Children of Eden

by Joey Graceffa

  Lachlan has an arm around me, bends low beside me. “In through your nose, out through your mouth. Slow. Easy. You’re going to be okay.” It takes a minute, but my breathing returns to something like normal. I stand up straight and try to maintain my dignity, but it is hard when I remember the torture I received in that room.

  Flint enters first, then Lachlan. He blocks my view with his shoulders, but I can see two people inside. One, a woman I met briefly beneath the camphor tree, holds something in her hand that looks like a small sock filled with sand.

  The other person is tied to the chair and has a bag over their head, and my lungs convulse again, though I keep myself visibly under control. I see bare arms covered with bruises, and as I watch, the Underground woman—Flora, that was her name—cocks her arm back and hits the prisoner in the shoulder.

  The prisoner groans. “Please . . .” The gasp is muffled under the soaking bag, but I know that voice, know the down of golden hair on those poor bruised arms.

  “Lark!” I shout, and surge toward her. Flint grabs me roughly by the shoulders and forces me back.

  Her head inside the bag turns toward me. Suddenly I see her entire body go rigid, straining tightly against her bonds. I push against Flint but he won’t let me go. Then Lark’s body starts tembling spasmodically. Her head thrashes back and forth, then after a long moment her body goes completely stiff again, then slack.

  “She has seizures,” I cry out, kicking uselessly at Flint’s shins. “Let me help her!”

  “Did you lead her here?” Flint growls, ignoring my struggles, and I remember that this is the man who tortured me. He’s been so pleasant ever since, his tone cordial and inspiring. Now I recall the voice of my interrogator, and I try to shrink away from him. But he holds me in an iron grip and shakes me. “Did you send her a message? Who is she? Who is she working for?”

  “Let her go,” Lachlan says, and if his voice is soft, his intentions clearly are not. His fists are clenched, his jaw set, and I think he’s ready to attack the leader of the Underground. Flora looks over her shoulder, surprised, and Flint lets me go abruptly. The two men stare at each other for a long, tense moment. Then Flint takes a step back.

  “You know this girl?” Flint asks, keeping a more respectful distance from me . . . and Lachlan.

  “She’s my friend,” I say. Lark’s head is turned toward me now, and I want to rip the bag off her head, comfort her, but I don’t quite dare.

  “I thought you said she was kept strictly in her house all her life,” Flint says to Lachlan.

  “She was, until just a few days ago. I don’t know who this girl is, though.”

  “She’s my brother’s best friend,” I explain. “I met her when I snuck out. She knows I’m a second child, but she’d never tell—ever! She’s an outer circle girl, and she . . . she helps people.” I really don’t know what Lark does, but I know she’s somehow involved in resisting the Center.

  “What was she doing snooping outside?” Flint wants to know.

  “Why don’t you ask her, instead of beating her?” I say, looking levelly at Flint. Then I slip between the two men. No one tries to stop me when I start to fumble with the cords that tie the wet canvas bag around Lark’s neck. The water has made the knots swell, though, and I can’t undo them.

  “Here, let me,” Lachlan says, and whips out a folding knife with a curved blade. He slices cleanly through the ropes, and I trust him so much I never even worry how close the deadly edge is to my friend’s neck.

  I pull the bag off, and strangely, it is Lachlan she sees first. The two people I’ve kissed, meeting face-to-face under these strange circumstances.

  Then she looks at me, and her face floods with relief. “You’re alive!” she gasps.

  I use the hem of my shirt to blot her face dry.

  “What are you doing here, Lark?” I ask, very close to her ear, so close it is almost a kiss.

  “I’ve been looking for you. I had all my contacts from the Edge searching.”

  “You’re with the Edge?” Lachlan interrupts.

  “Bunch of amateurs,” Flint mutters. “Deluded do-gooders.”

  Lachlan shoots him a disdainful look. “At least they’re trying. What’s wrong with trying to do good? Anything is better than nothing.”

