Andrea peeked out from behind the tree.
“We’re in a wood that doesn’t even have a path,” she said and giggled again. “What are you so afraid of?”
Jonah tried to remember everything he knew about the Virginia Dare story. She was the first English child born in North America, in the . . . Roanoke Colony. (Wow—wouldn’t his Social Studies teachers be proud of him for remembering that!) And then, hadn’t the whole colony disappeared? Because of what?
Wild animals? Jonah wondered. Hostile Indian tribes? Some enemy the English were fighting with back then—the Spanish? The French? Some other country I don’t remember?
Jonah had reached the end of his knowledge about Virginia Dare. Somehow, not knowing what he was supposed to be afraid of made things even scarier.
“Wait, Andrea!” he called again. “Come on, Katherine!”
Katherine groaned, and he took pity on her enough to reach down and give her a hand. He was still off balance, though, and for a moment it was a toss-up whether he would manage to pull her up or whether her deadweight would pull him down. Then she reached back and shoved off against a tree trunk. The whole tree shook, and a pine cone fell straight down, bonking Jonah on the head.
“Bet that pine cone was supposed to land on the other side,” Katherine moaned. “We probably just changed history, right there.”
“It’ll change even more if Andrea gets eaten by a bear or scalped by Indians or something,” Jonah said through gritted teeth.
The two of them stumbled forward, following Andrea. They wobbled terribly, bumping into each other and the tree branches. Jonah paused to take off his sweatshirt, hoping he’d do better if he wasn’t so hot.
It was still hot. The air was so thick and heavy around them that Jonah almost felt like he should be swimming. His T-shirt was quickly soaked with sweat.
None of that seemed to bother Andrea.
“Don’t you think . . . it’s weird how . . . Andrea isn’t scared anymore?” Jonah muttered to Katherine. It was hard to simultaneously walk, talk, and keep an eye on Andrea, who was practically running now.
Katherine nodded, an action that almost knocked her over. She stopped for a moment so she could speak without falling.
“Don’t you think it’s weird how, well . . . JB knows where we are, right?” she muttered back. “So why hasn’t he dropped in a replacement Elucidator for us?” She peered over at Jonah. Her whole face was twisted with fear. “You don’t think us losing the Elucidator made this Damaged Time, do you?”
“Don’t say that,” Jonah snapped. “Don’t even think it.”
But the idea had wormed its way into Jonah’s head now too. No time travelers could get into or out of Damaged Time. If they’d damaged Virginia Dare’s time period, no matter how well they helped Andrea, they could still be stranded here for days.
Weeks.
Months.
Years.
Forever, Jonah thought. It could be for the rest of our lives.
He forced himself to think only about keeping up with Andrea.
He kept losing sight of her and having to plunge desperately forward just to get the briefest glimpse of her hair or her shirt. Then he’d lose sight of her again. He finally decided it was hopeless—there was no way he and Katherine could keep up.
Just then, very suddenly, Andrea stopped.
“Can’t she at least hide behind a tree until she sees what’s out there?” Katherine mumbled.
Jonah realized that Andrea had stopped right on the edge of a clearing. He thought about calling out to her, ordering her to hide, but it didn’t seem worth the risk. It would have been like yelling at a statue. She had frozen that completely.
Jonah crept forward, Katherine alongside him. They reached a huge tree right behind Andrea and, in silent agreement, they each peeked around opposite sides of the tree.
What’s Andrea’s problem? There’s nothing out there!
That was Jonah’s first thought. And then, because Andrea was still standing stock-still, her face a stunned mask, he looked again.
In the clearing were . . . ruins.
What Jonah had first taken for a few downed trees out in the center of the clearing were actually the remains of a tall wooden fence. The fence we saw in the scene when Virginia Dare was born? Jonah wondered. A shudder ran through his whole body. That scene had seemed so happy, so hopeful, and now it was clear that everything had been destroyed. Rusting, arched metal that might have been the remains of a suit of armor lay off to one side of the clearing, beside an overturned old-fashioned trunk, half-rotting in a trench. There were no houses anymore, no people. Vines were creeping over the last part of the fence that was still even slightly upright, as if they were on a mission to pull it down too. It was no wonder that Jonah had first mistaken the scene for more wilderness: Soon it would all be wilderness again.
