And six weeks ago, Montez had announced that he was leaving. “I have to do my part,” he said, looking about as terrified and distraught as Magdalys felt inside. “Even though we weren’t born here, this war will determine what happens to me, to you — to all of us. I have to do my part. I can’t just sit here while it all happens hundreds of miles away.”
So, not just leaving: Montez was joining the Union Army. Montez who was skinny and wore big glasses and hated fighting and loved reading, Montez who still cried sometimes when he talked about Julissa and Celia, and always helped out the younger kids, Montez was off to war, and Magdalys was alone. Well, as alone as one could be in the midst of almost two hundred orphans and semiorphans between the ages of one and seventeen.
If the letter was from Montez, that changed everything, and Henrietta Von Marsh knew it. Magdalys finally exhaled in defeat and turned to face her. “Who … who’s it from?”
“Oh,” the matron declared, the slightest hint of a gloating smile curving her thin lips, “you’re Margaret now?”
Magdalys narrowed her eyes. “What’s the name on the envelope?”
Von Marsh looked perturbed for a moment, then simply shook her head. “I’m not going over this with you again, young lady.”
Magdalys tried to contain the wrath burning through her. “Who … is … my gram … from?”
“If you had really wanted to know,” Von Marsh chortled, “you would’ve answered when I called you the first time.” She patted her purse once and then turned away. “Now you’ll just have to wait till after the little play to find out, I suppose.”
Magdalys launched across the cart. Her hands reached out toward Von Marsh; she would tackle her and she would get her stinking letter. The other orphans were standing, eyebrows raised, mouths opening, and then a strange grunting sound erupted in Magdalys’s head: Ree rooh arroooh it went, and it sounded frantic, terrified. Magdalys froze. She looked around. Everyone was staring at her; no one seemed to notice the increasingly shrill squeals.
“Uh … Magdalys?” Two Step said.
“Didn’t anyone else hear that?” Magdalys said.
Sabeen looked scared. “Hear wha —” she started to say, but then a sharp voice called out, “Stop there, you!” and the squeal in Magdalys’s head became a shriek: AREEEE-OOOHH!! Magdalys ducked just as Varney reared up, jolting the cart to a sudden halt.
Daniel José Older is the critically acclaimed New York Times bestselling author of numerous books for readers of all ages: for middle grade, Dactyl Hill Squad, Freedom Fire, and Thunder Run; for young adults, Shadowshaper, Shadowhouse Fall, and Shadowshaper Legacy; and for adults, Star Wars: Last Shot, The Book of Lost Saints, and the Bone Street Rumba urban fantasy series. He has worked as a bike messenger, a waiter, and a teacher, and was a New York City paramedic for ten years. Daniel splits his time between Brooklyn and New Orleans.
You can find out more about him at danieljoseolder.net.
Text copyright © 2021 by Daniel José Older
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Press, an imprint of Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC, SCHOLASTIC PRESS, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Older, Daniel José, author.
Title: Flood City / Daniel José Older.
Description: First edition. | New York : Scholastic Press, 2021. | Summary: Flood City is the only habitable place left on the drowned Earth, but it is also a battleground between the Star Guard who have controlled the city for decades and the Chemical Barons in their spaceships who once ruled the planet, want it back, and are now preparing to destroy it; the future will depend on Max, his sister Yala of Flood City, and Ato, a young Chemical Baron who just wants to keep his twin brother alive and not hurt anyone—and somehow these natural enemies will have to work
together to save Earth.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020028676 (print) | LCCN 2020028677 (ebook) | ISBN 9781338111125 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781338111149 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Dystopias—Juvenile fiction. | Brothers and
sisters—Juvenile fiction. | Twins—Juvenile fiction. | Government,
Resistance to—Juvenile fiction. | Friendship—Juvenile fiction. |
Science fiction. | Adventure stories. | CYAC: Science fiction. |
Brothers and sisters—Fiction. | Twins—Fiction. | Friendship—Fiction. | Government, Resistance to—Fiction. | Adventure and
adventurers—Fiction. | LCGFT: Science fiction. | Action and adventure fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.O45 Fl 2021 (print) | LCC PZ7.1.O45 (ebook) |
DDC 813.6 [Fic]—dc23
First edition, February 2021
Cover art © 2021 by Sam Gilbey
Cover design by Christopher Stengel
Text excerpt from Dactyl Hill Squad copyright 2018 © Daniel José Older
Cover art © 2018 by Nilah Magruder
Title treatment by Afu Chan
e-ISBN 978-1-338-11114-9
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.
Flood City Page 22
