The children did not wake.
Elias carried Lyra from the water, her small body limp in his arms. She was breathing, but her skin was cold as the sea, and her eyes moved beneath closed lids like she was dreaming of something terrible. Jesus carried Isaac, and Reyes carried Nia. The other children were dragged, one by one, onto the black stone shore. Ava moved among them, checking pulses, her face tight with fear.
"Their minds are still in the doorway," she said. "I can't reach them."
Elias laid Lyra down on a flat rock and pressed his hand to her forehead. The network was silent, a broken web of faint threads. He could feel the children's presence, but it was distant, as if they were behind a wall of water. The rupture in the cave was still open, and it was pulling at them, even now.
"We
