Children of Eden
Page 35
A subtle smell comes next, warm and pleasant, an animal smell I would say, if I had ever encountered an animal. It makes me feel almost comfortable . . . until the rest of my body starts to wake. I feel heat in my muscles, coolness on my skin. And still I can’t see, don’t even remember how to open my eyes.
Then the pain comes, hitting me like a stone wall, and I groan, a deep, guttural sound. Everything hurts, with every kind of pain. Muscle aches and tendon tears, cuts and scrapes and sunburn and . . . a broken heart.
“Open your eyes.” I can’t tell if the voice is inside or outside my head. I feel fingers brushing the crust of dried quicksand away from my lids. Big hands. Gentle hands.
My lashes flutter. It is dark. Was I unconscious all day? I blink, and the world snaps into place as I come fully conscious.
Golden kaleidoscope orbs look back at me, a mesmerizing mix of brown and hazel and copper. Second-child eyes. I know these eyes, I think. But they’re in the wrong face.
I saw them before in the ragged hobo. But these incredible eyes are in a young man about my age, with longish chestnut hair pushed back from a broad brow and a long crescent scar curving on his left cheekbone. I’ve seen that scar before, I think, though I can’t remember . . .
I frown in confusion, and the young man laughs at me.
It makes me angry to see his mocking face, so carefree beside all of my suffering. He’s too close to me, too. It makes me uncomfortable to feel the heat of his body on my skin. Without thinking of the consequences I shove him away from me as hard as I can and try to scramble to my feet.
It doesn’t go so well. My body seems to have locked up. I stumble over my backpack, then just sort of crawl and collapse.
I’m sure he’ll fight me, but when I shoved him he just let himself roll backward like he was playing a game with a clumsy child. He’s still laughing, damn him! Laughing at my pain and my inability to fight.
“Who are you?” I demand to know. I’m crouched awkwardly a few feet away, and feel a little more comfortable with some distance between us.
He rolls to an easy sitting position, still smiling. “I guess I need to explain a few things. You know what I am, right?” He stares intently, meaningfully, his golden eyes open wide.
I nod. “I know what you are. I want to know who you are.”
“My name is . . . Lachlan.” I notice the pause. Was he deciding whether or not to lie? Which did he choose?
I think about the familiar eyes and take a guess. “And you’re the son of that old man in rags I met earlier?”
A hint of a smile twitches at the corner of his mouth, but he catches himself. “Not quite. I am the man in rags.”
My mouth gapes.
“Pretty effective disguise, wouldn’t you say?”
I can only barely believe it. In my mind I try to layer him in grime and stink, make his hair dirty and wild, clothe him in rags. If I squint, I can just see it.
“I use a few different disguises. Hobo, student, Bestial, woman. It makes it easier for someone like me to move around Eden without attracting notice.” The smile twitches again. “Unlike you, I can’t always outrun the Greenshirts. That was some impressive work.”
“You saw me?”
Again, there’s the slightest hesitation. I think if it wasn’t for the fact that people are so new to me, so alternately fascinating and frightening, I wouldn’t be paying as close attention. What is he hiding?
“I saw part of your escape. Just at the end. I’d been looking for you, you know.”
I stare at him. “You knew about me?” He nods, and the pieces start to come together in my brain. “You’re Rook’s brother?”
Lachlan nods. “You should have heard the way he told the story. There you come out of nowhere, a second child, with his giant shoulders the only thing between you and that securitybot’s cameras. Stop, he says, to keep you from getting in the bot’s line of sight. And what do you do?”
I hang my head when I remember how I shoved Rook. He was helping me! I thought I was being so brave, and after all that was the thing that almost got me caught. Maybe it was what initially alerted the Center to my very existence.
“And he had to tackle the bot and hope that it couldn’t get a good scan of you. His supervisor was so angry with him that he got transferred to the outer circles for a six-week punishment detail. Which, as it turned out, was fortunate.”
“They would have killed me if Rook hadn’t knocked out that other Greenshirt today.”
“My brother is a good man. He joined the Greenshirts just to help . . . me.” I want to tell him I notice the pauses, realize that there are things he’s not saying, but I bite my tongue.
Instead I say, “I can’t believe I’m actually looking at an-other second child. I always assumed there must be others, but I never thought I’d meet one. How many of us are there?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know.” Before I can ask whether he’s met another second child, he asks, “How did you wind up so far from home?”
A spark of suspicion. “You know where I live?”
“One of the inner circles, I’d guess. That’s where Rook ran into you. Or you ran into him.”
I can’t help smiling, and his answering smile makes my cheeks flush. I can’t look away from his eyes. Another person like me! Meeting Lark was amazing, but this is something on an entirely different level. This is like finding family. My people. Well, my person, anyway.
“Where were you headed when the Greenshirts found you?” he presses. I open my mouth to tell him, but something urges me to be cautious. I’m almost overwhelmed by this incredible feeling of camaraderie, and I want to trust him, but I know that’s just caused by the fact that he’s also a second child. Or seems to be. Everything that’s happened has made me suspicious. I met a man with eyes like a snake’s. If he could do that, why couldn’t Lachlan get contact lenses that make him look like a second child? What if this is a trap?
“I just went out to explore,” I say cautiously. “I took an autoloop, and got lost, and . . . wound up out here.”
He nods, but I can’t tell if he really believes me. “It’s tough out there for people like us.”
