“We are about to depart. This train is on a designated Greater track and is state-of-the-art, amazingly fast.”
I stared at him.
“You’ll need to rest. We will arrive in Olympus in only a few hours.” He looked at me and I looked away, out the window. The leaves had begun fallen off of the trees. Stragglers clung for dear life to the knobby, awkward limbs that birthed them just months ago, like toddling children to the legs of their parents. The full harvest moon stood proud in the sky spilling light over the landscape.
I realized that I now sat on the same train that Kyan had dragged me up the hill to look at just after those from the other Lesser villages had arrived. We had climbed the hill just up there, on the hill beyond the depot and took it all in. The sleek styling of the car seemed new and awesome as we stared, taking in the unusual shape and curve of the metal that night. I had no idea then that it would be a prison, a hound dragging me back to hell with it.
“I’ll sleep on the couch. You take the bed.”
He walked to the bedside, tugged down several stark blankets and then the pale sheet. He stepped back and dragged his hand down his face before approaching me on the couch. “Please?” He extended his hand to me. Ignoring it, I rose and stepped around him, collapsing upon the plush bed before covering myself completely. I imagined the charcoal tracks of my tears staining his spotless pillow and a grim satisfaction bloomed in my chest.
I had to do something. I couldn’t let the Greaters get away with this. They had to be stopped. Perhaps Olympus should know about the secrets their King has made. Perhaps I could learn to lie, too—at least until the truth needed to come out.
The muffled sounds of him shrugging off his jacket, unlacing his shoes and kicking them off, and then settling on the couch filled my ears. I wondered if he pulled the fur blanket over himself. He blew out a tense breath. The blankets that covered me sealed me in their warmth, cocooning me, while the sheets and featherbed below me softly cradled my body. After a while, I heard his soft, even breaths. Peeking out at him, I leaned forward to see him better. Crew lay on his back on the couch, one arm beneath his head and the other draped over his eyes. Sleep did not claim me during the train ride. I lay curled up on my side, clutching the blankets and watching my region slip away from me.
THE TRAIN BEGAN TO SLOW steadily a few hours later, just as Crew said it would. It was still dark outside, but the full moon created a sickly pale blue glow over the landscape. It was desolate. Silhouettes of bare trees scattered along what look like marshes stretch on as far as the eye could see. There were no houses. No buildings or signs of human beings anywhere.
I threw my covers off and padded to the window, taking a seat at the small table across from Crew, who still snored lightly. We slowed more and then passed between enormous gates made of concrete. Two halves of the Olympian insignia was carved on either side of the entrance, illuminated by bright lights. I watched out the window in awe of the enormous concrete and metal structure.
It was taller than I could stretch to see out the window. As we were riding in the last train car, we had a panoramic view out the very back window. After we passed through the gate, I could see an enormous shiny, silver door slide closed and seal itself behind us. We were in the city. The City of Greaters.
Great towering metal and brick stacks stretched to the sky pouring steam and black smoke into the air. One skinny, tall tower even spewed flames into the atmosphere. Tiny lights flickered throughout the area. I scrambled to see it again, but it was already out of sight. “Factories,” Crew said, sleep clouding his voice. He yawned widely and stretched his back out like a cat. Factories. I’d heard of them. They were where the Greaters took the things we grew and turned them into other things: wheat into flour, apples into applesauce, sliced apples, etc.
What I didn’t imagine was how enormous and widespread these structures were. Some seemed tall enough to brush the sky. The train crawled along until the factories were completely behind us. More forest surrounded us for a time until finally, the trees thinned. “Here.” Crew stepped behind me and leaned over my head, fiddling with the window, until it dropped down. “What do you smell?”
I sniffed the air. A faint smell of smoke filled the air. “Smoke?”
Crew laughed. “It lingers from the factories, but what else do you smell?”
