Elites of Eden

by Joey Graceffa

  “There had to be a reason,” I muse. “But what?”

  “You’re special in some way,” Lark says.

  I grin at her. “I’m glad you think so! But why would they?”

  She reaches up to fleetingly stroke a lock of my hair. “Anyone would think you’re special, Rowan.”

  For a second I have a bitter thought. It’s Rowan who’s special, not me. I’m a creation, an experiment.

  I echo the last aloud. “I’m an experiment.”

  Lark nods. “Maybe. We know that other second children have gone missing. None of ours, but there have been others we didn’t discover in time. And a few who didn’t want to live isolated from Eden. Those who have black market lenses and try to pass up above. They vanish, and we always thought they were killed. But maybe they were . . . changed, like you.”

  “You said they are messing with everyone’s minds, through the lenses. Maybe, with me and other second children, they want to see how far they can push it. It might be easy for them to tweak a few perceptions, alter a recollection here and there. With me, they wanted to see if they could change an entire person. Turn me into someone who isn’t a threat to Eden.”

  “I think you’re close to the truth,” Lark says. “But still, I think there must be something about you in particular. Some reason the Center is especially interested in you.”

  “I just hope I remember something useful,” I say.

  “Don’t think about that now. There’s nothing we can do until after the surgery. Flame should be here sometime today.”

  I dress, and we go out for breakfast. I want so badly to ask about Lachlan, but I don’t quite dare. Something about the way Lark prickles whenever someone mentions his name makes me wary.

  The morning passes happily, with Lark and Ash telling me all about my old self. We play guessing games at the foot of the tree, perched on roots that rise above the earth like massive sinuous snakes. Guess what your bedroom looked like, Ash asks. I guess it had multicolored lights like my room at Oaks does. I realize now that it looks a lot like the interior of the crystal cavern. I wonder if my subconscious mind directed me. I’m disappointed to learn that my bedroom at home was simple, disguised as a storage or guest room to hide the fact that there was an illegal second child living there.

  “Do you remember Mom?” Ash asks.

  The image of Chief Ellena flashes though my mind, but I shove it aside and reach out for any tendril of memory. There are sensations of what a mother should be—warm and loving and protective—and I can’t quite associate these with the Chief. So they must be from my real mom.

  “I can’t remember her face,” I admit, and feel tears welling.

  “It’s okay,” Ash says. “She’s there, inside you. She loves you just as much whether you remember her or not. Even if she’s not alive. That’s what mothers do. They love you forever, no matter what.”

  Near lunchtime, Ash and Lark are called away to kitchen duties. I suggest joining them, but they want me to relax. “You should take a nap. Be relaxed for when Flame comes.”

  I agree, tying not to think about the prospect of surgery. Eye surgery. Ew. Just the idea of it makes me quiver.

  I head toward my room, but when I’m almost there I have an impulse. I stop one of the second children passing me—a man in his thirties—and ask which room is Lachlan’s. He gives me a knowing look that makes me flush pink, and I hear him chuckle when I walk in the direction he indicates. I wonder whether a lot of girls seek out Lachlan’s room. I quickly force the thought away. I have no business thinking things like that.

  His room is at the very top. When he steps out of it every morning he can look into the highest branches of the canopy.

  I raise my knuckles to knock . . . and stop.

  What am I going to say? I found connections with Lark, and reconnecting with Ash was easy. But the idea of meeting Lachlan makes me flustered.

  You’re being stupid, I tell myself. He’s a friend. He’ll be happy to see you. And you’ll like him because you liked him before, when you were Rowan. It will be easy.

  Through pure force of will I make my knuckles hit the door. Three slow, uneven raps.

  Nothing.

  I knock again, almost relieved that he isn’t there. Maybe he’s on a mission. Maybe I won’t have to see him until I remember him, and know the reason why the mere sound of his name makes my legs a little weak.

