Island of Legends

A girl in the front row raised her shackled hands to her lips. A boy behind her touched her elbow. Another girl gazed across the water at the retreating ships, lip quivering.

Suddenly Alex realized they didn’t understand. To him, now, being Unwanted was a good thing. But the term still held its nasty bite to the children before him, stuck in this precarious position. “First,” he said hastily, “I want you to know that we consider Unwanted people to be very special. But I know—it feels terrible.” He nodded solemnly and wondered about these children’s parents. Did they know they’d be losing their children today? And were they as okay with it as Alex’s parents were? Maybe these children actually wanted to go back to Warbler.

He frowned, trying to imagine what Mr. Today would say, and then followed his instincts. “Well, we have a few options here. Let’s see. Does anyone wish to be returned to Warbler? We will get you there safely. Don’t be afraid.” When no one moved, Alex said, “Uh, you don’t need to answer yet—let me give you all the options first.” He turned when he heard footsteps coming up the path toward him.

“Ah, good,” Alex said, relieved. “Crow, can you interpret for us?”

“Sure,” Crow said. He scanned the group. “Hey,” he said. His eyes alighted on the blond girl in the front. A look of recognition passed between them. Crow studied her teary face for a long minute, and then turned to Alex. “You can ask them the questions yourself. But they can’t answer with the shackles on.”

“Oh. Of course. Which—?”

“Her,” Crow said, pointing to the girl. “I know her.”

Alex bent down next to Crow and said in a low voice, “Do you want to try to release the shackles?”

Crow shook his head. He wasn’t very good at magic. “You do it.”

Alex did. The shackles fell to the ground. The girl rubbed her wrists and signed, “Thank you.”

“Can you tell us . . . anything?” Alex wasn’t sure where to start. “Why did they use children in the catapults? Why did they leave you all here?”

The girl’s hands flew through the air. Crow watched. Sam and Lani did too, since they’d begun learning this language, but soon it was clear by the looks on their faces that they were lost. Every now and then Crow stopped her and reported her answers, and before long, the whole story came out.

“It was the parents,” Crow said. “When they heard that Queen Eagala was going to attack, and how she was going to do it with the catapults, the parents began a secret mission to send the children on shore to fight. They convinced Queen Eagala’s ruling board that the catapults could fit more children because they are smaller. Their plan all along was to retreat without going back for them.”

“What? That’s terrible!” Lani cried.

“It’s just like Quill,” Samheed muttered.

“I can’t believe it,” Meghan said.

The girl began signing faster.

“No,” Crow said. He jumped up and down, trying to get the Unwanteds’ attention. “Not like Quill. Listen.”

Alex held up a hand to quiet everyone and addressed Crow. “What are you saying?”

“She says the people of Warbler—their parents—convinced the ruling board to send the children to attack because their parents were trying to save the kids.” He looked at the girl, whose hands had slowed. “Their parents did it so the children could escape Warbler for good. To give them a chance here in Artimé.” He turned to Alex. “They did it out of love.”

“So they’re not Unwanted at all,” Alex said. He tried to imagine what it would be like to have to send your children off when you didn’t actually want to, in order to save them. It was kind of like what Lani’s parents did when they sent her to the Death Farm. Only she didn’t know it at first.

Samheed didn’t look convinced. “How do you know she’s telling the truth?”

Crow shrugged. “Because I know her. But mostly because that’s what parents are supposed to do.”

A Journey into Quill

Later, with the nurses caring for the injured and several of Alex’s trusted friends monitoring the Warbler children to be sure they weren’t tricking the people of Artimé, Alex turned his thoughts back to the events of the previous night. Something had been bothering him.

He knew what it was, of course, but hadn’t had a spare moment to think about it. Now that things were settling down a bit, Alex frowned, deep in thought. Anger bubbled up inside him. He slipped past the busy Artiméans and made his way with a firm step up the stairs, across the balcony, and down the last hallway on the left. At the end of it, he turned right and entered the tube. He pressed the first button.

In an instant he was reaching through the tube opening, feeling for the closet doors in the dark. He found them and pushed them open, stepped into Haluki’s stuffy office, and strode through the house to the front door, letting himself out into the overpowering desert heat of Quill. He walked up the short, dusty road to the larger main road that encircled Quill, and headed up the hill toward the palace.

As he drew near his identical twin brother’s lackluster residence, portions of his angry inner rant broke through his lips like bursts of steam from a kettle. He approached the rickety old gate. Two guards stood on the other side. “Open up,” he growled at the guards.

There was a moment of confusion as they looked at Alex, clearly mistaking him for Aaron but taken aback by the bright color of Alex’s robe. “It’s the brother,” one of them muttered. “I seen ’im before, wearing one a those ugly robes. Don’t let him in.”