I stood up and stuck my head out the window. The wind whipped my hair across my face. I could smell the lavender soap that I used to wash it with just last evening. But, that wasn’t it. Something else hung heavy in the air. I closed my eyes. Salt. That’s strange.
“I smell...salt.”
Crew sat in the seat across from me and smiled proudly. “Yes. You smell the ocean. The salt water.”
“The ocean?”
“Yes. Olympus is settled near the ocean.”
The sky was no longer the deep sapphire of the dead of night. It faded to cerulean and lighter still to the east. The train seemed to be circling to the left, in a wide arc. “If you want the best view of Olympus, come here.” Crew crossed the train car and stood silently on the opposite side of the car, at the windows near the couch. He ticked his head for me to come.
I stood and slowly walked over. “Look.” His eyes tracked to the right and mine followed suit. The trees that surrounded us disappeared suddenly, and plush lawns surrounding stark white buildings, at least six stories high lined up one after the other, one behind the other, in a matrix of green and white. “What are those buildings?”
“Housing. Every Greater male is assigned housing based upon how many family members reside with him. With the current...situation, our housing for couples is currently overflowing.”
Of course it was. If housing was assigned based upon the number of family members and no Greaters were currently able to conceive, it would definitely be overcrowded. Didn’t they understand what that meant? Or were there bigger factors playing out here? Were the Greaters afraid to question their King? Perhaps being a Greater wasn’t so wonderful after all.
The housing buildings, or complexes, as Crew called them, grew larger, the buildings taller. All were white. The train slowed. Its wheels grated and squealed. “Almost there.”
“Where?”
“City Center.” I looked for him for clarification. He ticked his head to the right again. In the distance, enormous structures burst forth from the ground. I lowered the window and stuck my head out to see the tops of them as we began to pass by.
“Oh my gosh! What are these? Are these houses?”
Crew chuckled. “No. Well, not exactly. Some are apartment buildings, where a family lives on each floor. Some are offices, where people work. Business is conducted.”
“Greaters work?” My mouth hung open and I shut it quickly, feeling my cheeks warm.
“It’s okay. Some do work. It takes a lot of organization to keep a city clean and functioning properly. To keep food distributed fairly, for example.”
“Do Greaters work in the factories?” I marveled at the passing structures that were tall as the clouds and painted to mirror the same, craning my neck to see their tops. They must have been a thousand feet tall. Maybe more.
After clearing his throat, Crew answered, “No. We have Lessers that work in that district. They work in the factories. Their housing is also within the district walls. They live and work just outside the city, separated from the Greaters, but still within its walls. They receive food and goods for their role in helping the City of Olympus.”
I nodded. The train wheels screamed, slowed, and jerked to a stop. I was jerked forward, but steadied myself on the window sill. Immediately, the warmth from Crew’s hands upon my waist registered with my brain. For a split second, I wanted to wrap my arms around him and press my lips to his. But, then I remembered that this is all some sick game to him and pushed his hands away.
“Abby.” His eyes clenched shut.
“Look, I’m not happy and I’m not going to pretend like I am. You forced me to come here.
You put this…thing on me and claimed me like some piece of property.” I spat. “You cannot expect things to be the same after lying to me, earning my trust, and then treating me like the Lesser I am. If you had been honest with me from the beginning, we wouldn’t be here right now. Blame yourself.” His eyes of molten gold met mine.
“And what did your Father mean about me being born a Greater? I’ve been a lesser all my life.”
He shook his head and walked to a five drawer dresser next to the bed, removing something from the top of it and returning to me. A mirror. Glass framed in smooth, cool silver. “Look at your eyes, Abby.”
He extended the mirror and I grabbed hold of it, but not before rolling my eyes at him for good measure. My eyes were blue. Always have been. Lulu said that’s why my father named me Abigail Blue Kelley. I held the heavy oval in front of me. It was so clear, I gasped when I saw myself.
The mirrors at home were dark and distorted the images they reflected. If you were lucky, you’d be able to tell if your clothes matched and were crooked, but in this orb, I could see every pore in the flesh of my face. My lips were still pink from Laney’s ministrations last night. My nose was small and slightly upturned.
