Page 39 of The Wild Zone

“Towels are good,” Harper said. Then he focused on Zuri. “So why are you so sure Grant didn’t leave the woods?”

“Oh…” Zuri cringed, like she was hesitant to explain. “Because…last night? I think I saw him disappear.”

9

Just Call Me Frodo Booger

“You saw Grant disappear?” Benny repeated.

Zuri shifted uncomfortably. “Well…sort of. I didn’t realize what I saw until tonight, when we were at dinner. I guess it’s more accurate to say I smelled Grant disappear.”

Benny, Harper, and I exchanged confused looks.

“You’re going to have to help us with that,” Harper said, toweling off scolex puke. “Take us back. What do you mean?”

Zuri began tugging off her fireproof gloves, which I took as permission to do the same. “You know how we had to make our offerings to the gods at dinner?” she asked.

Harper frowned. “Yeah?”

“When you put your offering in the flames, what did the smoke smell like?”

“Uh…lavender and s-salt water,” Harper said. His eyes got a little misty, but he didn’t elaborate.

“Leather and picadillo,” Benny said. “Leather, I guess because of the cows around our farm. And picadillo’s a ground beef dish my abuela makes.”

The others looked at me. “Cinnamon and toasted rice.” I gestured to Benny. “The rice, I guess, reminds me of home, too.”

“And the cinnamon?” Zuri prompted.

I hesitated. I’d just assumed the cinnamon was another cooking smell from our kitchen, but Mom didn’t cook with cinnamon very much. So what did I associate cinnamon with?

“Grant!” I said. “It reminds me of Grant!”

Harper wrinkled his nose. “Oh, yeah. He was chewing that cinnamon gum when we got abducted. It always smelled like someone had just sneezed.”

Zuri pointed at Harper. “Right? Well, tonight, when I made my offering, I realized how important scents can be. They remind us of people and things we care about.”

“What did you smell at your offering?” I asked.

Zuri ran her pendant along her chain. “Eucalyptus and hot tires,” she said reluctantly. “But that’s not important. It just made me remember something that happened in the Wild Zone. At one point, I got caught in this weird foggy area. It felt like something was breathing down my neck. So I crouched down and waited. A dark shape passed maybe thirty feet in front of me, and there was this smell, like sea water and cinnamon.”

“Grant,” I said, almost breathlessly.

Benny scrunched his forehead. “I get the cinnamon, but sea water? What’s that about?”

Zuri shrugged. “At the time, I thought it was a monster. I’d run into half a dozen by then. But if it was Grant, I’m glad I didn’t shoot him with an arrow.”

My heart did somersaults in my chest. I wanted to ask Zuri what section of the grid this had happened in, but sadly, nobody else used my system. “How long was this before you got out of the Wild Zone?”

Zuri looked pensive. “Not long.”

“And you were the last one out of the woods,” I noted. “Which means if that was Grant you saw, he must’ve gotten away from the thing in the trees. He was still alive and moving toward camp quite some time after I…lost him.”

I meant abandoned him, but I couldn’t make myself say it.

I was hoping the other newbies would support my theory. Whatever had happened to Grant, it wasn’t because I’d left him to face that thing in the trees. Maybe I wasn’t totally a bad person. But I didn’t like their grim expressions.

“We’re assuming a lot based on the smell of cinnamon,” Harper said.