Summary

When Part VII begins, Agnes is alone for the first time in her life. Her solitude lasts only one evening before she spends weeks finding the members of the Community who also ran away. She finds Jake, among others, but people start to disappear, discovered by the Rangers and removed from the Wilderness. As their numbers dwindle, more and more unfamiliar faces start to “appear out of nowhere” and ask if they are the Mavericks, the group they are looking for (374). Many of them had paid or bribed their way into the Wilderness, fleeing the City and now the Rangers. To Agnes, it seems that the Wilderness now “teemed” with people (376).

One day, Agnes finds a four-year-old Latina girl standing guard over her dead mother. Agnes invites the child, whose name is Fernanda, to join their group. Fernanda carries a map that her...