49 pages • 1 hour read
Among the Betrayed
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Chapters 1-7Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of physical abuse, emotional abuse, child abuse, and death.
Nina Idi, a 13-year-old girl, wakes up in a cell, thinking she is in a nightmare. She always had nightmares about the Population Police arresting her, but now everything seems real. Her hands and ankles are cuffed and chained to the wall, and her body aches. Nina recalls her arrest, still unable to believe that it actually happened. She was having breakfast at Harlow School for Girls when the Population Police arrived and called her name. Nina wonders why no one defended her, but she knows they were terrified. She thinks she must protect her friend Jason, who is another shadow child, and she wonders where he is, hoping he will save her.
Nina recalls an officer who works for the Population Police looking at her hatefully during her arrest—she thinks of him as the “hating man.” Later in the novel, he is revealed to be Mr. Talbot, the secret leader of the rebellion against the Government and the Population Police.
Chapter 2 Summary
The “hating man” shouts in Nina’s ear, asking her why she betrayed her country. Nina wonders why being born is a betrayal but says nothing, afraid she would betray her family. She thinks the man looks powerful, like Jason.
He laughs, telling her she does not need to speak because her “cohort” confessed. He implies that Nina’s friend wanted to save himself by turning her in, but he has been executed. Nina is confused before realizing he is referring to Jason. She refuses to believe that Jason betrayed her. She thinks that Jason loves her, and he is also an illegal child. It would be dangerous for any of the children to betray her. Nina thinks that maybe her father knew about her existence and turned her in. Finally, the man tells her that Jason portrayed her as the “operator.” In response, Nina screams in anger and frustration.
Chapter 3 Summary
Nina is devastated. She wishes the man had killed her without telling her that Jason betrayed her. Lost in thought, she recalls how she met Jason. Nina found a note at school inviting all Harlow school girls “who are concerned about shadows” to meet the Hendricks school boys in the woods (11). Until then, Nina had never been outside school or heard about Hendricks.
She talked to her friends about the meeting, but the girls were scared. All the girls were shadow children and illegal, they came to school with forged ID cards, and they were all terrified of the Government. Nina thinks they should talk about their situation, their real families and names, and how they lived hidden for years. She learned that her schoolmate Sally had two older sisters and her parents worked to overturn the Government. Bonner, another girl at school, also had a big family. Bonner worried the invitation was a trap, but Nina thought it could be their only chance to discover more than their secluded life at school.
Ultimately, the girls went to the woods and met Jason and his friends. Jason told them a story about Jen Talbot, a girl who organized a protest to demand rights for third children. Jen was brave and died for her beliefs. After listening to the story, Nina wanted to be like her.
With these memories haunting her, Nina screams again in her cell.
Chapter 4 Summary
The “hating man” returns to Nina’s cell. Nina lashes out, telling him he is lying and refusing to believe Jason betrayed her. The man says she is condemned to die and asks her if Nina Idi is her real name. Nina wants to scream out her real name: Elodie Luria. She recalls that her grandmother and aunts, Aunty Zenka and Aunty Lystra, struggled for years to save enough money and buy her a fake ID card. Nina felt her new name was a “death sentence” since she was not herself anymore.
The man tells Nina that Jason Barstow’s real name is Scott Renault. The boy posed as an illegal child to detect third children and turn them in to the Population Police. There is no evidence that Nina is a third child, so she was arrested for treason. Nina is relieved they do not know the truth and that her family will not be in danger. The man accuses her of cooperating with Jason to turn in a group of fake “exnays” or illegal children to get money from the Population Police. The man believes she will blame Jason, but Nina says they are both innocent. The man then plays a tape of Jason testifying that Nina convinced him to trick the Population Police. Nina grabs the tape recorder and smashes it against the wall. She tells the man she will never agree with anything he says. The man says he has an offer to make, and he then leaves.
Chapter 5 Summary
Nina eats the bread and rotten apple the man left her. She is not heartbroken anymore; instead, she feels angry and foolish. She wonders how Jason could pretend he loved her. She recalls their flirting, their kisses, and their meetings in the woods with other illegal children. Nina was mesmerized by Jason and did not contribute much to the political conversations. Now, she feels ridiculous. She wants to preserve “her memories of being loved” by Jason and her family (27), but she feels cold inside. Jason’s love was a lie, and she is no longer Elodie, the girl her family loved. Finally, Nina falls asleep in her cell.
Chapter 6 Summary
The next morning, the man returns to Nina’s cell to offer her a deal. First, he gives her a sandwich that Nina finds incredible since she is used to black bread and moldy cheese. She cannot believe the sandwich has real ham, lettuce, and tomatoes. The man says they could have executed her, but she is more useful to the Population Police than Jason. The man tells Nina they have arrested a group of shadow children. The Population Police want to discover who made their fake IDs, but the children refuse to speak. The man says Nina will go to their cell, make them trust her, and find out their families’ names. If she refuses to do this, they will kill her.