  “Until they get in our way, or expose us, or bring the Center sniffing around where it doesn’t belong.”

  “What is the Edge?” I ask.

  Lark answers. “The Edge is the opposite of the Center. We try to bring people together, people of all circles, all incomes, all educations.”

  “A social club,” Flint scoffs.

  Lark looks at him furiously, so impassioned even though she’s still tied down that my heart thrills for her courage, her strength. “We’re doing what we can. We let inner circle people know about the problems the outer circle people face. We raise money, we try to help the poor. We hide rebels. We help second children.”

  Flint looks incredulous. “What second children have you ever helped?”

  “Rowan, of course. She’s the first I ever met. Ever since then members of the Edge have been keeping an eye on her house, following her when she sneaks out to make sure she’s safe.”

  I feel my heart sink in my chest, as Lachlan and I exchange looks.

  “You told someone about me?”

  “Only a very few trusted members of the Edge. I’ve known them for years. They’re absolutely reliable.”

  “You idiot!” Lachlan thunders. He steps toward Lark, looking furious, and for a second I’m afraid for her. But then I see that once again he’s getting between Flint and his intended target. Lachlan is angry, but when I see Flint’s face I start to shake. He looks murderous. I think if Lachlan wasn’t between them, his hands would already be around Lark’s throat.

  “Lark,” I ask softly, “how could you do that to me?”

  Her face falls. “I . . . I thought I was helping you. I trust them.”

  “Then you trust a traitor,” Flint snarls at her. “Which makes you a traitor, too.” He jabs a forefinger in my direction. “This girl lived in perfect safety until you told one of your ‘trusted friends’ about her. Now her mother is dead, because of you. The Center is hunting her, because of you.”

  “I didn’t mean to!”

  “And did your Edge friends follow you here? Are they alerting the Center now?” She shakes her head, looking desperately at me.

  I’m confused, and turn away from Lark even as her flowing tears beg me to comfort her. I never truly believed that she would betray me. And this . . . She didn’t mean to, I know, but it is still her fault that Mom was gunned down in the street. I trusted her.

  “Rowan, I’m sorry!” she wails, pulling at the cords that still tie her, as if she would fly into my arms if she were free. I start to walk away . . . but I can’t.

  “She made a mistake,” I say firmly to Flint and Lachlan. “She thought she was helping me. But she didn’t turn me in. She didn’t betray me.” I look at her sweet, sorrowful face. “I trust her,” I say, and I’m absolutely certain that what I’m saying is true.

  “Trust,” Flint spits, scowling. Then he seems to relax, and shrugs slightly. “What motivated the girl doesn’t matter. She’s here now, and done is done. Flora, get patrols up to monitor the streets outside the entrance, and put everyone on alert. I want sidearms carried at all times by everyone over twelve years old until further notice.”

  She nods brusquely and leaves to make it so.

  “And now I think you should go, too, Rowan,” Flint says, and a sudden deliberate gentleness in his voice gives me pause.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I say staunchly.

  “You don’t need to see this. You’ve been through enough.”

  Perplexed, I look to Lachlan.

  “Do you really need to do this?” Lachlan asks his leader.

  “She’s been in the Underground, and she’s not a second child. What other choice is there?” He turns to me again. “
Rowan, go.” Then he opens a drawer in a rolling cart and takes out a syringe.

  Lark understands before I do. “No! Please!” she shrieks. “I’ll never tell anyone, I swear! I’ll tell them I was lying about Rowan, that she’s not a second child! I’ll leave the Edge forever. No! You can’t!” She twists in her bonds, trying to get as far away from Flint as possible. “Rowan, please! You can’t let him kill me!”

  I stare at Flint in disbelief.

  “I know it’s hard for you to understand,” Flint says, “but we can’t let anyone know about us. Not yet, and not for a long time. We’ve managed to keep this place secret. I won’t put all of us—all the children and families, the tree—in jeopardy because of one stupid girl. Maybe she just made a dumb mistake. But dumb is deadly, and we can’t take any chances. The girl has to die.”

