Chapter 10 Maddox
MADDOX
She likes my art.
That’s the only thought that has gone through my head for the past three days.
She likes my art.
When I was eighteen, a member of the British royal family commissioned a painting. At twenty-four, I had a four-page spread in Vogue for my creations. Not a single one of those things, individually or combined, amounts to the rush I felt when Reyna complimented me.
She thinks I’m talented.
My mind is in disarray because of a student and her sinful lips.
Which is possibly the worst thing I could think of when amongst Order members.
It’s made me feel like prey in this pit full of vipers.
If there were ever a place that I needed to be ready to kill—both figuratively and literally—it would be here.
My eyes drop to the ornate wooden floors, and I debate counting the grains. The high saint of House Dornmont stands at the center of the room, surrounded by pews full of people in long black cloaks. The six blocks radiate out from the center, a section for each of the houses.
House Shaw—mine, regrettably.
House Dornmont—my fiancée’s, unfortunately.
House Hopkins—hate those fuckers. It’s basically a glorified frat house right now.
House Sutherland—where my vote is going.
House Ellis—painfully boring, yet incredibly efficient. The traits of acceptable leaders, I suppose.
House Ortiz—highly respectable and unproblematic. Again, boring for my tastes.
The room is fashioned in a way that acolytes sit behind the houses they affiliate with.
They don’t need to vote for the high saint of their house. At the end of every election cycle, once the high saints for the following years have been chosen, they can move to a different house, should they choose.
The grand magistrate sits on a platform along the outskirts of the room to symbolize his superiority and all-seeing power. Regardless of which house an acolyte pledges themselves to, we all serve him.
Frederick Dornmont waves his arms about as if we’re attending Sunday Mass. The flames from hundreds of candles flicker against the walls, at the end of each pew, and around the dais, with a single candelabra in the very middle. The smoke threads up to the hive-shaped ceiling—toward God.
The truth is that the men who began the Order were religious for performative purposes. The only gods they believed in were themselves.
The Order of the Hallowed Hive secretly meets in a hexagon-shaped room with a roof with more hexagons on it. A bit on the nose if you ask me.
Roland stands beside Frederick Dornmont, nodding his head along every once in a while.
The two red ropes crossed over their chests that represent their status shift against their black robes as they move.
The forced attire is rather pompous. Just another attempt to set us apart from the “peasants” unworthy to join our “force.”
Dornmont drones on in Latin about the “importance” of the Order and how society “relies” on us and our decisions, as if we aren’t a group of self-interested bastards.
My Latin is piss-poor on a good day, and I’m only catching every other word of what he’s saying.
Over half these sad saps in the room understand even less than me.
Why the Order insists on making the language a requirement of our lifetime membership is beyond me.
The only time it’s ever spoken is by these old fools when they feel like being especially elitist during our monthly gatherings.
I’m sure I’d see boredom written over everyone’s faces if we weren’t all wearing pitch-black masks beneath our hooded cloaks.
And Frederick and Roland wonder why they’re ranking so poorly in the election polls. Keeping tradition “alive” means fuck all if it means needing to keep up with Duolingo.
Movement from the corner of my eye has my elbow immediately finding Spencer’s ribs. His phone nearly flies out of his hand.
We subtly glare at each other. If his general fidgeting wasn’t bad enough, this is the second time the fuckwit thought it’d be a good idea to text in the middle of the assembly.
“Chill out,” he hisses.
He’s lucky there are too many people around for me to slap him upside the head.
Attendance isn’t mandatory for all the acolytes, but it would be blasphemous if the members of the high saint’s family weren’t present. So texting during it, while sitting at the very front, feels like tempting divine wrath.
We’re not just the children of the high saints. We’re a sign of power, another piece on the board to be wielded as the Order deems fit. Soldier or pawn—there is no difference.
This centuries-old society was here the year Cresswell was built. More accurately, the university was built for the Order, because what is an academic institute if not the breeding ground for the future’s brightest?
It’s how the vast majority of neophytes in this room were recruited. Each house has a dedicated person whose entire job is scouting for potential acolytes to join the organization. Once they’ve proven themselves and are initiated, they sit in the rows of their respective house.
Mother spears me with a look from my fiancée’s side, and little Miss Abigail Dornmont stiffens.
