wall, he saw something else: movement. At first it was difficult to see exactly what it was that was moving; Peter figured later that it was because he was seeing white against white-white ground, white ice, big white bear. Peter'sblood went hot at the sight of it. There was a polar bear lumbering around out there, and Sasha had been trying to lead him straight to it.
The bear'sbody was huge and rounded, cartoonish even. The bear walked a bit, then stopped, walked a bit, then stopped. It took Peter another minute to see the cubwalking behind it—a smaller white form, with the same black stuffed-animal eyes as its mother. He watched them until he felt something behind his eyes begin to throb. Then he closed his eyes, reached for whatever muscle he was using, and tried to release it.
When he opened his eyes, he saw nothing: blackness. Don't panic, he told himself. There had been moments like this before. He squatted and touched the cold ground. He felt Sasha rub up against him. And then he could see—light was everywhere; it surrounded him in daggers. He raised his head: The horizon was empty again. He put his face into Sasha'sneck fur and inhaled. His head pounded.
“You're a good hunter. But no more bears, okay, girl?” He stood slowly and held her collar. With only a few backward glances, Sasha let him lead her back to camp.
He was reluctant to walk past the silent research tent to the geebee geebee, where he was sure he would find his mother just as he had left her. Maybe Jonas would have time for another dogsledding lesson. He was getting better.
But when he had grunted his way up the short slope, he found Jonas knee-deep in the snow between the geebee geebee and the dogs' house. Building an igloo.
“My grandfather and I built one every summer when I came to visit,” Jonas called as he used his knife to pry arectangular block from the snow, “even if we had to hike awhile to find the right kind of snow.” He had finished one circle of blocks, and was working on a second level.
“You're leaving a lot of spaces in between,” Peter said. “Kind of drafty.”
Jonas laughed, slicing into the snowbank with his knife again.
“It'ssupposed to look like that. I'll pack the holes in with loose snow later.”
“Oh. So, are you moving in here or something?”
Jonas looked up. “Not at all. This is just for fun. Temporary housing. Most Inuit use them on hunting trips. They build a new igloo every night—kind of like putting up a tent. I might spend a night in it, though. Want to help me build?”
They finished the igloo together. Jonas stacked the blocks in ever-smaller circles while Peter scooped up armfuls of snow and patched up the spaces between them. When they had a nice tight dome about four feet high, they stood back and admired it. Peter was a little disappointed to finish so quickly.
Then he burst out laughing. “Um, Jonas? I think we forgot something. How are we going to get in?”
Jonas scratched his head and walked around the igloo a few times pretending to look for a door, then admitted that it was supposed to be left for last. He let Peter cutthe archway, which turned out lopsided but usable, and together they cleared the snow from the new entrance. Then Jonas got down on all fours to go inside, and Peter crawled in after him.
“Cozy,” he said, although it occurred to him that it might get chilly sitting around on the snow.
Jonas straightened up halfway and began boring a little hole through the roof. “For light, and to let the warm air out,” he explained. “And if we're really going to do this right, we should build a tunnel in front of the entrance to protect us from the wind.”
Peter grinned. “Let'sdo it.”
Using smaller blocks this time, they made an arched tunnel about as long as Peter'sbody, just high enough to crawl through.
“This is where the orphans used to sleep,” Jonas said, as they were wiggling through it. “Their bodies blocked the wind for the others.”
“The orphans? You mean kids?”
“Yes, kids. Life was tough for them. They usually had to fight with the dogs for scraps after everyone had shared out the meat.”
“God, that'sawful,” Peter said, now sitting cross-legged inside the dome, where the bright point of light over his head was the only sign of the sunny day outside.
“Yes and no,” Jonas said. “Those children got strong, and they often became the most respected elders of thecommunity. They made very good hunters, because they had learned to withstand cold and starvation.”
Peter thought about that. “It still stinks,” he said.
“To tell you the truth,” Jonas said, “I agree with you. But my grandparents probably wouldn't.”
They were quiet until Peter said, “Jonas?”
“Yeah?”
“Do you ever have the feeling that my dad is looking for something? Besides the glacier-type stuff?”
