The Fugitives, A Dystopian Vampire Novel: Book Four: The Superiors Series by Lena Hillbrand Page B

together to make up the floor, completely smooth but not slippery even when wet. The dark grey squares weren’t like the outside of the house, the blue-grey sparkly, rough stones. The flat stones of the shower room floor chilled her feet when she stepped from the tub, no matter how hot she’d gotten. But they cooled in a soothing way.
    Usually she didn’t stay too long, but she made sure to get clean. She’d never summoned enough courage to look in all the colorful bottles around the huge tub, but she loved them, anyway. Glass jars in all sizes and shapes, of varying hues of blue and green, lined one side of the tub, along with a plant with slippery leaves that spread its vines among the edge. A few oblong bowls held different colored rocks, smooth and rounded, worked in among the vines. It looked more like decoration than a shower. But the shower was the best part—the two different nozzles on each end of the huge tub that sprayed warm water anytime of day or night. Cali had tried all the different showerheads, but she still hadn’t figured out how one person could get dirty enough to need all four.
    Today she looked at the one cake of soap she’d used every time she showered. She had always used that kind of soap for hair and body, just like at home in the Confinement. So many people had lived there, and all of them used the bars of soap provided in the communal showers. She had seen Draven washing his hair with a different kind of soap, a liquid kind, but she’d never heard of such a thing back home. Superiors must have all kinds of luxurious things she couldn’t imagine.
    She picked up one of the dark blue bottles and looked at the iridescent sheen of the glass, felt the surprising weight of it, the rounded corners. Opened the top, she looked into the bottle, standing with her back to the spray of hot water so as not to get the contents of the jar wet. Inside, white liquid, thick and shimmery, filled the jar. The smell that came out filled her nostrils, intoxicating and sweet, like the most delicious food she could imagine. She wondered if she could eat it without getting sick. She wanted to use it, but then she wondered what the other bottles contained, if they held similar wonders.
    One by one, Cali removed the lids and looked into the bottles and jars and tubs. One had grey powder and smelled like cooked eggs. A little of it spilled out when she untwisted the top, and she cast a guilty look at the door. How long had she been in the shower? She should get out, but not just yet. She had to smell all the wonderful scents, see the insides of the containers, touch the contents. Some of them had clear liquid, some whitish, all of it thick. They smelled of water in the dry season, of flowers, fruits, sweetness, indescribable scents she could only imagine but not name. One of the flat containers had a big white lid, and when she unscrewed it, the clear yellow gel inside released a tangy fragrance that made her mouth contract and fill with saliva.
    She rubbed a drop of gel between her fingers, wishing she could keep a tiny bit of each one to smell forever. If she had such a wonderful array of happiness in her bathroom, she’d never leave. Maybe that’s why Superiors had to decorate their showers, so if they stayed in them all day, they’d have something pretty to look at. Probably why they didn’t let saps have anything but flat, dusty smelling bars of soap, too. Saps had to work, not spend all day in the shower.
    Cali opened the last two jars, matching white ones with stoppers in the top. One of them contained white lotion that smelled of roses, and the other had green gel with a tart scent. If only she could keep one. She looked at the door. But no…Draven wouldn’t want her to steal. And she’d done enough bad things already. She didn’t need to make him mad again.
    But if she used just one, only once…
    He wouldn’t come in the shower room, so how would he know she’d used it? If he smelled it, she could