The brows that guarded my eyes matched my dark, auburn hair. Black tracks stretched from beneath my eyes, fading away as they trailed down my cheeks before fading away, making the skin of my face feel tight, stretched. My eyes were blue. Very blue. A deep, blue, not so dark as the sapphire of last night, but not like the daytime sky either. A blue settled somewhere in between. Lighter blue streaks radiated from the black pupils in the center. I looked at one and then the other. Then I saw it. I gasped. Oh my God.
Moving the mirror closer, it brushed my nose. The pupil of my eye was encircled by a small, golden ring. The ring? It must be what Mr. Cole was talking about last night. “You see it.” It wasn’t a question.
“Yes,” I whispered.
“Do you understand?”
“No.”
“After the first vaccinations were given out, changes in the iris of the eyeball of recipients were noted. Usually a small, golden ring appeared around the pupil. Within a couple of generations, the rings became almost a genetic trait. Do you know what that is?”
He wasn’t condescending when he asked. “No, and what is an iris. I know what the pupil of the eye is. It’s the black ball in the center.”
“Yes. The iris is the colored portion of the eye. Genetic traits are passed down from parents to their children, generation to generation. Like hair color, for instance, or the ability to roll the tongue, like this...” He demonstrated, twisting his tongue to the side. I mimicked his motions. I could roll mine, too! “Yes. You got that ability from one or both of your parents. The stronger the trait, the more often it is passed down in the family line.”
“I understand.”
“So, all Greaters are born with a golden ring, even if it’s small, like yours. After the person is vaccinated, the medicines within cause the ring to spread. My ring was quite large, so after my inoculation, the gold spread almost all the way to the edges, erasing most of the brown that had been there. Scientists aren’t sure why this happens, but it isn’t something harmful to the individual or detrimental to society, like the infertility of the Greater women. So, it is accepted and ignored. Eventually all Greaters will have completely golden irises.”
“Couldn’t some Lessers have a ring?”
“No.” His fingers brushed my eyelashes gently. My breath hitched. “You said your parents gave you to Lulu, that they couldn’t raise you?”
I nodded. “Can I suggest something and can you please not get angry at me for it?” I nodded again, looking into his eyes. “Perhaps, they sent you a way to keep you safe. So that you wouldn’t receive the vaccines. Wouldn’t be barren later in life.”
WE WERE STOPPED OUTSIDE AN enormous three story building. Its sparkling glass facade glistened in the moonlight. The large panes were settled in between pieces of white metal. What is with this preoccupation with white? Screams of the girls in the other cars echoed through the metal and glass of the train car, and out into the early morning air.
They were herded into the sterile building like cattle. Guards, dressed in head-to-toe black, armed with large black guns slung across their shoulders escorted the women and stood guard outside of our car. Crew raised the windows, but his eyes took in the scene unfolding around us. We couldn’t see all of the cars, but could clearly see the three ahead of us and what was happening to them. Some were being dragged by arms and hair into the building where they disappeared behind heavy wooden doors, silence and sterility swallowing them whole.
Laney stepped off of the car that was just ahead of us. She planted her feet and raised her hands. I’d never known her to be much of a fighter, but I understood her primal need to protect herself.
My eyes were torn away from her when a sucking sound of air filled the cabin and a tall guard stepped up into it. His hair was black and short around the sides. The top half of his hair was longer and it fell lazily into his eyes. The signature golden rings of his eyes were surrounded by a strange brown-orange color. “She has to be processed, Sir.” He addressed Crew, glancing briefly at me and then back at him.
“No.”
“Your father sent me. She must be cleaned and processed. The King has ordered it.”
“Tell my father that she will be cleaned by our staff, not here. Not like this.” Crew positioned himself between the guard and me. He was protecting me. I couldn’t help but feel grateful and at the same time wonder if this was another act, another manipulation.