“I don’t remember any of this,” Andrea murmured sadly.
Dare whined beside her, as if he was upset too.
“Andrea, you aren’t supposed to remember any of it,” Katherine said briskly, sounding more like herself again. Or maybe Jonah’s ears were just functioning better. “You won’t remember being Virginia Dare until you step into your tracer.”
“No, I mean . . . ,” Andrea let her voice trail off. “Maybe I just went the wrong way.”
She threw an anguished glance over her shoulder, as if she expected to find some other way through the woods, away from this devastated clearing. Jonah knew she would see nothing but more trees.
“Andrea . . . , I think this is the Roanoke Colony,” Jonah whispered. “Or what’s left of it.”
“Really?” Katherine whispered back. Now she was the one who seemed inexplicably excited. “Then . . .”
She gave one cautious look around before stepped out into the clearing. She peered at each tree ringing the clearing, paused for a second, then went over to the partially collapsed wooden fence. She seemed to be trying to lift the logs, to look at each one. Jonah was waiting for her to discover that that was impossible, when suddenly she let out a shriek.
“Katherine! Shh!” Jonah hissed, all his fears coming back about wild animals, hostile natives, or some other enemy.
“This is it! This is it!” Katherine answered, her voice screeching even louder. “Come look!”
Katherine was acting like she’d discovered the Seven Cities of Gold—wasn’t that one of the things the early explorers had been looking for? Jonah glanced around quickly and sneaked out to join his sister. Dare padded along beside him, and even Andrea crept forward after a few seconds.
“There!” Katherine exclaimed, pointing at the top log. “Don’t you see it?”
Jonah didn’t.
Impatiently, Katherine grabbed his hand and rubbed his fingers across the exposed side of the log.
“Oh, there’s something carved into the tree?” Jonah asked. “Letters?”
He could feel a crescent—a C, maybe? And then maybe an R . . . He tilted his head, so he could see the log from a better angle.
“It says, Croatoan,” Katherine said. “Croatoan!”
“So?” Jonah asked.
Katherine gave Jonah’s chest a shove.
“Didn’t you pay any attention in fifth-grade Social Studies?” Katherine asked. “Didn’t you learn anything?”
“I know that Virginia Dare was born in the Roanoke Colony,” Jonah said, feeling just as queasy as he always did when he took pop quizzes.
“And?” Katherine prompted.
“And then everyone disappeared?”
“And?”
This was getting annoying.
“Katherine, you had a better teacher than I did. I bet Mrs. Rorshas never even told us.”
Katherine rolled her eyes.
“She had to. This is, like, the best part of the whole story!”
“So, what is it?” Jonah challenged.
Katherine dropped her voice down low, making it creepy and mysterious.
“Virginia
Dare’s grandfather, John White, was in charge of the colony. He went back to England to get more supplies. He meant to come right back. But for some reason—”
“The war with Spain,” Andrea muttered. “The Spanish Armada.”
“Oh, yeah, the Spanish Armada,” Katherine said. “Because of that, it was three years before he made it back to Roanoke. And by then, everyone was gone. Even the houses were gone!”
“I knew that,” Jonah said defensively.
“But the colonists left behind one clue.” Katherine had begun using her normal voice again, but now she made it spooky once more. “It was the word Croatoan, carved into wood. Carved . . . right . . . here.” She pointed straight down.
Jonah had to admit Katherine had a flair for storytelling. And if there was only one clue, he probably should have remembered it. He’d probably missed the word Croatoan on the test. Mrs. Rorshas had always given hard tests.
“Okay, okay, I should have known that,” he said. “But still—so what? We already knew this was Roanoke.”