How am I expected to spend my life with a woman who quivers like a leaf whenever we’re under the same roof? It’s exhausting just looking at her.
I think I’ve made it abundantly clear that I couldn’t give two shits about what she does as long as it keeps my parents off my back. In fact, as long as she’s playing her part, she’s under my protection. Unless her boyfriend becomes a problem, we’re staying out of each other’s way.
She’s attractive, I guess. Hazel eyes, with long brunette hair. In another life, I could have been into her. But she does nothing for me. No one does.
Except for her.
My fucking student.
The fates have an exceptional sense of humor, I’ll give them that.
Acolytes suddenly start clapping for Roland and Dornmont as they descend down the steps. I missed their closing remarks. What a shame.
Roland takes his seat beside Mother, casting me a sideways warning glare as we all fix our masks back into place. I guess he noticed Spencer’s insolence. I’ll sign him up for toilet duty once he finishes his shift as a server. Lord knows he could use humbling.
The respectful applause turns into a roar as Daniel Flores makes his way down the pews of House Sutherland’s section.
And if that isn’t a bloody beautiful sound.
I can feel people’s eyes light up behind their masks. The cultish fashion choice keeps the acolytes’ anonymity from each other to avoid a lower ranked from naming names, but there’s one thing we all seem to agree with: Daniel is one charismatic chap.
Or as my father likes to call him, “a liberal socialist twat.”
Roland is absolutely seething in his seat. Nothing makes my day quite like it.
Five years ago Daniel was a nobody paladin who’d been loyal to House Sutherland since day one. But he’s now risen to be the greatest threat to my father and future father-in-law.
He’s the one contender who could replace one of the current houses. Daniel has the acolytes eating out of the palm of his hand—something my father hasn’t been able to pull off.
Daniel is everything he’s not: He’s young (late thirties) and fun, has a full head of hair, and is actually likable.
Someone hoots, and it’s truly fantastic not needing to hide my grin behind the mask.
“Thank you, my brothers and sisters. Please, I don’t deserve such a warm welcome.” Daniel beams, placing a hand over his heart.
“So humble,” Spencer quietly snorts from beside me.
It helps that Daniel isn’t wearing the two red ropes that high saints wear. All he has is the cloak like the rest of us.
“Many of us are strangers to each other, but every month we come under the same roof for the same reason. For generations we have held the power to make this world better.” Try corrupt, dangerous, immoral instead.
“We’ve written the footnotes of history while others got the headlines.
We carry the burden of the unseen, day in and day out.
We do it for us, and our children, and our children’s children. ”
Kill me now.
Look, the guy knows how to move people, and I agree with what he’s saying. I simply want no part in witnessing any of it. I have a running list of things to do that impact my livelihood, and none of those things involve the Order.
“Except we aren’t doing it for our children anymore.”
Here we go. Time to make Roland’s eyes roll.
“For all the influence we hold in this world; the blood, sweat, and tears we’ve spilled for our houses—What have we gained? Where did the wealth go? To serve the few in the hopes that we may one day be in their position.” He looks amongst the crowd.
Daniel caters to the neophytes and the paladins, the lowest ranked that Roland and Dornmont are falling behind on. They forgot who bleeds so they can have their money. Daniel hasn’t.
“I stand here before you not to rule you. I am here to be your partner. Someone you can trust to act in your interest and your children’s interest, and the interest of your children’s children.”
Okay, let’s wrap it up.
“So as you vote this cycle, I ask only one thing: What do you value?” He walks in a slow circle around the dais.
“Our power comes at the price of corruption, but what matters is what you intend to do with it. Be puppets or be the ones holding the water while the world above is on fire? Remember, we work together in the shadows to live in the light.”
Fuck it. Maybe I’ll vote for him instead of House Sutherland.
The room erupts into applause as Daniel returns to his seat, and I do what any good son must to support his father’s campaign, I bring my hands together and clap louder than any other person in our row.
Daniel stands up on the platform, smiling like a man who already knows he’s won. The question is, whose seat is he going to take: Father’s, the Dornmonts’, or the Hopkins’?
The grand magistrate’s right-hand man drifts up the platform to the center candelabra to extinguish its flame with a candle snuffer.