  I turn to go, but an irresistible force makes me whirl back almost at once. I lean my shoulder against the door, and casually, almost as if it were an accident, I push the door slowly open. My body sways into the empty space, and I peek in.

  I breathe the air of his room, and the scent awakens a hunger in me, as if I’m a starving girl smelling food. The pervasive sharp smell of camphor mingles with a warm scent I can only describe as “boy” and a warm, woody spiciness. It’s an exciting smell, and it draws me farther inside.

  “Hello?” I call out, hoping at this point not to get an answer. Because now I’m unabashedly snooping. I flip on the light. . . . and find a museum.

  Artwork covers every wall. Real canvases with vibrant oil paint, scraps of paper with pencil sketches. I’m mesmerized by the scenes. Animals, vivid and alive in dying landscapes. A minimalist portrait of the little girl Rainbow, with all of her vivacity captured in a few quick bold lines.

  Then I turn and see the mural covering the wall directly opposite his bed.

  It’s me.

  My hair is dark, long, and flowing over shoulders left bare by a gauzy white robe that seems to be less an article of clothing than a stray wisp of fabric blown across my body by a stray breeze. There are flowers woven in my hair, bright spots of white and pink in my almost black locks. The artist has positioned the image so that the contours in the stone walls mimic the shape of my body, making me look like I’m emerging from the rock itself like a magical woman.

  Behind the mural of me are a hundred creatures, big and small, spread out like worshipers around a goddess. Each one is paired, like with like. A maned lion nuzzles against the flank of a golden lioness. A gaudy peacock spreads his tail protectively around a sleek brown peahen. Every animal is gazing at me with hope. At the very back, tucked in the shadow of a recess in the rock wall, is an image of another human. A man. I lean in close, but I can’t make out his features. He alone isn’t looking at the flowery goddess image. His head is bowed.

  I step back and look at the central figure. Now I’m not so sure it is meant to depict me. The facial structure is the same—wide-spaced eyes, strong, angled jaw, the firm chin with a thumbprint dimple. But one thing is completely different.

  The artist gave me kaleidoscope eyes. Vivid, vibrant, complicated second child eyes faceted with hues of green and gray and blue, with a starburst of gold radiating from deep black pupils.

  Is that what I looked like when I was Rowan? Those eyes transform my face, make me look magical. I touch the contours of my own face, caressing my skin as I search for confirmation that this lovely creation is me. What skill the artist has. It must be Lachlan who did all these pictures.

  But why has he covered a huge percentage of his bedroom with a picture of me. I must be the first thing he sees when he wakes up, the last thing he sees before he falls asleep. I am painted with such loving detail. He must spend hours looking at my face, when I don’t even have a clue what he looks like. I don’t quite understand it.

  “What are you doing . . . Oh! It’s you.” The voice behind me goes from aggressive to shocked to tender to confused all within those few words. I whirl, and see a young man who looks a few years older than I am. He has chestnut hair worn a little long, cut haphazardly, pushed away from a handsome face with a scar shaped like a long crescent moon slashed across his left cheekbone. In the shadow of the doorway his eyes look flat brown, and he could pass for a legal first child. But as soon as he steps into the light, his e
yes come alive with nuances of hazel and gold speckled in the rich brown.

  “Lachlan?” I ask in a whisper.

  He doesn’t answer, which I find incredibly frustrating. I hold out my hand formally, a little stiffly. “Hi, I’m Yarrow.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Well, yeah, but I mean . . . I am now. But I was . . .” Everyone else in the Underground has made this pretty easy for me. They completely understand that though they might know me as Rowan, inside my head I’m completely Yarrow. Lachlan is making me feel like I have to explain what ought to be obvious.

  But I can tell he’s not having an easy time of it himself, and I feel a flash of sympathy even through my annoyance.

  It’s strange to see such a big, strong man look so flustered. He takes my hand, but I can tell he’s not really aware of that. He’s looking at my eyes. I see his own gaze flicker just for a second to the mural, to the girl who is so much like me but with the exceptional second child eyes. When he shifts his gaze back to me I swear he looks disappointed.

