Page 129 of Elas

“Stop trying to rationalize the actions of monsters,” she reprimands gently, reverting for a few moments to the leader I worked underneath at the camp. We fall into silence for a moment as I close my eyes through another flare of pressure in my skull.

“Hey, Taryn?”

“Yeah?”

“Back at the camp… did you know about those attacks on the convoys?”

She huffs a quiet, bitter laugh. “No. Bruce wanted to take my place at the head of the camp, and he convinced a few of his cronies to join him. He thought he’d be ableto blame it on me and reason with the military when they came. He actually thought they’d leave him there in charge if he agreed to work with them.”

“Gods, he’s an idiot,” I mutter, and she grunts her agreement. “How’d you find out?”

“A few of the others that worked with him were in my cell at Glaston. They confessed once they realized he’d doomed us.”

“I knew you hadn’t done it,” I whisper, and I can feel her smile even if I can’t see it. “You’re too good for that.”

“Thanks, August.” The main doorway beeps and pushes open, and we wait in silence as dinner is delivered from cell to cell.

My appetite is nonexistent, and has been since they dragged Elas’s unconscious body away from me that night. I’ve been forcing myself to eat, though, for no other reason than to keep my strength up. Weakness won’t do me any favors in this place.

A familiar face rounds the corner. The same Khileon guard that escorted me to my barracks walks to my cell with a tray of food. I dash to the door and grip the bars. “Matuk,” I say, and he doesn’t meet my eyes as he slides my dinner through the slot. “Thank you. Can you tell me anything about Elas? Please? Anything at all.”

“Not supposed to talk to you,” he mumbles, flicking his eyes up to mine.

“I won’t tell a soul. Please, Matuk. You won’t get in trouble. I just need to know that he’s okay.”

He swallows, and his eyes dart around the room. “He’s… alive.”

“Alive… but not okay?” I ask, dread squeezing my throat closed. He remains silent, but the quick, nervous flick of his gaze speaks volumes. “Take my dinner to him,” I plead, pushing my tray back towards him. “Please.Please.Make sure he’s getting enough to eat.”

He hisses, shoving the tray so hard it clatters to the ground, the food ruined. “They will kill me in a heartbeat. Do not ask this of me.”

“Please?” I whisper, but he squares his shoulders and storms away. I fall against the wall, fighting the tears that are welling in my eyes again. All I do these days is cry, and it doesn’t do any good.

It doesn’t help him.

“Do you want my bread?” Taryn asks gently. “Don’t eat off these floors, August. There’s no telling what’s down there.”

“No, I’m not… I’m not hungry.” I stare at the chunk of bread in its fallen spot against the wall, grains of rice scattered in an abstract pattern across the dirty concrete, and I wonder if I’ll ever be hungry again.

Elas

Theendlessdarknesshasstrained my eyes until they ache, burning and refusing to obey my brain’s command to stop fighting the void. Every one of my senses is fucked. Time, depth perception, direction… my entire world has been shifted on its axis. Up and down mingle in a confusing blur, and left and right are no longer distinguishable. Even the act of lying down causes me to flinch, because my brain struggles to understand the spatial orientation of my body.

Time comes in random intervals. I have periods of intense awareness where I can recall every detail of every fucking minute, and there are other times when the hours pass without conscious thought. The days bleed together, indistinguishable, and the absence of distinct light and dark has erased any sense of day or night.

Twice more, they’ve wheeled me into a room to listen as August is tortured on the other end of the speaker. The last one was so brutal, I ended up on my hands and knees,heaving bile from an empty stomach that scorched its way up my throat.

I’ve never felt so helpless.

The impossibly thick liner that surrounds my cage is only pulled back when they pass me something. Tiny glasses of water, or moldy pieces of bread I’ve been fed twice. The bitter flavor was wretched and burned my raw tongue, but my body didn’t care. I ate it anyway, and suffered the cramps later.

I’ve become numb to the smell inside this hellhole. My nostrils are seared to the point I can’t recognize my own stench, and my skin itches, desperate to be cleaned.

And throughout it all, the only thing keeping me from snapping entirely is the promise I made August.

The vow that I would always come for him.

My mind betrays me at times, though. Sanity becomes a fluid thing, ebbing and flowing through the recesses of my consciousness. The scar on my lip is freshly ripped open from trying to shove myself between the bars, shredding skin and muscle as I screamed myself hoarse.

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