Jonas gave Peter an amused look. “Occasionally, yes.”
“I thought so. Any idea what it is?”
“Not yet.”
“Want to ask him?”
Jonas smiled. “Not yet.”
Peter nodded. “Okay.”
“Why don't you ask him?”
Peter thought. “If he were willing to tell me, I think he already would have.”
After a few seconds, Jonas said, “Whatever it is, I think your mom is looking for it, too.”
Thea was on the pass to the waterwheel when she saw Mattias skating in the other direction.
“Mattias!”
He waved and slowed down.
She glanced over her shoulder, saw no one behind her, and made a neat arc to join him. They picked up speed, skating toward the Mainway together.
“Are you through for the day?” Thea asked.
“Just out. But I have to go to my grandmother's for supper.”
“Do you have time for a stop? I have something to show you.”
Mattias smiled. “Yes.” Mattias never looked forward to supper with Dexna.
Thea eyed the blue apprentice's sash Mattias wore. “Can't you stuff that in your bag? It practically glows.”
Mattias looked down with a frown.
“Unless you had planned on wearing it to bed.” Thea loved to tease him about his fancy engineering apprenticeship.
“You're very funny.” Mattias lifted the sash over his head, folded it, and tucked in into his shoulder sack as he skated.
“Are you going to tell me what this is about?” he asked.
“Someone left something in my sleeping chamber during the first-line supper. A map.”
Mattias's surprise told Thea that he had known nothing about it.
“What sort of map?”
“It's a copy—a very good copy—of the first settlement map.”
“Grace's Hope, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“Very strange. Do you have any idea why?”
“None at all.”
“I wonder if it has to do with your council address.”
“I hadn't thought of that. But what does an old map have to do with it?”
Mattias shook his head. “Dunno.”
“I went to the archive today and asked Lucian some questions.”
“And?”
“He said that the … that the ‘traditional interpretation’ of the map is wrong. ‘Flawed,’ he said.”
“How can that be? It's a map of Gracehope. How else should we interpret it?”
They came to the Mainway, crowded with skaters.
“We’ll talk more when we get there,” Thea said quietly.
“Get where?”
“Main Hall. I want to look at the original.”
They entered the hall by the side gate, hoping to avoid anyone who might be shopping at the market stalls, and slipped into the exhibition chamber. There was rarely anyone here when classes were out of session, and they were happy to find themselves alone.
“It's
over here.” The far wall was lined with framed maps. Thea's map was part of a set of four drawn at the same time. The cousins studied them for a while without speaking. Thea saw that the map with the tree-sign was more of a sketch than the other three, which were drawn with great precision. She hadn't remembered that.
“Meriwether always said that this one was intended as an overview,” Mattias said, gesturing to Thea's map, “andthat these”—he gestured to the others—“were detail studies.” Thea never understood how Mattias could miss so many lectures and still seem to know almost everything.
It was true that the other maps in the set were much more detailed: the largest, a map of the original settlement homes, showed each set of chambers distinctly drawn and labeled. Thea could find her own sleeping chamber on it if she took the time.
A second map showed the waterwheel and the enormous council chamber. The third was a careful treatment of the lake, showing every curve and dip of the shoreline.
Only Thea's map showed everything together. Next to the others, it seemed almost freely drawn, things sketched in without a care for scale or exact position.
Mattias squinted at the wall. “Let's start with fundamentals. Why is this map so roughly drawn while the others are so detailed?”
“Because it shows an overview?”
Mattias nodded. “According to Meriwether, yes. But maybe Meriwether is wrong. Isn't that what Lucian said?”
Thea wished she could remember exactly what Lucian had said. “I think so.” She looked and looked at the map, waiting for something to happen. “Mattias,” she said after a minute. “There is one detail. Look at the lake.”
She pointed. Gracehope's lake had a deep crack running along one icy shore and into the water. It was throughthis fissure that gases escaped from the earth into the depths of the water, warming it.
“The fissure is drawn very carefully,” Thea said. “See how it bends just a little there? That's just exactly how it goes. Why bother to get it so exactly right, if this map is no more than a sketch?”
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