“John White thought that the word Croatoan meant that his colonists had gone to another island, to stay with the Croatoan Indians there,” Katherine said. She put her hands on her hips, obviously ready to issue a challenge. “So if Virginia Dare went to Croatoan Island, why did JB return Andrea to history at Roanoke?”
“Maybe John White was wrong?” Jonah retorted. “Maybe you got your history mixed up?”
“No, she’s right,” Andrea murmured.
She had crouched down and was tracing the carved letters with her fingers, again and again.
“How long do you think this has been here?” she asked plaintively. “Could a carving stay in wood like this, out on the open, for a long time? For . . . centuries? It could, couldn’t it?” Her voice shook, as if she might start crying again if Jonah and Katherine didn’t give her the right answer.
“Centuries?” Katherine repeated. “No way! Andrea, did you hit your head or something coming through time? It wouldn’t need to be here for centuries. I’m not sure how old you were when you were kidnapped from history, but you were still a kid. Under eighteen. So this carving couldn’t be more than eighteen years old, at the most.”
“I don’t think it’s even that old,” Jonah said. “Out in the open, wood would start breaking down. See how it’s really faint and hard to read, already?”
He kind of wanted to add, “I’m a Boy Scout. This is something I know about,” just so Andrea wouldn’t think he was a complete idiot.
But Andrea was collapsing against the log, throwing her arms across it and burying her face in her arms.
“No-o-o-o,” she moaned. “It can’t be. . . .”
Jonah peered over at Katherine, hoping she could explain Andrea’s strange behavior, going from giggling to freezing to wailing in nothing flat. But Katherine only gave an “I’m mystified too” shrug.
After a moment of Jonah and Katherine staring at each other over Andrea’s wailing, Katherine dropped down beside the other girl.
“Andrea, it’s okay,” Katherine said soothingly. She patted Andrea’s back. “Remember, we’re here to help you, Jonah and me. We’ll take care of you.”
Jonah decided if Katherine was doing the comforting, that cast him in the role of guard. He looked around, just as Dare began barking at something off to the right. Jonah caught a quick glimpse of something pale—a white shirt? White skin? He instantly dropped down with the two girls and pulled them off the top log, out of sight.
“Ssh! Stop talking! Someone’s coming!” he hissed in Katherine’s ear. He slid his hand over Andrea’s mouth, but the shock had evidently already stunned her into silence.
Dare kept barking, so Jonah couldn’t even listen for footsteps. What if whoever it was stepped right into the clearing? Shouldn’t the three kids scramble back into the woods while they still had time?
Jonah raised his head, just enough to see past the toppled logs. He scanned the scene before him: pine tree, pine tree, pine tree . . . there! Something pale was moving through the trees, coming toward the clearing. Jonah blinked, because his eyes had chosen that moment to go out of focus again. The movement he saw was blurry and indistinct; watching was like trying to keep track of a ghost.
Or . . . not exactly a ghost . . .
Jonah grinned and dropped back down with Andrea and Katherine.
“It’s all right,” he whispered. “It’s just a tracer! I bet it’s Andrea’s!”
All three kids peeked over the logs now. Even Dare stopped barking and just watched silently. Now that Jonah knew he was watching a tracer, it made sense that the figure moved without rustling any tree branches, without snapping any twigs underfoot.
“There are two of them!” Katherine whispered.
Jonah scooted over so he could see from the same angle, and she was right—there were two figures gliding silently through the trees.
“Let’s make sure there aren’t any real live human beings with them too,” Jonah whispered back grimly.
But as the figures approached, it became clear that no one else was around. When the tracers stepped into the clearing—becoming a bit more distinct in the brighter light—Katherine began to giggle.
“Uh, Jonah, I don’t think either of those tracers are Andrea’s,” she whispered.
“Why not?” he asked. “. . . oh.”
The tracers were boys—rather scantily clad boys. At first Jonah thought they might even be naked, but then he realized that they had squares of some sort of cloth or animal skin hanging down from their waists.
Katherine kept giggling.
“Oh, grow up,” Jonah muttered. “You’ve seen boys in swimsuits before. Those . . . outfits . . . cover just as much territory. These guys are Indians. Er—Native Americans.”
