A Girl from Nowhere (The Firewall Trilogy, #1)

by James Maxwell

He saw a land under cloudless skies as clear as still water and bounded by hazy red horizons. It was a land filled with fields of cactus, deep ravines, stone formations, and ancient riverbeds. The shades of red were innumerable: ochre and amber, pink and rust. A savage land, a land of contrasts, it appeared completely uninhabitable; yet he knew it contained a bewildering array of life, adapted to the harsh environment, buried within the cracks, nestled wherever water was near.

“Sometimes things have a place,” she said. “They belong in their place; they fall into the same arrangement, time after time.” She paused. “It’s like when your pack settles on your shoulder, or when you put a knife back in its sheath. At night, a wherry returns to its bed. Do you know what I mean?” “Like the groove on my bow. When I draw an arrow, it slots into the right place every time.”

He gave her his hand and she clasped their two palms together. Her skin was smooth. Her hand was smaller than his, but there was no gap between them—they fit together perfectly. “Like this,” she said. “Sometimes, things fit together. Everything needs a place, a purpose. Everyone needs to fit into their place. A home. A life. People who care about you.”

“You can’t be strong all the time, or you won’t be strong when you need it most.”

“The men who killed your parents were evil too,” Selena said, making him wonder if she could somehow read his thoughts from his face. “One day you might find them, and do what you need to do. You need to understand, though, that the world will stay the same.”

Perhaps rather than places we go to when we die, these might be the worlds where we were born. Perhaps rather than dreaming, we are remembering.”

Taimin called down to the crowd below the wall. “People of Zorn!” Their expressions were expectant as they waited to hear his words. “The Protector has used fear as his weapon. He has sought to create hatred for anyone different from ourselves. He wants to make us so afraid of everything outside this wall that we will agree to anything, even terrible deeds against those we share this world with, so long as we think we’re safe.”