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eyes shifted back and forth as she sized us up.
    “Amneet joined us this afternoon and, wow, it really is great to see all of you again.” Ryder motioned toward the sandstone mansion nearby. “There. The Sharon Building. The rain’s gonna really start coming down soon. Let’s get inside, and then we’ll tell you what we’re all about.”
     
    Jett busied herself by tending the candles that crowded the turret’s wide stone windows. We were seated in the one remaining wing of the mansion that still had glass in its windowpanes. Outside, the rain was pouring in sheets, and its chill infused the room with an eerie, expectant stillness.
    “The first thing you probably want to know is who we are.” Ryder pulled a handful of blankets from a pile in the corner and tossed them to the spot where Amneet, Javi and I sat on the floor.
    He motioned and said, “There, get comfortable,” before continuing, “So, Cody, Jett and I were raised right here in San Francisco. We grew up with the ‘rules’, we attended our own Free Soul Ceremonies… We even wore those terrible white temple robes, just like you guys.” At this, he grinned over his shoulder. “Not that you don’t look great in them, because I’m sure you totally do.”
    “Ryder’s father was one of Cedar’s very first followers,” Jett said, waving an extinguished match and flitting to a seat on Cody’s lap. It was an unexpected act of affection that made me blush and quickly look away. “Helped organize the movement, and even oversaw the purchase of all those buildings on Haight Street. Started as an apprentice under Cedar and then worked his way all the way up to meditation master.”
    “He was a good one, too,” Ryder said, retrieving a flask of dark liquid from a box in the corner. He pulled the cork with his teeth and spat it to the floor. “Probably procreated about twenty kids in the name of the Movement over the course of the first few years, but then my mother had me, and everything changed.”
    Amneet snorted. “This isn’t one of those ‘love at first sight’ deserter stories, is it? Because we’ve all heard those before, and I’m not impressed by people who are too weak to control their emotions.”
    Ryder chuckled. “Don’t worry, Amneet. This isn’t one of those stories.” He took a swig of the liquid and passed it to Cody. “But everything did change when my mother had me, because he got attached. To both of us.”
    Jett motioned from her place on Cody’s lap. “Cedar noticed, and it wasn’t long before Ryder’s father got reassigned. He was forbidden from spending time with Ryder or his mother, and when it was time for her to conceive her second child, another meditation master was given the task.”
    “My old man got upset,” Ryder said. “Was generally pretty good at staying neutral, but when it came to my mother and me…”
    He shook his head and sank to a seat on an empty windowsill. “So, one night, he decides he’s gonna protest his reassignment. Shows up at the temple late, figures Cedar’s gonna be there somewhere, and guess what he finds? Way back in one of the meditation rooms – the small ones they use for students? – he finds Cedar all tangled up with not one, but two of his meditation masters. Male ones.” He smirked. “Let’s just say conception didn’t seem to be on their list of priorities.”
    “No way,” Amneet said. “There’s no way Cedar would have ever…”
    “Yeah? Then why did the meditation masters come after my father? Why did he find himself kicked out of the Movement the very next day?”
    She snorted. “Because he was trespassing ! Attempting to sneak into the temple without Cedar’s permission!”
    Irritation seemed to flash in Ryder’s eyes for an instant. “Yeah, maybe,” he said. “And that would make sense if they’d stopped at just kicking him out of the Movement. But they didn’t. Soon he started noticing strange men following him everywhere he went, and then he