The Jewel (3 page)

E
LECTRIC STAGECOACHES TAKE US THROUGH THE DUSTY
streets.

Thick velvet curtains protect us from the flakes of dried mud that swirl through the air—the ones that used to stick to my skin as a child. I peek through the fabric, unable to help myself. I haven't been outside the holding facility since I was twelve.

The streets are lined with one-story mud-brick houses; some of the roofs are rotted or caving in. Children run half naked in the streets, and potbellied men lounge in alleys or on stoops, drinking strong spirits from bottles hidden in paper bags. We pass an almshouse, its shutters closed, its doors padlocked. On Sunday, there will be a huge line down this street, families waiting for whatever food and clothing and medicine the royalty has donated to help the unfortunate. However much they send, though, it's never enough.

A few streets later, I see a trio of Regimentals pushing an emaciated boy away from a greengrocer's. It's been so long since I've seen any men besides the doctors who examine us. The Regimentals are young, with large hands and noses, and broad shoulders. They stop harassing the boy when my coach rolls past, standing at attention, and I wonder if they see me peeking through the curtains at them. I quickly cover the window.

There are four of us in the coach, but not Raven. Her family lives on the other side of Southgate. The Marsh is like the tire of a bicycle, encircling the outer reaches of Lone City. If the Great Wall should ever crumble, we'd be the first to go, consumed by the terrible ocean that surrounds us on all sides.

Each circle of the city, with the exception of the Jewel, is divided into four quarters—North, South, East, and West—by two spokes that form an X. In the middle of each quarter in the Marsh is a holding facility. Raven's family lives on the eastern side of Southgate, mine to the west. I wonder if Raven and I would ever have met, if we hadn't been diagnosed as surrogates.

No one speaks in the coach, and I'm grateful for that. I rub my wrist, feeling the hard circle of the transmitter they implanted just under my skin. We all got one before we left for our homes. It's only temporary—they'll dissolve in about eight hours. It's Southgate's way of enforcing the rules: Do not talk about what goes on inside the holding facility. Do not talk about the Auguries. Do not talk about the Auction.

The coach drops us off, one by one. I'm last.

My whole body is trembling by the time I reach my house. I listen for some sign that my family is out there, waiting for me, but I only hear the dull thud of my pulse in my ears. It takes all my strength to reach out and turn the brass handle on the carriage door. For a fleeting moment, I don't think I can do it. What if they don't love me anymore? What if they've forgotten me?

Then I hear my mother's voice. “Violet?” she calls timidly.

I open the door.

They stand in a line, wearing what must be their best clothes. I'm shocked to see that Ochre has grown taller than my mother—his chest and arms are muscled, his hair cropped short, and his skin tough and tanned. He must have gotten a job in the Farm.

My mother looks so much older than I remember, but her hair is still the same red-gold color. There are deep wrinkles around her eyes and mouth.

Hazel, though . . . Hazel is almost unrecognizable. She was seven when I left, eleven now. All arms and legs, her sad, tattered pinafore hangs loose on her bony frame. But her face is just like Father's; she has his eyes, exactly. We have the same hair, long, black, and wavy. This makes me smile. Hazel edges a little closer to Ochre.

“Violet?” my mother says again.

“Hello,” I say, surprised by my formality. I step out of the carriage and feel the thick marsh-dust between my toes. Hazel's eyes widen—I don't know what she thought I'd be wearing, but probably not a nightdress and bathrobe. None of my family is wearing shoes. I'm glad I'm not, either. I want to feel the dirt beneath my feet, the grimy dust of my home.

There is a second of awkward silence, then my mother stumbles forward and throws her arms around me. She is so thin, and I notice a slight limp that I'm sure she didn't have before.

“Oh, my baby,” she croons. “I'm so happy to see you.”

I inhale her scent of bread and salt and sweat. “I missed you,” I whisper.

She wipes the tears from her eyes and holds me out at arm's length. “How long do we have?”

“Until eight.”

My mother opens her mouth, then closes it with a tiny shake of her head. “Well, then. Let's make the best of it.” She turns to my siblings. “Ochre, Hazel, come hug your sister.”

