Chapter 22 #3
I couldn’t speak, trying to piece together what it all meant.
All this time, I’d thought he’d died for an idea, but that had been too simplistic.
His reason was right beside me, in flesh and blood with a beating heart.
His cause wasn’t words on paper or a noble conviction.
No, it was more real, more consequential, more important than I could have ever imagined.
Max continued. “It was during a Council meeting, when the Father was due to report his latest research to the Magister at the time and the Council. Lucien snuck into the lab rooms and helped set us free. All of us. Elli, Andre, even Damien. Nina, I’m alive today because your father paid the ultimate price and saved us all. ”
“They killed him?” My voice broke. “Because he found out?”
“Because he did something about it,” Max corrected.
“Lots of people knew, Ace. When the enforcers found us, he distracted them so we could get out. I vowed to return one day and make sure he was avenged, but eventually, I lost track of the researcher who was head of the Trials. He disappeared. The Academy tried to cover it all up, claimed they had banned all practice of invasive procedures on human specimens because of the rumors going around. Perhaps that’s why this buyer has been buying bodies on the side…
” He shook his head, forgetting the thought.
Human testing… This had been the same incident Cassien mentioned to the Magister that day I was arrested. Reven had been obviously perturbed at the mention of it as if it were a personal insult.
“And you don’t know the name of the man who did this to you?”
Max frowned. “No. That’s why we call him the Father, because he never gave us a different title.”
I reached for his arm, resting my hand there, when I really wanted to wrap him in a tight embrace. Everything between us felt so fragile, like I could shatter it at any moment. “You didn’t tell me about my father because then you’d have been forced to tell me about the Trials.”
“Yes,” he whispered. “It’s not a good reason, but I also liked that you didn’t know where I came from. You made me feel like… I was normal, for once.”
“Look at me, Max.”
He did, reluctantly, sliding his stare to where I lay beside him, silently caressing his arm. “Well? How do you feel when I look at you now?”
He cleared his throat, quickly looking toward the footboard. “I’d rather not say.”
Right. His pulse was skipping in his wrist, but I let it go. “How many?”
“How many what?”
“How many operations did it take?”
Max squinted his eyes, thinking. “Nine. They had to wait until I was older to accept some of the donors. There were three for each Archetype, one that briefly didn’t take because they operated too soon after the previous surgery.
It nearly killed me. To be kind, they tried to condense multiple bloodlines for each Archetype transplant. ”
“Nine…” I breathed the number.
He nodded. “Nine gifts that don’t belong to me. Nine times I was opened and shut, completely awake to remember each moment. Nine hells I occupy simultaneously.”
I couldn’t imagine how he felt, the emotions he had to balance daily. Just hearing his story made my heart swell with a painful ache. Words failed me. My hand slid lower until it settled inside his palm. He gripped it tight.
“What about the rest of your siblings? Elli and Andre.”
“My siblings were the donors. All besides Elli and Andre died in the Academy. They are a bit younger, so they had a different focus. Mostly relic-based research. They still experienced their share of testing and experimentation, but no surgeries.”
One surgery, one transplant, was enough for a lifetime… but nine? I realized why he’d flinched under my knife—on an operating table, no less. “What is that like? Living with so many donors?”
His eyes squeezed shut. “Sometimes, I see them. In my dreams, I have memories that don’t belong to me. The faces of someone’s family, a bakery with desserts and the scent of chocolate, a house in the suburbs with a broken shutter. The parts inside me carry tiny pieces of so many lives.”
A quiet pause lingered as he considered what he was about to say.
“I’ve thought about dying many times. About ending the guilt, the pain of the scars, the dreams I have of people I don’t know…
But when I get to the end of the knife, the end of the gun, I feel shame, like their lives would have ended for nothing. ”
He opened his eyes to look at me. “This is why I want to find the buyer, Nina. I’m worried someone is recreating the Trials, using Damien because he’s so desperate to be part of this again…
possibly coerced by the Father himself. And if I can stop them, then it’s like all those people I carry with me could have their vengeance, too. ”
I gave his hand a gentle squeeze. “That’s an admirable way to look at it, Maxence. I just hope you know that you don’t have to do anything to avenge what you were put through. You were a victim just as much as they were. You have no responsibility to right someone else’s wrongs.”
To think he’d tried to end his life over the guilt of what was done to him… I couldn’t imagine that kind of pain he carried.
When he said nothing, I felt the need to explain.
“Working in a surgery, you learn that underneath our skin, no matter how different our outward appearance, we all look the same. We’re just wired a little differently.
” My fingers stroked the inside of his palm.
“I happen to believe a person’s worth isn’t based on where they come from or how they were made, but that it is a human right.
You’re worth the fight, Max. You’re worthy of love and happiness and every good thing in this life. ”
He brought our hands to his lips and gently placed a kiss on the back of my fingers, stealing my breath. As if realizing what he’d done, Max let my hand slide from his palm. “I should go, Nina. I have to get up early to find Damien. We have the duel to discuss—”
He started to rise, but I caught him by the wrist.
“Stay,” I demanded. Just a single word, but it was enough to make him consider.
He winced. “Nina…”
“Why do you keep running away from me?”
For a long moment, he didn’t move. His weight finally settled back on the mattress. I pushed to my knees, tracing my fingers along the edge of his jaw. He didn’t flinch this time, instead closing his eyes, like he craved physical touch more than he’d ever despised it.
“I’ll stay,” he whispered, “a little longer.”
“You sound frustrated. Am I so terrible to be near?” I teased, letting my hand fall to the space of skin where his shirt opened. I found myself curled atop the covers beside him, wide awake now. His heart an unsteady patter against my palm.
“Yes,” he replied curtly as he leaned closer, his touch finding the bend of my knee.
Rough fingers skimmed the sensitive flesh of my thigh, climbing higher, drawing chills, wiping the coy smirk from my lips.
He made it to the crest of my hip, lingering as he drew circles across my skin.
“Being this close, it’s very frustrating. ”
“Max—”
He snatched the hem of the shirt and pulled it low, covering every inch he’d explored.
“You should get some rest while you can.”
The enchantment slipped away like smoke through my fingers, and Max withdrew my hand from his chest, drawing the line between us once more. Instead of pushing him, I slipped beneath the covers. He didn’t look at me again until I was completely covered by the heavy sheets.
He finally spoke. “Maybe it’s a good thing you don’t have any dice. I don’t trust you not to use them to seduce me.”
“Like I need magic for that.” I rested my head on the pillow, settling in for the night while he sat with his eyes closed against the headboard, on top of the sheets.
Sleep was alluring at this hour. “You know, sometimes I want to use the relics on you again. Command you to kiss me and hold you back like you did to me, like you do every day, and let you feel that kind of torture.”
“Nina, I already do.”
I smiled, sleeping restfully with Max close to my side.