The Kindred Few (The Kindred Few Book 1)

Chapter 1

The bell tolls for the dead.

I straighten my back as I follow the Citadel guard to the court. The blue feathers attached to his tall white hat sway back and forth as he leads me through the maze of hallways. A single tear traces a path down my cheek, but no one is there to wipe it away. The solitude amplifies the ache in my chest.

I clutch my mother’s ledger, not wanting to part with her delicate script filling the pages. Everything else she owned has been turned over to the government.

We approach the towering white doors of the Council Room. Its imposing presence is meant to intimidate, entry reserved only for those with the proper credentials or court-ordered purpose.

“Name.” The courtroom guards take over, dismissing the burly man who led me from my apartment in the Vitalis Sector.

My gaze is on his shiny black boots rather than his steely eyes, intent on malice. This will not be a pleasant visit to the court. They hold my fate in their hands.

I swallow back the lump in my throat. “Maribel Nexis Windsong.” I leave off my father’s hyphenated name, no longer identifying him as kin. With my mother’s death, I’m officially an orphan.

“Age.” His harsh voice echoes through the great hall, causing bystanders to stop and stare.

I dare to look up at the man, his chiseled jaw composed of sharp angles, shaved clean with a razor as it is with all men in the city. He wears the white-and-blue uniform of a soldier, the men and women who cleansed the capital city of Avren over three decades ago. Today, they’re more ceremonial, using the most handsome specimens to adorn the streets of the city in their fancy uniforms.

“Seventeen.” I bite down on my lip, my admission punctuated by the subtle taste of copper. It is a capital offense to lie, so I tell the truth. My age will seal my fate. If my mother had waited three more weeks to succumb to the ravaging sickness, things could have been much different. I draw in a deep breath, my mind swirling with self-loathing for holding such thoughts.

The guard points to a stone bench inside the door. Two others are there already. One a teenager and one a man. “Wait here. The Council will call you up when they are ready.”

The bench is cold beneath my skirt. An appointment with the leaders of the city means I’m dressed in my finest garments, tailored for Citizens of Avren: pale green shirt that matches my eyes, along with a white skirt with flowers embroidered throughout the material. The only real flowers we see in Avren are brought in from the wilderness by the Undesirables.

I crack my knuckles in a nervous habit and glance at the two sharing the bench with me. The boy beside me wears dark trousers and a crisp shirt, freshly pressed and laundered. He is a Citizen like me, no more than sixteen. His face is damp with tears.

The other wears brown trousers, a dirty shirt that may have been white at some point in its existence, and a cap. The clothing of an Undesirable. He is well built, with tousled sandy-blond hair. His chiseled jawline and light scruff on his face suggest a man in his mid-twenties. Without warning, his eyes meet mine, and he winks, causing my face to flame.

I scoot closer to the edge of the bench, trying to avoid the sickness that took my mother. Undesirables carry it, but it only transmits by touch.

My mother was too careless. Our house cleaner, Caron, became a good friend to her. She’d even take her to coffee in the neutral zone, a place that shut down once the sickness spread. Caron died two weeks before my mother.

A guard appears in the courtroom’s doorway, a clipboard in his hand. “Grayson Elrod.”

The Undesirable at the other end of the bench stands and follows the guard. The government usually reserves court proceedings for Citizens. Undesirables are shot, not tried.

I don’t talk to the boy beside me. His tears tell me he’s here for the same reason. Orphaned Citizen children not of age have only one destiny.

Instead, I stare at the heavy straps of my heels, clicking the toes together. In three weeks, my eighteenth birthday would have allowed me to move into an apartment of my own. The city requires parents to set aside credits for the children they choose to raise. Many Citizens decided not to have children because of this rule and the arduous process of growing their baby in a test tube.

My mother told me parents used to have babies naturally, when two people fell in love and created a new life together. This process, she said, now belongs to the Unseen, forbidden in our society. If an Undesirable woman becomes with child, she needs to hide it or get rid of the baby. A pregnant woman cannot work in the later stages of her pregnancy. If the child goes to full term, the Council forces the parents to give it away to a Citizen.

The night my mother told me about the way people had babies in the Unseen, I laid on my bed and stared up at the ceiling for hours. As a lady, it is unacceptable to have a man in my bedroom, but something about the idea sent a rush of heat through me. The Citizens of Avren are humane, not forcing their women to carry babies. Growing them in the laboratory makes a lot more sense. The ladies of Avren don’t have to lose their figures and can carry on with their lives. If they choose to have a baby, they can hire an Undesirable nurse to care for it.