  Offended, I jerk my hand away, but try to make myself be pleasant. They say he was a good friend, once, so I owe it to him to be civil. Though at the moment I don’t know what I could see in this tongue-tied, surly looking boy.

  Lightly, I say, “I was admiring your artwork. It’s amazing. They say that I was an artist, back when I was Rowan, but I don’t remember. Still, I can’t imagine I was anything like as talented as you.” I gesture to the mural. “Take this, for example. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything quite like it.”

  I turn back to him and say, more sharply than I mean to, “Rowan must have meant a lot to you, for you to paint her like that.” I’m trying to provoke a reaction . . . and I get one.

  “I . . . I can’t.” His voice is anguished. “This is just too much. I don’t know how to do this!” He turns and strides swiftly out of his own bedroom, and I get the impression it is only amazing self-control that keeps him from breaking into a run.

  “Lachlan!” I call down the walkway after him. He gives no sign of hearing.

  Other people do, though. In a moment Iris climbs the stairs to this level, hiking up her skirts to take them two at a time on her short, strong legs.

  “So you’ve seen Lach at last, have you now?”

  “Yes,” I say, confused and cross. “And I can’t imagine what Rowan saw in him. He’s strange, and not very friendly.”

  She sighs. “I look after the children of the Underground, you know. For all that Lachlan may seem like a man, he’s a boy in many ways. The same angry, defensive boy I took in when his family abandoned him. He’s not good at showing his feelings.”

  “But if we were friends, why can’t he just—”

  She doesn’t even let me go on. “Friends to you, maybe. You never said, and I couldn’t tell for sure in the time you were here. But Lachlan is in love with you. With Rowan. Of course it is killing him to have you back . . . and not her.”

  She pats me on the shoulder as I take all that in. “Be gentle with him,” she says. “He’s had a hard few months with you gone.” She shakes her head. “A hard life, in fact.”

  She makes the little clucking sound I heard her make to the children, and leaves me alone outside the room of the mysterious boy who loves me.

  It makes sense. Why would he paint such a picture if he didn’t love me?

  The thought makes me squirm with discomfort and happiness both. The happiness is instinctive. Some deep part of me is naturally gratified. But is scares me, too, to think that I might be loved by someone I don’t even know.

  PART OF ME now wishes I was back at Oaks. That life might not have been real, but it was real to me. It might have had its complications, but they were nothing compared to this. I love the Underground already, and the people I’ve met. Still, it was easier being a rich girl at Oaks.

  I consider going to my room, but I know I’ll just lie on my back thinking way too much. Luckily the children get out of class for midday break and, when they spot me, break into a run. They’re intensely physical and wild, shrieking and clinging to me and patting my arms. One sturdy boy about ten years old pulls my head down so he can stare into my flat gray eyes. “Completely weird,” he says, but without any malice.

  “Have you ever seen eyes with lenses?” I ask him when he lets me go.

  He shakes his head. “I haven’t been up top since I was a baby.”

  “Yeah,” Rainbow says as she clenches the loose fabric of my pants in one chubby little fist in a proprietary way. “The up-there is full of monsters.” She thinks a minute, then her eyes dance. “Ohhh . . . have you seen any monsters?”

  She looks at me hopefully, and the other children start to bounce up and down, shouting, “Monsters! Monsters!”

  Mercifully, the children are distracting me from my worries. I’m caught up in the surging little bodies as if in a flood, borne to the base of the tree. They drag me down and beg me to tell them stories about the surface. “The other adults don’t tell us hardly anything,” Rainbow protests. “Make it good.”

  “Make it scary!” another chimes in.

  “I’ll do better than that,” I say, getting into it. “I’ll make it true.”

  So I devise the perfect monster for these eager little second children. As they cluster around me with their beautiful complicated eyes latched onto me, I tell them about Pearl.

