Chapter 8
Ipull my hair into a ponytail as I exit the supply closet, finally ready to take on whatever the Sweet Street Bakery will throw at me. This is not my skill set, but I’m willing to learn. Thoughts of the men and women in the cave remind me I’m lucky to procure a job assignment within the city.
The woman named Kit wipes her hands on her apron and crosses the kitchen to greet me. “You must be a former Citizen,” she says, glancing at my hand as I hold it out to her.
I quickly hide it behind my back. “I’m Maribel. My father was on the Council about five years ago. Daxon Barellis?”
“Never heard of him,” she says as she turns and marches back to the counter where she was working. “I don’t keep up with politics or matters of state. They expelled my family when I was three.”
“What for?”
The expulsion of an entire family is extremely rare.
“My parents had me without permission.” She offers me a satisfied grin as her hands dive into a pile of dough. “The old-fashioned way.”
“What?” My mouth hangs open. “But women take pills for that, and if it happens by accident, there are places to correct it.”
“My parents didn’t believe in those kinds of places.” Kit frowns at me. She portions the dough in half and slides it toward me. “Here. Wash your hands and help me knead the dough. We’re preparing the bread for tomorrow morning.”
I stick my hands under the stream of water, still chewing on Kit’s words. The Undesirables defy the Council, but to hear of Citizens actively going against orders is unheard of. When it comes to making babies, the Council always knows best—growing babies in test tubes, where things like hair color, eye color, and personality can be controlled, makes the most sense. Anything could go wrong if parents brought a naturally born baby to term.
But here I am standing beside a woman who was born the natural way and I see nothing wrong with her. In fact, she’s beautiful with her dark almond eyes, straight brown hair, and shapely figure. She’d fit in with the people of Avren, but she’s baking their bread. Other than Levi’s hearing impairment, I’ve seen nothing wrong with the people born the natural way in the wilderness either.
I slide beside Kit at the counter, placing my hands in the dough. It feels cold and elastic, but the sensation of forming and reforming it over and over with my knuckles relaxes me.
“Guy is the owner.” Kit tosses the dough into the air and slams it back down on the counter. “He’s a Citizen. Bit rough around the edges, but once he knows you’re a good worker, he’ll warm up to you.” She points to a man beside the oven. “That’s Felix.”
The man gives me a quick salute and returns to his job.
“And that’s Robert.” She nods her head toward a younger man squirting icing out of a tube onto a pan of rolls. “Guy was in line to receive the newest person expelled from the city, so the officials sent you here.”
“Do you ever switch jobs?” When I lived in the city, the workers in the shops and Caron came to mind when I thought about Undesirables. I never imagined the harsh working conditions in the caverns for the people who keep the inner bowels of the city running.
Kit smirks and pounds her fist into the dough. “Got your first glimpse of the Unseen.” It isn’t a question. She knows I had to come that way to enter the city. “Nothing you need to worry about unless you cause trouble. You’re an Untouchable.”
“What’s that mean?” I slow my hands in the dough.
Kit places her dough into a ceramic bowl and covers it with cloth. “Although we’re considered Undesirable, there are different classes within the system. Only the highest class may work in the city. We were Avrenian as children. We know their ways.” She carries the dough to a windowsill, and when she returns, takes mine and works it. “The next class are those who the authorities expelled in good standing. They at least know how the city operates, but for some reason, didn’t fit in. The children of the Undesirable come next if they’re caught. Because they don’t have a tracking anklet, the guards seldom catch them.” She slows her kneading and looks me in the eye. “The last group are the criminals. People the Council expelled for crimes against the higher order. They wear red anklets so others can identify them. The Council assigns them to the worst jobs. With no rights or protections, the guards work them to their limits using corporal punishment.”
It”s the Council’s heavy hand that keeps crime out of the city. Although I don’t agree with abusing the criminals, it makes sense to keep them in line.
“Do you know what the number one crime in Avren is?” She places my mound of dough in another bowl.
I can’t imagine what it might be because I never saw a crime happen within the walls of the city. “Stealing?”