“Maribel Windsong.” The guard reads my name as if he is reading a dictionary from Avren’s library.

The weight of the boy’s eyes bears down on me as I stand and follow the guard into the chamber. My heart thuds. My fate is already sealed. This is only a formality.

Five Council members occupy thrones at the front of the room—three men and two women, all adorned in blue ceremonial robes with white embellishment for the solemn occasion.

I walk to the front, propelled by the guard’s insistent hand on my back. The guy with the sandy-blond hair is still in the room, leaning against the wall. His dark eyes flash to mine.

“Maribel Windsong?” the head woman calls out from her prominent position at the center of the dais.

I tip my chin. “Yes, Lady Raven,” I respond, adhering to the proper term of respect for any adult within the city.

Lady Raven peers down at me, her long gray hair braided and wrapped on top of her head. Only those not of age wear their hair down. “Your mother, Celia Windsong, passed to the beyond.”

My heart clenches at the sound of her name. It is a statement. Nothing I need to respond to.

The head Council member continues, “Two hundred and ten credits sit in your mother’s account, left to you. It is five credits short of the two hundred and fifteen required for residency. Do you have any kin who can gift you these credits?”

I do not. The Council knows this. They know everything about each citizen within the city walls—what they eat, what time they wake, how many lovers they take. With my father gone, I have no kin. “No, my lady.”

With her lips pursed, she looks to the left and to the right to her fellow Council members. Each gives a nod. “Then we have no choice but to banish you to the Unseen. Without the proper credits, you lose your rights as a Citizen of Avren.” She brings a giant wooden hammer down on a pulpit in front of her. “Our decision is final.”

I hold my chin up in a rigid attempt to keep the tears from flowing. The healer gave me a double dose of the daily vitamin we take to stabilize our brain chemistry and prevent displays of emotion prone to cause unwanted disturbances. Avren raised me soft—a perfect Citizen. I can dance, employ proper utensils, and use flowery speech, but jobs like cleaning, building, and cooking are for the Undesirables.

“Maribel, it is time to go.” Lady Raven’s words cut into my thoughts. I wander through the room, unsure of what to do. While I was here, the workers have cleaned out my home and taken every credit from our safe. The only thing they allowed me to keep was my mother’s ledger.

A hand clutches my arm, dragging me to a side door near the front of the room. It’s the Undesirable with the sandy-blond hair, the one the guard called Grayson, the one I tried to avoid on the bench.

Outside the courtroom, I shake my arm free from his clutch. “Don’t touch me, urchin.” If the sickness clings to my clothes, there is nothing I can do now.

Grayson laughs, his gaze raking over my dress clothes. “They all start out the same—too high and mighty for the rest of us. I remember that feeling well. It won’t last long, my lady.” He gives a mocking bow.

I straighten my shoulders. Before today, an Undesirable like Grayson could have faced the death penalty for treating a Citizen in this manner. “Three weeks, two hours, and fifty-seven minutes, and this would have been different.”

Grayson sits on a bench and removes his cap, flipping it in his hands. “One week, fifteen hours, and thirty-nine minutes.” He rolls up his sleeve and reveals a tattoo of the numbers 11539. “It’s a constant reminder of the life I lost.”

Still hesitant, I position myself on the opposite side of the hard wooden bench. Part of me is repulsed by him. Part of me feels the pull of his pain. “What happened to your parents?”

He clears his throat. “Tanner will be out here soon. We don’t have time to bond over our tragic stories, Mari.”

“My name is Maribel.”

“In Avren, your name is Maribel.” He pulls his cap back on as the door to the chamber opens and Tanner walks out with a guard. “The Unseen is my realm, and your name is Mari.”

Of all the presumptuous, arrogant ideas.

Grayson stands to greet Tanner, holding out his hand. The younger boy stares at it but doesn’t reciprocate. I don’t blame him. More than likely, Tanner’s parents died from the sickness too, and touching the unsavory likes of Grayson Elrod feels like a death sentence to him.

“As a former child of Avren, the Council has tasked me with guiding orphans into their new lives in the Unseen.” Grayson walks down the hall, and we follow, knowing we have nowhere else to go.

“But why would they hire an Undesirable like you?” Tanner says, tears still visible on his cheeks.

Grayson whips around, grabs Tanner’s shirt by the shoulders, and pins him to the wall. “First, never refer to the people of the Unseen as Undesirables. That’s a slanderous term used by Citizens. We call ourselves the Redeemed.” He releases Tanner’s shirt, letting him drop to his feet. “I branded my skin to remind me of my past and how far I’ve come.”