  I hurl myself on top of her, protecting her with my body. “Lachlan . . . ,” I beg in a whisper.

  He looks torn. “Flint, I appreciate everything you do to keep us safe, but . . . she’s just a young girl, not a Greenshirt or a Center official. There has to be another way. You don’t even know how she found the Underground yet.”

  “No,” Flint admits. “Flora reported that she hadn’t yet elicited that information from the girl.” He looks at Lark with a touch of grudging respect. “She withstood interrogation well.”

  “Then let’s find that out first. How she came here—and why she came here. Without beating her. Then, when we’re all cooler, we can decide what to do with her.”

  “You’re just delaying the inevitable, prolonging the suffering for Rowan, and the girl,” Flint says. “There’s only one option.”

  “There are always more options,” Lachlan insists.

  Flint agrees, obviously reluctantly, and I hold Lark’s hand while he and Lachlan ask her questions.

  * * *

  THE EDGE MEMBER assigned to keep a discreet watch on my house followed us when Mom and I went out to get my lens implants. They saw everything—the roadblock, Mom’s murder—but couldn’t help me without giving themselves away. They gave Lark my last known location, and she came searching for me, along with other members of the Edge who were in on the secret of my existence. But no one could find a trace of me.

  In despair, Lark went to her star tower, the glorious rooftop where I got my very first, very confusing kiss. And there, by a strange coincidence, she looked down over the edge to the city below and saw me.

  She was sure she was imagining it. Of all the vast number of people in Eden, how could it be that she happened to spy the one person she was searching for. She almost stayed on the rooftop, knowing it was only wishful thinking . . . but in the end she dashed down the stairs. She lost us for a long time, but finally spotted Lachlan and me just as we were slithering through the grate that led to the Underground.

  How could she know me from so high up? I wondered. I had been up there at night, of course, but even in daylight I doubt I could have picked out any one person from so high up. Could her story be true? I want to believe it.

  “No one else knows,” she swears. “Just me, and it was just luck.”

  “Why did you want to find Rowan so badly?” Lachlan asks.

  “I didn’t just want to find her. I needed to find her!”

  “You care about her that much?” Lachlan asks, half-respectful and, I think, half-suspicious.

  “I do,” Lark says amid her tears. “And I had to tell her something.”

  “What?” I ask, coming closer.

  “It’s your brother, Rowan. They’ve got him.”

  My heart seems to sink in my chest with a sick thud. “Who?” I ask, knowing only too well.

  “The Greenshirts came for him when you were missing. They dragged him out of his classroom.”

  I can’t believe it. Not Ash. Not poor, weak, innocent, loving Ash.

  “His trial was already held, quickly and in secret. He’s going to be executed in three days.”

  My hand covers my mouth. He’s done nothing wrong! Holding back sobs, I force myself to ask, “And my father? Has he been arrested, too?”

  “Oh, Rowan,” Lark says with such sorrow you’d think I was the one bound in a torture chamber, my death looming. “Your father is the one who condemned him.”

  “UNTIE HER,” I say, and when no one makes a move, I scream, “Let her go now!” I feel like I’m losing it. Not Ash. Not sweet, gentle Ash . . .

  “Rowan, I think you should . . . ,” Flint begins.

  “No,” I shout, and I’m surprised at my own strength, standing up to these two men. Where Ash is concerned I can do anything. “She’s going free, and she’s going to help me rescue Ash.” I stare evenly at Lachlan. “And you’re going to help us.”

  “Out of the question,” Flint answers for him. “Even if we let her live—and that’s still very doubtful—she can never leave the Underground. We can’t take the risk. And I’m very sorry about your brother, but we simply can’t help him. Neither can you.”

  “You can’t stop me from trying to save my brother!” My voice comes out in a snarl, fury rising in my throat.

  “We most certainly can. It won’t be pleasant, but we can lock you up, drug you . . . whatever it takes to protect the Underground from exposure.”