Nina wonders how she can agree to this, but she feels that Jason betrayed her and her friends did not defend her. She realizes that she must begin to look out for herself. Still, a part of her wants to refuse and yell that her real name is Elodie, but she cannot speak back. The man leaves, saying they will take her to the children’s cell the next day.
Chapter 7 Summary
In the morning, Nina tries to convince herself that maybe the children deserve what is coming, but she cannot truly believe it. The guard comes to lead her out and hits her in the stomach. She drags herself out of the cell, and the guard takes her to the basement. She notices the walls are moist as he unlocks a dark cell and pushes her inside. At first, Nina sees no one. Then, she hears a noise as somebody lights a match. Nina sees the faces of three little children. Horrified, she asks if anyone is more than five years old.
Chapters 1-7 Analysis
In Among the Betrayed, Margaret Peterson Haddix shifts the series’ dominant point of view from Luke Garner to a new female protagonist, Nina Idi, a third child whose real name is Elodie Luria. Nina previously appears in the series’ second novel, Among the Impostors, as a potentially duplicitous character and possible accomplice of Jason Barstow, betrayer of third children. She is reexamined in this novel, expanding the series’ narrative and thematic scope.
Nina is presented as a young girl who struggles with The Corrosive Impact of Totalitarianism. Innocent and naïve, she was raised lovingly by her grandmother and aunts who did their best to hide her and “[keep] her alive” (6). Yet Nina is not prepared for the full force of state repression. Her identity as an illegal third child—termed “exnay” in the story—has caused her to live a life of secrecy and fear. While her family strived to protect her from the oppressive social environment, they could not completely shield her. To ensure her survival, her aunts secure a fake identity for her and send her to the Harlow School for Girls. However, these experiences take a psychological toll: Nina feels alienated and deprived of any sense of self. Her new identity feels instead like a “death sentence” to her as she has to be a “strange new person” (18). This internal conflict foreshadows Nina’s character arc, signaling that she must learn to accept herself fully.
The first section establishes the novel’s setting, introducing the dystopian world and dark tone that characterize the oppressive environment Nina inhabits. The Government is depicted as the antagonistic force that warps social relationships and individual freedom, and the Population Police symbolizes the state’s attempt to exert absolute control over the people. After her arrest, Nina is confined in a “concrete cell” and her experience feels like a “nightmare.” Her inner torment and feelings of hopelessness indicate the pervasive terror that dominates her social world. Haddix uses vivid imagery to illustrate the dehumanization of children, describing Nina’s “rubbed” wrists and ankles from the “handcuffs and ankle cuffs” chained to the wall, her “swollen” eye from the physical abuse she endured, and her aching body. Nina’s cell is both literally and figuratively “dark” (2), alluding to the tyrannical political forces that threaten her existence.
Betrayal emerges as a key motif, which is directly tied to the theme of The Challenges of Coming of Age in a Repressive Society. Nina’s trust in Jason, whom she believed to be an ally and romantic partner, is shattered by the revelation that he betrayed her. Jason’s memory haunts her throughout the story. His betrayal wounds her self-esteem, making her feel angry and like an “idiot” for believing him while simultaneously nurturing deep hurt. Eventually, she begins to feel distrustful about all people. Nina also feels betrayed by her school friends who did not defend her during her arrest and her heartbreak transforms into “fury.”
Nina’s feelings of betrayal illustrate that the political turmoil in her world divides people and disrupts personal relationships, reinforcing a climate of fear and suspicion that pits citizens against each other. The idea of betrayal is also central to Nina’s character arc in this section as the “hating man’s” offer presents her with a moral dilemma. When he suggests that Nina become a traitor herself, Nina is torn between her impulse for personal survival and ethical responsibility. However, her experiences convince Nina to decide to betray the other children, showing the consequences of living in a tyrannical world. She tells herself, that “[i]t [is] the way of the world to look out only for yourself” (33). Her selfishness is fostered by her environment of fear.
Even within the darkness and despair of Nina’s world, there are seeds of hope and resistance, building the theme of Enduring Hope in Humanity. Though Nina is politically inexperienced, she demonstrates a developing awareness of—and resistance to—systemic injustice while at school. She wants to break the silence about third children that is prevalent among the girls at school and attend the secret meetings in the woods with the Hendricks School boys, hinting at her growing desire to interrogate the oppressive society she lives in. Nina reflects: “Oh, please, there’s got to be more. This can’t be all my life is” (15), articulating her belief in freedom and justice. Additionally, her memory of Jen Talbot, a brave young activist who gave her life for third children’s rights, also indicates that there is an emerging resistance against the tyrannical Government. Nina aspires to this kind of bravery, which foreshadows her shift from hopelessness to purpose. The “hating man” is later revealed to be Mr. Talbot, Jen’s father. He works as a double agent, seemingly on the side of the Population Police while secretly advancing the cause of the rebels. He tries to break Nina through his harsh methods in order to test her mettle.
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By Margaret Peterson Haddix