Ochre strides forward—when did he get so big? He was only ten when I left. When did he become a man?

“Hey, Vi,” he says. Then he bites his lip, like he's worried about addressing a surrogate so informally.

“Ochre, you're huge,” I tease. “What has Mother been feeding you?”

“I'm six feet,” he says proudly.

“You're a monster.”

He grins.

“Hazel,” my mother says, “come say hello to your sister.”

Then Hazel, my little Hazel, who I used to sing to at night, and sneak cookies to after lights out, and play Jewel-in-the-Crown with in our backyard, turns her back on me and runs into the house.

“S
HE JUST NEEDS A LITTLE TIME,
” M
OTHER SAYS A FEW
minutes later, as she pours me a cup of chrysanthemum tea.

But time is something I don't have.

I take a sip of tea and try as hard as I can not to make a face. I've forgotten the bitter, astringent flavor, my taste buds so used to coffee and fresh-squeezed juice. Guilt slides into my stomach as I swallow.

My mother and I sit at the wooden table on chairs that my father made. The house is smaller than I remember it. Only one room for the kitchen and sitting area. There is a sink, a little paraffin stove, a side table with a cabinet underneath for plates and cutlery. There is only one couch, its stuffing poking out in places, and a rocking chair by the fireplace. My mother used to knit in that chair. I wonder if she still does.

“Hazel doesn't remember me,” I say glumly.

“She does,” Mother replies. “Just . . . not how you are now. I mean, goodness, Violet, look at you.”

I look down. Do I really look that different? My arms are plumper than hers, and my skin has a healthy pink flush to it.

“Your face, sweetheart.” My mother laughs gently.

My throat goes tight. “I . . . I haven't seen my face in a while.”

She purses her lips. “Would you like to see it now?”

I can't swallow. My hand slips into the pocket of my robe and I squeeze my father's ring. “No,” I whisper. I don't know why, but the thought of my reflection terrifies me. I stare at my mother's hands, folded in her lap—they are gnarled with arthritis, blue veins popping out like rivers in a topographic map.

“Where's your ring?” I ask.

Her cheeks turn pink and she shrugs.

“Mother,” I press, “what happened to your ring?”

“I sold it.”

I can feel my eyes bugging out of their sockets. “What? Why?”

She looks at me, her expression defiant. “We needed the money.”

“But . . .” I shake my head, bewildered. “What about the stipend?”

A yearly stipend is given to the families of the surrogates, compensation for the loss of a daughter.

My mother sighs. “The stipend isn't enough, Violet. Why do you think Ochre had to drop out of school? Look at my hands; I can't work as much as I used to. Do you want me to send Hazel to the factories? Or the orchards?”

“Of course not.” I can't believe she would even suggest that. Hazel is too young to withstand the brutal labor in the Farm—there's barely an ounce of muscle on her. And she'd never survive the Smoke. I cringe at the thought of her operating some heavy piece of machinery, choking on the dust that saturates the air.

“Then don't judge how I provide for this family. Your father, rest his soul, would understand. It's only a piece of gold.” She wipes her hand across her forehead. “It's only a piece of gold,” she mumbles again.

I don't know why I'm so upset. She's right, it's just a thing. It's not my father.

I squeeze his ring one last time, then take it out of my pocket and place it on the table. “Here. You can have this back now. I can't keep it anyway.”

There is a look in my mother's eyes as she picks up the ring, and I see what it cost her to sell hers.

“Thank you,” she whispers.

“Can I keep the bathrobe?” I ask.

She laughs, and her eyes glitter with tears. “Of course. It fits you so well now.”

“It'll probably get thrown out. But I'd like to keep it for as long as I can.”

She reaches out and squeezes my hand. “It's yours. I'm surprised they let you visit us in your pajamas.”

“We can wear whatever we want. Especially today.”

Silence falls, pressing down on me like a pillow, smothering all the things I want to say. A fly buzzes in the window over the sink. My mother strokes the back of my hand with her finger, her expression distant, worried.