The boy scowls at Grayson. Tanner is too small in stature to act on the anger he feels toward our guide to the Unseen. The helplessness we both feel, untrained in anything of importance, grows like an insurmountable wall. If we don’t join the people who live beneath our feet, we might receive a worse fate: banishment to the wilderness.

I shudder. “But who would choose the life of an Undesirable—I mean, a Redeemed, over the life of a full-fledged Citizen of Avren?” I ignore Grayson’s brusque ways, expecting nothing less from an Undesirable.

“Someone who has tasted both and realizes one comes up lacking.” He removes a key from a chain at his waist and unlocks a metal door. One of the many doors keeping Undesirables without working papers out of Avren. “Have you ever tasted a beer, Mari?”

I draw in my eyebrows and shake my head. “No. It is forbidden to drink alcohol in Avren. Why would you ask such a question?”

Grayson swings the door open and ushers us inside. The passageway smells of must and germs—everything kept far away from the city. I want to back against the wall, but fear of what might crawl along the damp surface keeps me at the center of the stairs.

“Or have you met a boy and shared a passionate kiss?” Grayson lights a match and holds it to a torch affixed to the wall.

My body burns like the torch in his hand. How could he expect me to answer such a question? “Life partners may exchange chaste kisses. I am only seventeen.” But I had experienced this type of kiss—behind a utility wall and out of sight of the cameras. The memory of the touch of his hands still warms my skin.

“And a whole new world is about to blow your mind, Mari Windsong.” He glances at Tanner, sizing up his slight form. “You will both need to undergo strength training.”

“To hold a broom?” I conjure images of Caron sweeping our floor, humming songs. “Or to bake a pie?”

Grayson holds his torch up to another door, using a key to unlock it. “The Redeemed do a lot more than wait hand and foot on the Citizens of Avren. And the Supes will eat you alive.”

The Supes? The concept sounds foreign to my ears. The history books in Avren’s library only talk about the stories of the removal of the Undesirables thirty years ago, saying the soldiers met little protest. It was as if the other side knew they didn’t belong and there was only one possible outcome.

The air beneath the surface stifles, and I suddenly feel as if an invisible force curls around my neck and squeezes. This is not where I belong—in a dank world surrounded by obnoxious characters like Grayson. He was a Citizen. If I spend too much time in the Unseen, will I lose myself too?

“In the short term, neither the Redeemed nor the creatures of the wilderness like Citizens. Orphan or not, your life is on the line the second you leave the tunnels.” He holds the torch close to his face, casting an eerie shadow. “Stick close to me.”

Great. A place where I don’t want to go doesn’t want me.

“I’ll go back and plead with the Council.” I am positive I have a solid case for a rebuttal. My mother held a respectable position in the Circle, publicly condemning my father the day he left for the Unseen.

I reach for the handle to the metal door and find it locked. Turning around, I stomp my foot, clenching my fists. “Open it now.”

Grayson shakes his head. The corner of his lip lifts as he appraises me. “It’s no use, Mari. The Council’s determination is final. I learned that eight years ago.”

Beside the next door, canvas bags hang from hooks on the wall. Grayson removes two, tossing one to me and the other to Tanner.

“What’s this?” Tanner opens the mouth of the bag to peer inside.

“Government standard issue,” Grayson says as Tanner removes a dingy, long-sleeved shirt. “They will identify you as newbies, but once you earn a credit or two, you can change them out.” He drags his eyes over our outfits. “One thing’s for sure, you don’t want to set foot in the Unseen in those clothes.”

“What’s wrong with these?” Tanner’s defiant jaw juts out. “My dad’s the mayor of the Third League and he’ll…”

“You mean, your dad was the mayor of the Third League.” Grayson arches his eyebrow, then turns to unlock the door, not bothering to watch Tanner’s face fall.

I’m there for the entire show. Emotion is a sign of weakness in Avren, although I’ve let my own guard down several times already. Tanner should know this. Composure, discipline, grace, and beauty separate a Citizen from an Undesirable. He holds back the tears, clutching his bag to his chest before letting it fall to the floor. Our parents are gone. We can’t bring them back.

As Grayson rifles through his keys, I reach out in the darkness and take Tanner’s hand. The human connection we both crave after losing our parents.

He is the younger brother I have never had or knew I wanted, and I’ll protect him with my life.

Grayson lets the door swing open to the Unseen.