Island (8 page)

“So you lied to me, to get me there. And they lied, to keep me.”

“White lies,” Colin said.

“How did you explain my disappearance to my parents? Another white lie? Did you say I’d swum out by myself — that you
tried
to pull me back, but I just went off on my own?”

Colin didn’t answer.

White lies.

To get what he wanted.

To get me to do the dirty work.

And now the island is gone.

And the destruction is on my hands.

I lunged at him, fists flying. “Are you happy now? You could have gone back yourself, Colin. THEY WERE YOUR FRIENDS — GRANDPA CHILDERS’S FRIENDS. AND YOU KILLED THEM!”

Colin grabbed my arms. “Rachel, they’re not dead!”

What?

I pulled away. “So … they were lying about that, too.”

“No,” Colin said softly.

“You’re here, Colin. I’m here. No one else could have — ”

The rest of the sentence choked in my throat.

And I knew. I knew right away.

Colin nodded slowly.

“But … why?”

“To rescue you,” Colin replied. “And to save the others.”

“A sacrifice.”

“One out, one in. The Law of Onieron.”

I ran out to the dock. I scanned the horizon. For a patch of cloud, maybe. A chance the channel might be open. A chance to say a proper good-bye, at least.

Not a wisp.

And I heard my father saying to the harbor police: “He was seventy-five today … ”

Case File: 7003

Name: Rachel Childers

Age: 13

First contact: 58.65.07

Acceptance: REJECTED

Case File: 7004

Name: Clemson Childers

Age: 75

First contact: 58.65.07

Acceptance: YES

Peter Lerangis (b. 1955) is a bestselling author of young adult fiction; his novels have sold more than four million copies worldwide. Born in Brooklyn, New York, Lerangis began writing in elementary school, inventing stories during math class—after finishing the problems, he claims. His first piece of published writing was an anonymous humor article for the April Fools’ Day edition of his high school newspaper. Seeing the other students laughing in the corridors as they read it, planted the idea in his head that he could be a writer. After high school he attended Harvard University, where he majored in biochemistry and sang in an a cappella group, the Harvard Krokodiloes. Intending to go on to law school, Lerangis took a job as a paralegal post-graduation. But after a summer job as a singing waiter, he changed his path and became a musical theater actor.

Lerangis found theatrical work on Broadway, appearing in
They’re Playing Our
Song, and he toured the country in such shows as
Cabaret
,
West Side Story
, and
Fiddler on the Roof
, acting alongside theatrical greats such as Jack Lemmon, John Lithgow, Jane Powell, John Raitt, and Victor Garber. During these years, Lerangis met his future wife, Tina deVaron, and began editing fiction, a job that would eventually lead him to writing novels of his own.

Lerangis got his start writing novelizations under the penname A. L. Singer, as well as installments of long-running series, such as the Hardy Boys and the Baby-sitters Club. He eventually began writing under his own name with 1994’s
The Yearbook
and
Driver’s Dead
, two high-school horror novels that are part of the Point Horror series of young-adult thrillers.

In 1998, Lerangis debuted Watchers, a six-novel sci-fi series, which won Children’s Choice and Quick Picks for Reluctant Readers awards. The first book in the Abracadabra series,
Poof! Rabbits Everywhere
(2002), introduced Max, an aspiring magician who struggles to keep a lid on the supernatural happenings at his school. Lerangis followed that eight-book series with the immensely popular Spy X novels, about a pair of twins drawn into international espionage.

The stand-alone novel
Smiler’s Bones
(2005), based on the true story of an Eskimo brought to New York City in 1897, won critical acclaim and a number of awards. Most recently, Lerangis has collaborated with a group of high-profile children’s authors on Scholastic’s the 39 Clues, a sprawling ten-novel adventure series.

At times, Lerangis’s life has been as thrilling as one of his stories. He has run a marathon, rock-climbed during an earthquake, gone on-stage as a last-minute replacement for Broadway legend Alan Jay Lerner, and visited Russia as part of a literary delegation that included First Lady Laura Bush. He lives with his family in New York City, not far from Central Park.