From some long-ago Social Studies class, Jonah remembered the name for the clothes the two boys were wearing: loincloths. Couldn’t they have come up with a less embarrassing name? he wondered.
“Those aren’t Indians,” Andrea whispered, speaking up for the first time since she’d collapsed on the Croatoan log. “Look at their hair. The texture. It’s all wrong.”
Jonah squinted. It wasn’t easy to examine the texture of two guys’ hair when those guys were practically see-through, even if they did glow, ever so slightly. But he could kind of see what Andrea meant. Neither of the tracers had long braids or long straight hair trailing down their backs or even a ridged Mohawk on an otherwise shaved scalp—none of the hairstyles Jonah would have expected for old-timey Native Americans. One tracer boy did have longish hair, but it was very curly long hair. The other tracer boy’s hair was closely cropped and wiry.
“So maybe they come from some tribe that never got its picture into any of our Social Studies books,” Jonah said, shrugging.
“That guy came from Africa,” Andrea said, pointing at the tracer with the shorter hair. “Or his ancestors did.”
She sounded excited about this.
“Why would an African guy pretend to be an Indian?” Jonah asked.
“Hello?” Katherine said. “To get out of being a slave?”
Jonah blushed, because he’d kind of forgotten about that. He always hated it whenever they talked about slavery at school, because the teachers got a weird tone in their voices, as if they were trying really, really hard not to offend anyone. And a lot of the black kids in his class just stared down at their desks, as if they were wishing they were somewhere else.
“No,” Andrea said, her voice rising giddily. “I bet it’s because they’re actors or something. Not very realistic ones. And this is just a movie set, and it’s still the twenty-first century, and we didn’t go back very far in time at all, and . . .”
She broke off because the two tracers were suddenly both lifting bows to their chests and pulling arrows out of packs that Jonah just now noticed hanging from their shoulders.
Tracer bows and arrows? Jonah thought. Oh, yeah, I saw a tracer battle-ax too, on my last trip through time.
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That wasn’t a happy memory. Jonah didn’t want to think about what these tracer boys might be shooting at, but he couldn’t keep from watching the arc of the arrows, zipping through the air.
At first it seemed that they’d fallen uselessly to the ground. Something rustled amid the pine branches, but it was only a deer aimlessly strolling away. Then Jonah saw what the deer had left behind: a tracer version of itself, pierced by the tracer arrows. The tracer deer’s glow was fading, growing dimmer and dimmer.
Oh, no, Jonah thought, horrified. JB told us before that the tracers of living things stop glowing when they die.
The two tracer Indians—or tracer Indian wannabes—shared none of Jonah’s horror. They were jumping up and down and hollering (though Jonah couldn’t hear anything). Then they took off running toward the tracer deer and . . . attacked it. There was no other way to describe it. Jonah was so glad that he was seeing only the tracer, ghostly version of the action, because otherwise he would have been sick.
“This isn’t a movie set,” Katherine whispered. “Movies always have that disclaimer, ‘No animals were harmed in the making of this film. . . .’”
“Those guys are hungry, for real,” Jonah said, turning his head because he couldn’t watch anymore. The tracer boys seemed to be eating some of the meat raw, and smearing some of the blood on their faces. “Starving. Nobody could act that.”
“But then . . . ,” Andrea began. Her face twisted with anguish. She glanced once more at the two tracers, who now were hacking at the dead tracer deer with ghostly tracer knives. “I should have known he was lying. I should have known it wasn’t possible, even with time travel. . . .”
“Who was lying?” Katherine asked. “Do you mean JB? What are you talking about?”
But Andrea didn’t answer. She slumped back to the ground, her shoulders shaking with silent sobs. A whimper broke through, and she stifled it, but her whole body was racked by the effort. Even though she was so quiet, Jonah knew this was the most devastated crying he’d ever seen, a million times worse than any of Katherine’s drama. And, like the tracer boys with the tracer deer, this was much too real for Jonah. He couldn’t watch.