She laughs as she carries the bowl to the windowsill. “In a place where they give you everything you’d ever need? No, Mari.” She leans against the counter, lowering her voice. “It’s plotting against the Council.”
Inhaling sharply, I furrow my brow and shake my head. “Why would anyone want to threaten the Council?”
“Think about what happened to you… to me… to Felix and Robert.” Her gaze rests on the other two workers. “We did nothing wrong. I was three years old. What kind of human expels a toddler to the wilderness, which they know is full of Supes? Can you answer that question?”
It isn’t something I ever questioned—it’s the law. My conversation with Grayson from earlier floats to the forefront. Reversing your brainwashing. “Do you think the Council expels someone at the first hint of dissension?”
“That’s exactly what they do. If you don’t fit into their perfect world because you look or think differently, you’re gone.” She joins Robert at the icing station, picking up a bag of confectionary sugar and emptying it into a large bowl.
I chew on her words before following. It doesn’t make sense to me. “But what about the orphans? They did nothing to deserve the wilderness.”
Robert raises a dark brow his eyes meeting Kit’s. He’s ruggedly handsome, and I sense a connection between them. “You’re an orphan for a reason.”
“Yes, my mom got sick.” The feelings run fresh through every nerve in my body. “An Undesirable like you brought it into the city and infected her. She did nothing wrong.”
“The healers have the antidote,” Robert says flatly as he carefully creates a delicate swirl on a cinnamon roll. “The Council instructed them not to use it.”
“How do you know this?” My voice rises, and the others glance at the door. I lower my voice, knowing they are fearful Guy might walk in. “Why wouldn’t they save her?”
“What happened to your father?” Kit asks.
My father. The one who walked away from his family because of his fascination with the wilderness. “He left on his own.”
“And you said he was on the Council before?” She stares at me as if she wants me to connect the impossible dots.
“Are you saying my father committed a crime and was expelled to the wilderness, so the Council punished us?” It’s an outrageous claim—one I never considered before. As a member of the Council, he’d know things he wouldn’t share with me.
She sighs and places a hand on my arm. “We don’t know what really happened.” Her eyes meet Robert’s, his lips purse. “But we know what the Council is capable of. They released the sickness into select portions of the wilderness. Places where the rebellion percolated. But they used it more as a weapon against their own people, blaming the Undesirables for the ramifications. If they used it against your family, there must be a reason.”
“How do you know this?” The immensity of her claim is almost too much to handle. If it’s true, the Council, in whom I’ve always trusted to care for the people of Avren, are the enemy.
“Unless you find out the truth, you can never see things the way they really are.” Robert lowers his lips close to my ear and whispers, “We are part of the rebellion.” He passes his tray of cinnamon rolls to Felix to place in the oven. “The Council sent me to the wilderness with my mother when I was eleven because the guards caught my father in his bedroom with another woman. It tore our family apart—my father with a red anklet and my mother and I with blue. Two different classes in the fallen world.”
“Maribel! Get up here! I need your help!” Guy barks at me from the front of the shop.
I almost trip over my feet trying to please my boss, an unfamiliar situation. A line stretches outside the door, snaking to the right, making me wonder if Guy is adding a secret sauce to the bakery items.
My boss’s face is red, perspiration slick on his forehead as he ducks into a glass cabinet and removes two cinnamon rolls. “Here.” He gives me the rolls wrapped in paper. “Put these on a tray and deliver them to table seven.”
Tray? Table seven?I think he forgets this is my first day.
Beneath the counter, there’s a stack of blue trays, so I remove one and set the rolls on top of it. I scan the store for table numbers.
“Put them on a damn plate, phaloc,” Guy hisses as he removes three more pastries. “The rolls are going to Citizens, not vermin like you. I swear, all they send me are imbeciles.”
My cheeks flame as my heart races with the shame of his words. Never did my parents speak to Caron like this. It was almost as if she was a member of the family. My hands shake, placing the paper-covered rolls on a gold-lined plate.
Table seven.I don’t want to ask Guy anything.
