The Forsaken

better after you eat this.”
    “Alenna.” He hunches forward. More light falls onto his face. His eyes are red, like he’s been crying. “You gotta get me out of here.”
    “I’m working on it.”
    “Why am I still locked up? I told them everything I know.”
    “They think you’ve got some kind of secret plan, maybe put there by hypnosis. That you’re working for the Monk. It’s crazy, I know.”
    He shakes his head. “I barely spent any time in the drones’ camp. I didn’t even pass my initiation rite with them, because I didn’t kill anyone. And they definitely didn’t hypnotize me.”
    “I believe you.”
    “So what are the villagers planning to do with me?”
    “Veidman said they want to ask you more questions or something.”
    “So the drones are after me, and the villagers don’t trust me. No side wants me.” He looks down at the bowl, and then back up at me. “I just don’t wanna end up like them .” He points at the occupants of the other cells. “There’s something wrong with the prisoners, and not just because they’re drones.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “I think they’re being drugged with more than truth serum. They’re acting like zombies. Don’t you see that?”
    I glance behind me. Markus isn’t watching us. He’s ladling soup into bowls. “Tell me more.”
    “Maybe someone’s putting drugs in their food to keep them docile.”
    “Well, no one put anything in your soup. And you’re probably safer in here than anywhere else on the wheel.”
    “I doubt it.” He leans closer. His cheekbones catch a flash of sun. His skin is tight across them. Dirty, bruised. He moves closer still, pressing his face against the bamboo, talking softly. “I just want to be free.” His black hair is matted. “And I can barely see. My glasses got smashed by the drones, right before they attacked the village.”
    “I’m—”
    Without warning, one of his hands lashes out of the opening at the bottom of the kennel.
    I try to leap back, stunned. But I’m not fast enough. David’s thin fingers grab me around the wrist.
    The soup bowl spins sideways with a clatter, spraying its contents over the earthen floor of the cell. David must have been creeping his hands closer to the opening the whole time he was talking to me.
    He yanks me forward, off balance. I tumble against the bamboo slats, slamming my face against them. I open my mouth to scream for Markus. David’s fingers tighten like claws.
    “Don’t yell,” he whispers, his breath hot in my ear. “Just listen.”
    But Markus has heard the noise and is already rushing over from across the clearing. I try to pull away, but David won’t let me go.
    “There’s something you don’t know about the wheel! Get me out, and we can figure things out together! I can help you.”
    “I’m not the one who needs help!” I yell at him, still shocked at what he’s doing.
    “Yes, you are. You just don’t know it yet.” He presses himself against the bamboo, his words rushing out: “Nothing here is what you think it is! I heard the drones talking when I was in their camp, after they interrogated me about my arrival on the island. I mentioned your full name—I saw it when you wrote it on the leaf. They went crazy when they heard it. They asked me a million questions. I think your parents were—”
    “My parents? What are you talking about?”
    Suddenly Markus is there, towering over me, screaming at David. He’s holding a thin pointed stick. He jabs it between the bamboo slats just as David releases my arm. The stick catches David in the shoulder and tosses him back against the other side of the cell.
    Markus puts his hands under my armpits and yanks me to my feet. “Did he hurt you?”
    “I’m fine,” I say, although I’m shaken and my mind is spinning.
    Your parents. That was what David said, unless I heard him wrong. What could he possibly know about my mom and dad?
    Markus lets me go. We both step back from David’s cell. “I told you to watch yourself,” Markus says sharply. “Drones are like animals.” He stares into the cell, brandishing his pointed stick. “Touch her again and I’ll thrash you, understand?” Markus pokes the stick through the slats again, trying to prod David. But David suddenly grabs hold of the stick and starts a tug-of-war.
    “Let go!” Markus yells, but David keeps holding on. Long enough that he has time to stare directly at me.
    “I think your parents got sent to this island!” he