Page 8 of Whispers of the Dead

When no one speaks, Zoey hugs her knees tighter and fixes her stare on the ground as if it holds the answers to her problems. She leaves her food untouched.

Benji breaks the silence first, as always. “Well, hell. Guess that explains the attitude.” His voice is lighter than usual, but I can hear the edge to it. “You’re not just mad. You’re on a deadline.”

Zoey lets out a bitter laugh, though the sound is devoid of humor. “You, you could say that.”

I exhale through my nose. Frustration knots in my chest. “You can’t give up on food.” My eyes flick toward her tray, then to mine. “If you stop eating, you won’t last long enough to try your grand plan of getting out of here.”

Her head snaps up and irritation flashes in her eyes. “You think I don’t know that? You think I haven’t been doing this for years? The wrong food spikes my blood sugar, and stress doesn’t exactly help. Guess what I’ve got an abundance of right now?”

Her voice cracks at the end, and for some goddamn reason, I feel guilty.

“I’m doing the best I can,” she adds in a whisper.

Fortunately for her, my guilt isn’t enough to make me stop pushing, or to regret it. I need to know what I’m dealing with. What she’s dealing with. I can’t protect her if I don’t know all that I’m protecting her from. She’s going to get my help, regardless of whether or not she wants it. No matter how angry it makes her.

That thought hits me harder than it should. I can’t even properly see this girl, and I already have her under myprotection. Still, her fear of the dregs earlier keeps eating away at me. Everyone fears dregs, but hers is something else, and it feeds my intense curiosity.

Benji clears his throat. “Look, I’m not exactly a nutritionist, but I’m pretty sure whatever passes for food around here isn’t doing anyone any favors.”

His attempt at humor falls flat. That’s a new experience for him, and it amuses me greatly.

“Laughter won’t help her right now. However, I have something that might.”

I reach for my water. Without a word, I snake the glass through the bars and set it on the ground before sliding it toward her. The high-pitched scrape of glass against concrete fills the cell block, and Zoey lifts her head at the sound.

Her blue eyes flick to the cup. She hesitates.

“Drink,” I command.

This time, this doesn’t argue. She uncurls herself from her ball with caution, like she’s expecting a trick. When she crawls across the floor and passes through a ray of sunlight, I see her eyes for the first time. Bright, striking, electric blue. Like the sky I’ve been watching day in and day out for months through the barred window. Something in my chest tightens. Electric is a fitting description, because the sight paralyzes me to the spot and I don’t back away from the bars like I intend to.

She reaches for the glass at first, then at the last second, she reaches for me. I pull my hand back before she can touch me, but not before a ray of light gleams off my metal ring and catches her attention. My body tenses at the near contact.

“Thank you,” she says, wrapping her fingers around the cup. “I’m sorry I don’t have juice to swap with, but I appreciate you sharing. I’ll only take a little.”

“You can keep it. I’ll take the next one.” When she looksin my direction, her eyes searching for me in the dark, I remain still, afraid to make a single movement that she might see.

“Deal,” she says. Then, with a small smile, she brings the cup to her lips and takes a sip.

I watch her from the shadows and run my tongue along my dry lips.

3

ZOEY

Sunlight streams into my cell, catching the dust motes in the air and painting the cold concrete floor in patches of pale gold. It’s soft, warm, and the only thing in this place that feels alive. I watch the light dance with the changing clouds from where I sit with my back against the far wall.

Outside the bars that make up my cell are shadows that stretch long and deep. The dim light from the window above isn’t strong enough to chase them away. The only sounds are my breathing and the occasional, distant scrap of nails against the outer walls.

Rotters.

I try not to think about them, or how close they are. I know they’re out there. Shuffling corpses. Bone-thin fingers dragging against the stone at my back. They’re close. Always close.

Though, I’m not sure which I’m more afraid of getting inside of here: the rotters or the dregs.

I shift, and a dull ache pulses through my body as a reminder of everything I’ve been through. It’s been a full night since the dregs threw me in here. A full night since I met Damon and Benji, two voices in the dark. Onecommands me to survive, while the other makes me laugh. I can’t see them, not really, but I know they’re there. At least, I think they are, even though they’re not speaking right now. I’m still not sure if they’re real, or products of my fevered imagination. Either way, right now, their voices are enough to keep me going.

Then there’s Cole. The man in the cell across from mine. He’s only a few feet away, but anything outside of my cell becomes engulfed in shadows. I haven’t heard his voice, but I’ve seen his eyes., Two sharp green orbs that cut through the dark and watch me, even now. They’re so sharp, so piercing, that part of me wonders if they’re even real.

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