The Talisman

disappeared.
    ‘No, Jacky,’ Wolf said. The ceiling was no more than an inch from the top of his head. ‘Wolf can’t stay here.’
    ‘You’d better sit down,’ Jack said. ‘You want the top or the bottom bunk?’
    ‘Huh?’
    ‘Take the bottom one and sit down. We’re in trouble here.’
    ‘Wolf knows, Jacky. Wolf knows. This is a bad bad place. Can’t stay.’
    ‘Why is it a bad place? How do you know it, I mean?’
    Wolf sat heavily on the lower bunk, dropped his new clothes on the floor, and idly picked up the book and two pamphlets set out there. The book was a Bible bound in some artificial fabric that looked like blue skin; the pamphlets, Jack saw by looking at those on his own bunk, were entitled The High Road to Everlasting Grace and God Loves You! ‘Wolf knows. You know, too, Jacky.’ Wolf looked up at him, almost scowling. Then he glanced back down at the books in his hands, began turning them over, almost shuffling them. They were, Jack supposed, the first books Wolf had ever seen.
    ‘The white man,’ Wolf said, almost too softly for Jack to hear.
    ‘White man?’
    Wolf held up one of the pamphlets, its back cover showing. The whole rear cover was a black-and-white photograph of Sunlight Gardener, his beautiful hair lifting in a breeze, his arms outstretched – a man of everlasting grace, beloved of God.
    ‘Him,’ Wolf said. ‘He kills, Jacky. With whips. This is one of his places. No Wolf should ever be in one of his places. No Jack Sawyer, either. Never. We have to get away from here, Jacky.’
    ‘We’ll get out,’ Jack said. ‘I promise you. Not today, not tomorrow – we have to work it out. But soon.’
    Wolf’s feet protruded far past the edge of his bunk. ‘Soon.’
    3
    Soon , he had promised, and Wolf had required the promise. Wolf was terrified. Jack could not tell if Wolf had ever seen Osmond in the Territories, but he had certainly heard of him. Osmond’s reputation in the Territories, at least among members of the Wolf family, appeared to be even worse than Morgan’s. But though both Wolf and Jack had recognized Osmond in Sunlight Gardener, Gardener had not recognized them – which brought up two possibilities. Either Gardener was just having fun with them, pretending ignorance; or he was a Twinner like Jack’s mother, profoundly connected to a Territories figure but unaware of the connection at any but the deepest level.
    And if that was true, as Jack thought it was, then he and Wolf could wait for the really right moment to escape. They had time to watch, time to learn.
    Jack put on the scratchy new clothes. The square black shoes seemed to weigh several pounds apiece, and to be suited to either foot. With difficulty, he persuaded Wolf to put on the Sunlight Home uniform. Then the two of them lay down. Jack heard Wolf begin to snore, and after a while, he drifted off himself. In his dreams his mother was somewhere in the dark, calling for him to help her, help her.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
THE SERMON
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    1
    At five that afternoon, an electric bell went off in the hallway, a long, toneless blare of sound. Wolf leaped from his bunk, thudding the metal frame of the upper with the side of his head hard enough to wake up Jack, who had been dozing, with a jolt.
    The bell stopped shrieking after fifteen seconds or so; Wolf went right on.
    He staggered over into the corner of the room, his hands wrapped around his head.
    ‘ Bad place, Jack! ’ he screamed. ‘ Bad place right here and now! Gotta get outta here! Gotta get outta here RIGHT HERE AND NOW! ’
    Pounding on the wall.
    ‘Shut the dummy up!’
    From the other side, a shrieking, whinnying, horsey laugh. ‘You gittin some sunlight in yo souls now, boys! And from de way dat big fella soun, it sho feel fine !’ The giggling, whinnying laugh, too much like a horrified scream, came again.
    ‘Bad, Jack! Wolf! Jason! Bad! Bad, bad—’
    Doors were opening all up and down the hall. Jack could hear the rumble of many feet dressed in blocky Sunlight Home shoes.
    He got down from the top bunk, forcing himself to move. He felt cross-grained to reality – not awake, not really asleep, either. Moving across the mean little room to Wolf was like moving through Karo syrup instead of air.
    He felt so tired now . . . so very tired.
    ‘Wolf,’ he said. ‘Wolf, stop it.’
    ‘Can’t, Jacky!’ Wolf sobbed. His arms were still wrapped around his head, as if to keep it from exploding.
    ‘You got to, Wolf. We have to go