The Castaways have stayed hidden for years, despite Dane searching for them every day. I know now how they’ve stayed hidden for so long, traveling through the island, not on it. Worry fills me as I think about being stranded here, the newest victim to the Castaway mind games, with no one to help me but myself.
Years of unsuccessful searching have proven the Castaways are invisible, so I can’t sit around waiting to be saved. There are only three things that need to happen now.
I need to endure whatever torture, physical or mental, that Weston is about to inflict on me.
I need to find Fin.
And we need to escape.
CHAPTER THREE
“Lennox! Lennox! You’re here! Wake up!”
Fin’s voice echoes in my mind and I groan, squeezing my eyes shut tighter, trying to will away the image of him standing in front of me, waving and jumping excitedly. I don’t need to endure any more pain right now. The nightmares haven’t stopped, but instead have worsened since being locked in this room, fueled by starvation and isolation.
Because now I’m seeing Fin, and he’s never been in one before.
I tuck my chin into my chest and curl into a tighter ball. This is the longest I’ve been without food in my entire life, and now my mind is clearly being affected.
“Why aren’t you sleeping in your bed, Lennox? The floor is too hard.”
The floor? We aren’t anywhere near our bunks at camp.
My eyes fly open. His voice is too loud and clear to be part of my dream. Light and shadows dance across the wooden wall I turned to face in my sleep, a stark contrast to the darkness I’ve been living in for hour after hour. I push myself up onto my elbows, my head swiveling to look into the room.
I must be hallucinating.
Fin kneels next to me, eyes wide with a cheerful smile as he watches me look over him. A lantern sits beside him on the floor, the flicker of flames responsible for the light in the room.
He can’t really be here. I hadn’t heard him come in, which means he’s either a figment of my imagination, my dream projecting into my reality, or I am so weak and unguarded that the sound of the door opening and closing, of him maneuvering into the room didn’t wake me.
“Are you real?” I ask, hesitating to reach out and touch him.
“Course I’m real! Why wouldn’t I be?” he says, his smile widening.
Slowly, I extend my arm. My fingertips brush the top of his knee and meet warm, solid flesh.
“Oh my gods, Fin!” I scramble onto my knees and all but tackle him with a hug. Dark spots appear over my vision and I heave breaths to keep my head from spinning. This is the most I’ve moved since I got here, and my stomach sinks as I realize how weak I have become.
I pull back and run my hands over his face and shoulders, my eyes assessing him for any marks or bruises. “You’re alright. You’re fine. They didn’t hurt you?”
“Nope! They didn’t hurt me. Don’t be scared. I was scared at first, but everyone is so nice to me. You’ll see.”
I feel a pang in my chest at his youthful innocence. He is so pure, so loving. He isn’t hardened to the world yet from the wicked motivations of others. I grieve for all of us who have already lost it. He doesn’t understand how he is being manipulated, how the kindness they are showing him is only to gain his trust and compliance. It makes me want to protect him even more.
I shake my head. “No, Fin. I know it might seem that way, but they aren’t nice. Remember everything Dane told us about the Castaways? They try to confuse us to get us to believe them.”
How did Edmond teach me these kinds of things as a child? How am I supposed to convey the severity and danger of the situation without scaring him, in a way he will understand?
“Oh,” he says, his face falling slightly. “Well, when I asked if I could see you again today, mister Weston told me yes. He said I could have lunch with you. That was nice.”
I huff a breath out of my nose. “Yes, I suppose that was nice,” I say, keeping my voice soft. It isn’t Fin’s fault he’s being manipulated by a monster. He’s a child and doesn’t know any better. He needs someone to protect him and teach him, but most importantly, to get him out of here.
“See?” he says. He spins on his knees and comes back around with a large wooden board piled high with food. Fruit and bread and chunks of cheese cover every inch, and my mouth salivates at the sight. My stomach feels like it is folding in on itself, and it takes a lot of focus to pull my eyes away from the food.
Fin shifts his body to sit down cross-legged in front of me, and I do the same as he slides the board between us. He reaches back toward the lantern and grabs a glass bottle and two wooden cups stacked inside each other, and sets them both down next to the board.
“I heard Sig say you were here, and I was so happy to see you! But then you didn’t come out, and it was sad. I came out really fast, but you didn’t. You just kept staying and staying and Sig told me I had to be patient. Being patient is hard. But then it has been lots of days, and I miss you.” He rambles on, the disappointment from a few minutes ago already forgotten.