“I can go with him.”
“No,” his eyes pierced mine. “No.” He shook his head almost imperceptibly.
The guard looked outside the door. “He refuses,” he shouted to someone below.
More footsteps. Two more guards stepped into the small space.
“Crew.” I tried again.
“No, Abby.”
“Crew, just let me go.”
“No!” he roared, causing me to jerk backward from his harshness.
One of the guards pointed a small device at Crew. Crew looked haughtily at him until the man pushed a series of buttons. Immediately, Crew grasped the back of his neck. He dropped like a stone to his knees, and then collapsed face-first onto the floor.
“Come with me, now.” The guard who aimed that strange device at Crew and his partner, exited the train car. The guard with black hair and strange eyes, stood before me extending his hand. “Easy way or hard way, Lesser. It’s your choice.”
I looked at Crew beside me and back at his large hand. His skin was tan, unlike Crew’s and his family’s. “What did you do to him?”
“He was immobilized. He’ll wake up shortly, so we need to hurry.”
“Will he be okay?”
He snorted. “He’ll have a headache, but don’t worry. Can’t kill the Crown Prince.”
I huffed and gathered my skirts. “Fine.” Ignoring his hand, I stepped away from Crew. His chest moved up and down rhythmically. He was still alive.
The guard chuckled at my blatant refusal. “That’s a first. Most of the other girls are terrified. A couple of them even tried to climb me.”
“I’m not like the other girls.” I stomped around him, down the steps and out into the cool dawn.
∞
I MOVED TOWARD THE BUILDING where the other girls had been shoved into, with the guard following close behind. My hands shook violently as I lifted the skirt of the gown to ascend the few stone steps leading to that dreadful wooden door. I turned to look back at the train car before I grasped the handle. Strange eyes looked at me. “What happens in here?” I gulped down my nervousness.
“You will be cleaned, evaluated medically, and screened for disease,” he answered automatically.
“Then why are they screaming?” His jaw clenched as I opened the door and we were assaulted with the sounds of terror and the harsh smell of disinfectant.
�
��I don’t know,” he muttered.
I stopped before gathering a deep breath of fresh air.
“Go on.” He poked me in the back with his gun.
“Not necessary. I’ll walk in of my own accord. My dignity is the last thing I will allow you Greaters to take from me.” And with that, I gathered my skirt and walked inside, shoulders back, confidence fueling my steps forward.
The scene in front of me was more horrible than I had imagined from the opposite side of the door. The women were being lined up, forcibly stripped of their clothing, shoved into strange white paper dresses, and herded from one station to another.
Greaters wearing the strange glasses were examining their heads and hair, before ushering them into tiny stalls from which huge billows of steam erupted. Others were having lights shone into their eyes and ears, flat wooden sticks shoved on their tongues.
Their bodies were being poked and prodded. Machines were squeezing their arms and then beeping frantically. One was lying flat while a doctor scanned her stomach with some sort of wand. A square on the wall projected a grainy black and white image of what the strange wand saw inside the girl’s stomach, my guard explained.
A skinny, middle-aged woman with sharp cheekbones and a matching nose approached me. “Take her to the first line,” she ordered the guard behind me, refusing to address me. The look in her beady eyes said that I’d been found wanting. I watched as her dark pony tail swished away behind her. Before he could poke me in the back again, I turned sharply. His hand was already moving his gun forward. I pushed my finger into his face. “Don’t poke me with that thing again. I’m not fighting you.”
He nodded toward the furthest line and moved the gun back closer to his chest. I walked across the room and settled in at the back of the line. Laney stepped out of the steam closet and gasped when she saw me. “Abby!” she yelled. “Abby!” She tried to run toward me. I shook my head, tried to motion for her to be quiet but she refused. She was frantic. Two guards seized either of her arms and a Greater male stepped forward and quickly injected her with something.
Reap (The Harvest Saga Book 1) Page 18