“How have you managed this long?” I ask. “Do you live with your family?”
He bites his lip, and the gesture makes him look so much younger. “No,” he says, a tiny word that speaks volumes.
Then the pain comes, hitting me like a stone wall, and I groan, a deep, guttural sound. Everything hurts, with every kind of pain. Muscle aches and tendon tears, cuts and scrapes and sunburn and . . . a broken heart.
“Open your eyes.” I can’t tell if the voice is inside or outside my head. I feel fingers brushing the crust of dried quicksand away from my lids. Big hands. Gentle hands.
My lashes flutter. It is dark. Was I unconscious all day? I blink, and the world snaps into place as I come fully conscious.
Golden kaleidoscope orbs look back at me, a mesmerizing mix of brown and hazel and copper. Second-child eyes. I know these eyes, I think. But they’re in the wrong face.
I saw them before in the ragged hobo. But these incredible eyes are in a young man about my age, with longish chestnut hair pushed back from a broad brow and a long crescent scar curving on his left cheekbone. I’ve seen that scar before, I think, though I can’t remember . . .
I frown in confusion, and the young man laughs at me.
It makes me angry to see his mocking face, so carefree beside all of my suffering. He’s too close to me, too. It makes me uncomfortable to feel the heat of his body on my skin. Without thinking of the consequences I shove him away from me as hard as I can and try to scramble to my feet.
It doesn’t go so well. My body seems to have locked up. I stumble over my backpack, then just sort of crawl and collapse.
I’m sure he’ll fight me, but when I shoved him he just let himself roll backward like he was playing a game with a clumsy child. He’s still laughing, damn him! Laughing at my pain and my inability to fight.
“Who are you?” I demand to know. I’m crouched awkwardly a few feet away, and feel a little more comfortable with some distance between us.
He rolls to an easy sitting position, still smiling. “I guess I need to explain a few things. You know what I am, right?” He stares intently, meaningfully, his golden eyes open wide.
I nod. “I know what you are. I want to know who you are.”
“My name is . . . Lachlan.” I notice the pause. Was he deciding whether or not to lie? Which did he choose?
I think about the familiar eyes and take a guess. “And you’re the son of that old man in rags I met earlier?”
A hint of a smile twitches at the corner of his mouth, but he catches himself. “Not quite. I am the man in rags.”
My mouth gapes.
“Pretty effective disguise, wouldn’t you say?”
I can only barely believe it. In my mind I try to layer him in grime and stink, make his hair dirty and wild, clothe him in rags. If I squint, I can just see it.
“I use a few different disguises. Hobo, student, Bestial, woman. It makes it easier for someone like me to move around Eden without attracting notice.” The smile twitches again. “Unlike you, I can’t always outrun the Greenshirts. That was some impressive work.”
“You saw me?”
Again, there’s the slightest hesitation. I think if it wasn’t for the fact that people are so new to me, so alternately fascinating and frightening, I wouldn’t be paying as close attention. What is he hiding?
“I saw part of your escape. Just at the end. I’d been looking for you, you know.”
I stare at him. “You knew about me?” He nods, and the pieces start to come together in my brain. “You’re Rook’s brother?”
Lachlan nods. “You should have heard the way he told the story. There you come out of nowhere, a second child, with his giant shoulders the only thing between you and that securitybot’s cameras. Stop, he says, to keep you from getting in the bot’s line of sight. And what do you do?”
I hang my head when I remember how I shoved Rook. He was helping me! I thought I was being so brave, and after all that was the thing that almost got me caught. Maybe it was what initially alerted the Center to my very existence.
“And he had to tackle the bot and hope that it couldn’t get a good scan of you. His supervisor was so angry with him that he got transferred to the outer circles for a six-week punishment detail. Which, as it turned out, was fortunate.”
“They would have killed me if Rook hadn’t knocked out that other Greenshirt today.”
“My brother is a good man. He joined the Greenshirts just to help . . . me.” I want to tell him I notice the pauses, realize that there are things he’s not saying, but I bite my tongue.
Instead I say, “I can’t believe I’m actually looking at an-other second child. I always assumed there must be others, but I never thought I’d meet one. How many of us are there?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know.” Before I can ask whether he’s met another second child, he asks, “How did you wind up so far from home?”
A spark of suspicion. “You know where I live?”
“One of the inner circles, I’d guess. That’s where Rook ran into you. Or you ran into him.”
I can’t help smiling, and his answering smile makes my cheeks flush. I can’t look away from his eyes. Another person like me! Meeting Lark was amazing, but this is something on an entirely different level. This is like finding family. My people. Well, my person, anyway.
“Where were you headed when the Greenshirts found you?” he presses. I open my mouth to tell him, but something urges me to be cautious. I’m almost overwhelmed by this incredible feeling of camaraderie, and I want to trust him, but I know that’s just caused by the fact that he’s also a second child. Or seems to be. Everything that’s happened has made me suspicious. I met a man with eyes like a snake’s. If he could do that, why couldn’t Lachlan get contact lenses that make him look like a second child? What if this is a trap?
“I just went out to explore,” I say cautiously. “I took an autoloop, and got lost, and . . . wound up out here.”
He nods, but I can’t tell if he really believes me. “It’s tough out there for people like us.”
“How have you managed this long?” I ask. “Do you live with your family?”
He bites his lip, and the gesture makes him look so much younger. “No,” he says, a tiny word that speaks volumes.