“They do take good care of you there, don't they?” she asks.

I shrug and look away. I can't really talk to her about Southgate.

“Violet, please,” she says. “Please tell me. You can't imagine how hard it's been. On me, on Hazel and Ochre. First your father, and . . . look at you, you're all grown up and . . . and I missed it.” A single tear escapes and runs down her cheek. “I missed it, baby. How am I supposed to live with that?”

A lump forms in my throat. “It's not your fault,” I say, staring very hard at her hands. “You didn't have a choice.”

“No,” my mother murmurs. “No, I didn't. But I lost you, all the same. So please, tell me some good has come out of it. Tell me you have a better life.”

I wish I could tell her that I do. I wish I could tell her the truth, about the three Auguries and the years of pain and the endless tests and the doctor visits. I wish I could tell her how much I've missed her, how there is more tenderness in her finger stroking my hand than in all the caretakers combined. I wish I could tell her how much I love playing the cello, how good I am at it. I think she'd be proud of me, if she knew. I think she'd like hearing me play.

The lump in my throat is so swollen I'm amazed I can still breathe. My mind flits back to that awful day when the Regimentals came, a memory that is so old, so tangled, like a jigsaw puzzle with missing pieces. Me, crying, screaming, begging her not to let them take me. Hazel's eyes, wide and pleading, her tiny hands clutching my ragged dress. The cold glint of a Regimental's gun. And my mother, pressing her lips against my forehead, her tears saturating my hair as she says, “You have to go with them, Violet. You have to go with them.”

Suddenly, the room is too hot. “I—I need some air,” I gasp, pushing my chair back and stumbling out the back door.

The backyard is just a patch of dry earth and yellowing grass. But I feel better as a cool breeze tickles my skin, rustling the leaves of the lemon tree in the center of the yard. The lemon tree that never once produced a lemon. What was that song Father used to sing?

It was some sort of analogy about the dangerous nature of love, but all I remember thinking whenever he sang it was how much I wanted to eat a lemon. It was the first thing I tried when I got to Southgate. In my excitement, I bit right through the rind, the sourness so shocking.

“You look different.”

I whirl around. Hazel is sitting on an upturned bucket against the wall of the house. I didn't even see her.

“That's what Mother says.” My voice comes out a little breathless.

She studies me for a moment. Her eyes are sharp and intelligent. It hits me again how much she looks like our father.

“She says you're going to the Auction tomorrow,” Hazel says. “That's why they're letting you see us.”

I nod. “They call it Reckoning Day. To . . . settle the accounts of your past before starting your future.” I don't know why I say it. The phrase I've heard from the mouths of caretakers a hundred times tastes bitter in my mouth.

Hazel stands. “Is that what we are? An account to settle before you go off and live in some palace in the Jewel?”

“No,” I say, aghast. “No, of course not.”

She balls her hands into fists, exactly the way I do when I'm angry or hurt. “Then why are you here?”

I shake my head, shocked. “Why . . . ? Hazel, I'm here because I love you. Because I missed you. And Mother, and Ochre. I miss you every day.”

“Then why didn't you write to me?” Hazel shouts, and her voice cracks, and my heart cracks with it. “You told me you would. ‘No matter what,' you said. I waited every day for a letter and you never, ever wrote, not once!”

Her words punch at my chest. I thought she would've forgotten that promise. It'd been so clear that it could never happen once I was inside the facility. “Hazel, I couldn't. We're not allowed.”

“I bet you didn't even try,” Hazel spits. “You just wanted your fancy things, new clothes and fresh food and hot water. That's what you get in there, I know it, so stop lying.”

“Yes, I do get those things. But don't you think I would give them all up in a second if it meant I could live with you again? If I could tuck you in at night, and sing to you? And we could make mud pies when it rains, and then throw them at Ochre when he's not looking?” The images well up, threatening to consume me. The life I could have had. Poor, yes, but happy. “Do you really think I'd abandoned my family for running water and clothes? I didn't have a choice, Hazel,” I say. “They didn't give me a choice.”

Hazel doesn't say anything, but she looks unsure. I take a step toward her.