The tray wobbles in my hands as I cross the floor, weaving in and out of patrons, trying to find the correct order. Customers lounge at the tables, laughing and talking—like I used to do with my friends—clueless to what lies beyond the walls of the great city. Small placards with pink borders stand in the center of each table, identifying their numbers. Seven is by the window.
I freeze.
Flynn sits beside Rosie, his arm draped over the back of her chair. He has a wide smile on his face, his attention on the guy opposite him. He laughs, and my stomach clenches remembering how we used to laugh together.
I skirt around the edge of the table, slightly behind Flynn, hoping he won’t look up. He can’t see me as an Undesirable. I need him to remember how it used to be—long talks in the city park, accidental brushes of skin, and heated kisses in secret. If he sees me this way, I don’t think I can take it.
Without a word, I place the tray on the table and turn to walk away, ready to leave this part of my life behind.
“Maribel?” a woman at the table calls.
I stop and close my eyes. I could ignore the woman’s recognition—continue walking away.
I turn.
Flynn’s eyes meet mine. Warm brown pools flecked with gold assess me—the woman he would have really wanted beside him—if my mother hadn’t died.
“I’m sorry about your mother,” the woman, a distant memory from school, continues to ramble. “It really wasn’t fair.”
Her voice drifts over my shoulder, lost in the haze filling my mind. I don’t move my eyes from Flynn’s to acknowledge her, afraid I’ll lose him forever if I do. He speaks volumes without uttering a word.
My body shudders, and I feel like I’m going to be ill. I rush to the rear of the shop, intent on reaching the supply closet before I empty the contents of my stomach. The door slams behind me. The vomit splatters into the corner, covering the cement cinderblocks. I lean an elbow against the wall and rest my head as my body continues to shake.
The door cracks open.
“Go away.” I don’t want Kit or Robert to see the mess in the corner.
The door squeaks as he enters, and I look up. Flynn’s blondish-brown hair falls over his right eye. He strings it behind his ear, a move I’ve helped him with many times before. “Maribel. Can we talk?” He takes a step into the closet, then stops, plugging his nose. “What died in here?”
Our love. Any hope for the future I created in my mind.
“I think you should go.” I roll a mop bucket over the puke and hope he’ll go away. “Don’t want to catch the sickness from an Undesirable.”
His forehead creases in pain. “I still love you. It’s not your fault the Council banished you from the city.” He reaches for my hand, so I slip it behind my back.
“But they did.” I take a step backward, intent on keeping our conversation light and professional. I’m the worker, he’s the patron. If only he’d stay at his table like the well-behaved customers.
“What if we could change that?” The gold flecks in his eyes intensify as he continues to push for something I’m not sure I want anymore.
Not since seeing the wilderness.
“The same Council has ruled for eight years, never opposed. A vote might force some of them to step down and give us the opportunity to write a new history.” He runs his fingers through his hair, giving him the tousled look I always loved. “A group of us meet every week to discuss the changes we want to bring to the Council. They’ve got to listen to reason.”
“The idea is wonderful, but what if you fail? They’ll kick you out of the city too.” I run a finger along the hem of my uniform shirt. “It’s better this way,” I say in the strongest voice I can muster. I draw in a deep breath, trying to find the courage. “You have your future with Rosie. I have mine. The Council will never allow a Citizen and a phaloc to be together.”
The heat of his stare makes me uncomfortable. He can’t let go of what can never be. I hold my arm over my mouth and nose, wondering how badly my breath reeks.
He stops a couple of feet away, stuffing his fists in his pockets. “Promise me something.”
“I can’t make promises I can’t keep, Flynn.”
He’s close enough that if I raise my arm, I can touch him. “Promise me to never refer to yourself as a phaloc again. You are so much better than them.” With one step, he closes the distance, raising a palm to my cheek.
My insides twist in confusion. I’m a wreck of nerves and desire, unsure if I want to kiss him or run away. “Guy will wonder where I am.” I brush past him and head out the door, ready to get back to work. Empty hope no longer plays a role in my life.
“Where have you been, worthless girl?” Guy bends over, reaching into the pastry case. His pants slip to reveal a crack.
It’s just what I need to relieve my nerves. My lips tug into a smile as I hand my boss two more plates to load for the customers.