  I exaggerate a bit. Oh, okay, I exaggerate a lot. The kids eat it up.

  “The best monsters are the most beautiful ones,” I confide to them in a low voice. “Because then, you can’t tell right away that they’re monsters. They’re so lovely they make you want to be with them. Want to be like them. That’s how they trap you. And then, once you can’t escape, they destroy you.”

  “Unless you fight back!” Rainbow shouts. There are cries of agreement. I like these kids.

  “Exactly,” I say. “And you should always fight back. Anyway, one day the monster Pearl saw a young woman who was as beautiful as she was, with lilac . . . no, pink hair.” Luckily they’re so excited about the story they don’t notice my slip. “Only this pink-haired girl was kind and good and brave. So of course the monster Pearl wanted to end her. So that night she filled her fangs with poison, sharpened her claws, and . . .”

  I fill their little heads with the most extravagant tales of the surface. Stories of securitybots stalking unwary second children and mowing them down. Rumors of the gangs of Greenshirts who snatch people and drag them away to unimaginable horrors at the Center.

  None of it is exactly true, but it is true enough to thrill them, and give them enough to fear that they are happy to be safe in the Underground.

  They are begging for another story when there’s a commotion from the top-level balcony. High up, I see Lachlan standing with a lithe woman with fiery red hair. Down below, people are waving to her. From another balcony Ash calls out to me, “Rowan, it’s Flame! She’s finally here!”

  So much for the distraction of scary fairy tales. Now I have to live the real-life story—strange boys, lost memories, surgery, and all.

  With regret, I rise, and I’m smothered in hugs before I can get away. “You’ll be fine,” Rainbow says as she bestows a squishy, sticky kiss on my cheek. “Lach wouldn’t let anything bad happen to you.”

  My feet feel impossibly heavy as I trudge up the steps I ran so blithely down before. I want the truth . . . but I know the truth is going to be hard.

  Is this the right decision? I think about my life at Oaks. It isn’t perfect, but it’s mine, and I’ve seen just barely enough of the rest of Eden to know it’s better than a lot of other possibilities. Even now I could just go back to my old life. Don’t we all delude ourselves in one way or another? I was happy, more or less. Will finding out the truth make me happier? Maybe the truth is overrated.

  Or maybe happiness isn’t the most impo
rtant thing.

  I’m still torn by the time I climb to meet them. A crowd has gathered. Ash, Lark, and Iris have joined Lachlan and the cybersurgeon Flame, as well as a few people I don’t recognize. There’s an older man, hard and serious, with black hair streaked with silver and an off-center nose. He nods to me, then I see his eyes cut quickly to Lachlan.

  “I’m Flint, leader of the Underground,” he says as he imposes his bulk between me and everyone else. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here to greet you properly yesterday, sister.” The word “sister” sends a little shiver of pleasure through me. “But these are trying times, and we’re all busy. And on edge.” He looks over at a powerful woman whose bare arms are twined with snake tattoos. “Are you certain she wasn’t followed? Double the sentries, just in case. Now in particular we can’t take any unnecessary risks.”

  He claps a hand on my shoulder. “You’ve been returned to us at an ideal time, Rowan. We’ve been gathering intelligence, forming alliances. We have plans that may alter the fate of second children.”

  “There’s still the final vote,” Lachlan growls from behind him.

  Flint flicks a mere glance at him over his shoulder, as if he’s no more than a troublesome child. “We’ve put enough resources into this scheme that the vote is a foregone conclusion.”

  “Your plan puts the entire Underground at risk!”

  “We know the risk,” the tattooed woman interjects. “If we succeed, everything will change for us. And if we fail, well, at least we’ll go down fighting.”

  “And the children?” Lachlan asks. “Will they go down fighting, too?”

  The woman glares at him until Flint barks, “Enough! This is a matter for future debate. For now it is imperative that Flame retrieve Rowan’s memories.”