  “You mean I’m a prisoner? I thought this was supposed to be a free society, where second children could lead normal lives.”

  “There’s no such thing as normal on this Earth anymore,” Lachlan interjects.

  I ignore him. “You’re all about protecting second children, right? Well, my mother and brother have been protecting one for sixteen years. My mom gave her life protecting one! My brother has been arrested because he kept me safe for so long. You have to help him.”

  “Rowan,” Lachlan says very gently, “your brother must be in the Center prison. I’m so sorry for him, and for you. To lose everyone important to you all at once . . .” He breaks off, and I see his eyes glisten with tears that don’t fall. He blinks them quickly away. “But there’s nothing we can do. There’s no way any of us can get inside the Center prison.”

  “I can get you in,” Lark says.

  * * *

  WE LISTEN TO her idea. It sounds feasible, but . . .

  “No, it wouldn’t work,” Lachlan says. “That would get us in, but once inside we’d have to maneuver within the building. We’d need IDs, clearance. None of our contacts have that kind of power. We’d have to have someone very high up on the inside to give us security codes, access passes.”

  I think for a moment. “Someone like the next vice chancellor?” I ask.

  They look at me in surprise as I let them know my father has been handpicked by the chancellor to be his second in command.

  “But he would never help you,” Lachlan protests. “Not if what Lark says is true.” He asks Lark, “Did he really turn in his own son?”

  She nods. “My father overheard some Center officials talking about it, though I don’t think anyone outside the government knows yet. I don’t know how he managed to protect himself, but your father’s job—and his life—are secure. And he’s the one who signed his own son’s death warrant.”

  I hear Lachlan suck in his breath, feel his hand on my arm. I shake him off.

  “I don’t need your pity—I need your help. I know my father is a wicked man who would do anything to save himself.” No, that’s not quite true. I never, ever imagined he would do this to Ash, his beloved son. I always knew he would have turned on me, turned me in, if it wasn’t that Mom and Ash would have suffered, too. But Ash? I wouldn’t have thought it possible, even from him.

  “We can’t help you,” Lachlan says again, so gently. “It’s an impossible mission. Suicide. We can’t put what we have here, and our future plans, at risk.” I can see the strain in him, the tension of believing that two opposing things are absolutely right. He wants to save Ash, for my sake, and because Ash helped a second child, and, I think, because Lachlan simply believes that it is his duty to help people
in need. But he also has an unshakable commitment to the Underground, to keep it safe no matter what the price. He would give his own life for the Underground. He will give Ash’s life, too.

  Would he give my life? I wonder.

  “Not can’t,” I correct him. “Won’t.” I stare at him without flinching so he will understand how deadly serious I am. “If you won’t help me, I won’t help you.”

  For a moment Lachlan’s mouth works without uttering a sound as he tries to process, to come up with an argument. But I think I see something in his eyes that tells me he approves. He can’t go along with it, but if I give him no other choice . . .

  Flint spins me around by the shoulder, and this time Lachlan doesn’t intervene. I think I understand why. “What do you mean?”

  I regard him coldly. “I mean simply this: if you don’t help me rescue my brother, I won’t help you get the implants you need from the cybersurgeon.”

  Flint starts to fume and sputter, a far cry from the collected leader I’ve come to know. “This is preposterous! We take you in when you have no one, nowhere else to go. You depend on us. If it wasn’t for us, you and every other second child would be dead. And you think you can defy us?”

  My only reaction is to blink once.

  “You heard me,” I say evenly.

  “You stupid girl, do you think we won’t make you tell us what you know?”

  I raise my eyebrows slightly, though I can already feel my lungs tighten. “You tried that before,” I tell him, trying to throw as much disdain into my voice as I can. “Didn’t get very far, did you? As I recall you didn’t get any useful information out of me even when I thought you were a Center official. What do you think you’ll get now that I know you’re just a cringing second child skulking in an underground lair . . . with my brother’s very life at stake.” I’m talking so much more bravely than I feel.