Page 124 of The Sovereign: Part One
I felt Maxim shift beside me, his hand firmly in mine.
Caleren took one step closer.“It is with great care that we proceed.Isara, if you’ll permit me.”He lifted a small, silvered device—no larger than a stem of lavender—and held it behind my left ear over the access point I used to access Calyx with the auditory network.A cool touch, a measured pressure, the subcutaneous node settled beneath the dermis, and a filament latched to the mastoid with a muted click.Maxim bowed his head, allowing the same noninvasive procedure.He didn’t flinch, though I saw his jaw shift slightly as the connection took hold.
“Isara and Maxim will now be tethered, an encrypted neuro-sensory conduit that allows shared access to biometrics, location, emotional thresholds, and regulated affective calibration.But more than that…” Caleren paused, folding the device into his robes.“It is the pulse of devotion, read not by algorithms, but by the constancy of presence.By proximity, by breath.”
His gaze rested on us both.“Please, join hands.”
Maxim reached for me.The moment our fingers threaded together, Caleren produced a long, narrow length of fabric—ivory, with subtle threading of silver—and wrapped it around our joined hands, binding us palm to palm.
“You may now speak the vow together.”
We had practiced it, but in that moment, it caught in my throat.Maxim’s hand tightened.
“I grant you access.”He began the first words, and I joined him.“To my biorhythms, impulses, thoughts as permitted.My breath is yours to know.My presence is yours to feel.And I receive you,” we continued, my voice threading into his.“With trust.With dominion.With no lesser intention than all.”
The cloth binding our hands grew warm.
Caleren lifted his hands as if holding the silence itself.“With these declarations, witnessed and recorded, the tether is now engaged.”
Maxim blinked once.His mouth parted slightly.For a beat, he looked dazed, as if the ground had subtly shifted beneath him and only I had remained unmoved.
Caleren watched him with a knowing smile.“The tethering is complete,” he announced.He gestured for us to bow our heads, and then he removed the connection.“Your bond is now active, registered, and sanctioned for Oathbond formalization.Congratulations.”
Behind Maxim’s shoulder, I caught Papa’s hand smoothing across his mouth, then curling into a loose fist.Mina dabbed beneath her eye with a folded square of cloth.Avaryn tilted her head with an unguarded softness I hadn’t seen in her in years.Bellam was smiling through parted lips, scanning both Maxim and me, as if she were trying to memorize the shape of the moment.Roan, beside her, had gone perfectly still—his hand resting protectively over hers.
Lourdes sat with her usual poise, spine straight, expression serene and faintly pleased, as if everything was unfolding exactly as it should.But beside her, Leopold’s gaze lingered on Maxim, a furrow in his brow betraying some inner calculus.I watched him too long, trying to decipher whether he sensed it, that the bond between us had already been forged, long before the ceremony made it official.
I drew a slow breath and turned to Maxim.Nothing had changed, and yet everything had.We were just one step away from being significantly safer than we were in Vesture.Maxim’s eyes swept over me, brimming with raw emotion.Whatever he felt, it clung to the surface of his eyes, just barely held in check.He squeezed my hands, his lips forming a hard line.
“Just one more night,” he murmured.
Caleren stepped back, his mantle gathering around his legs.“May your tomorrow arrive with open hands, and may your union stand should the world dare to shift beneath it.”
Even though I was lost in Maxim’s beautiful olive-green eyes, some part of me kept waiting for an alarm to sound, or for a commotion outside to give way to a line of Regs marching in with cold expressions and clipped orders.I looked to my beloved best friends and family, so happy they were near tears, and a moment passed.Then another.Caleren offered a final nod, then turned without fanfare and withdrew.We remained in place, hands still clasped, suspended in a silence that stretched just long enough to suggest something else might follow.But nothing did.No red lights.No intrusion or raid.Just the hush of a room wrapped in ceremony.Lev had done it, just as he said he would.And for the first time since we learned the truth, I let myself believe we might actually make it.We were less than twenty hours from the Oathbond, and for now at least, we were safe.
After the family dinner at Celestines, compliments of Lourdes and Roan, we all went our separate ways, and then it was just Maxim and me, sitting alone and silent in the darkness of our sub-bay.
“The Crèche will deliver my belongings an hour before the Oathbond… just the last of my wardrobe, toiletries, grooming kit, and the diagnostic tablet,” Maxim said.“I’ve already packed for the resort, so once the ceremony is complete and we’ve said our goodbyes, we can leave without delay.Have you finished packing?Would you like help with anything?”
I blinked, slow to return from my thoughts.“Hmm?”
His hand found mine.“You’re worrying,” he said gently, pressing his lips to my fingers.“What is it?”
“I was scared today,” I admitted.“I kept waiting for the Regs to come storming in, to rip you away from me.”My voice faltered.“And I’m still afraid.Afraid that tomorrow will be the day it all ends.Lev says we’re protected, and he’s proven it time and time again, but it’s hard to believe it when we’re this close.This is the part in every story where everything falls apart—the second they think they’re safe.”I turned toward him, my eyes searching his.“Tell me that’s not how our story ends.”
“If it does,” he began.
“You have a plan,” I finished.
He let go of my hand, then stepped out of the transport.When my slipgate opened, he was already there, hand extended, his expression calm but resolute.“Many.I have many plans,” he said gently as he helped me to stand.“And tomorrow, whatever may come, we start our lives together.”
I let him guide me from the sub-bay, our steps muted as we ascended the narrow staircase.We lingered in the low-lit corridor until the panel gave way with a muted sigh, and he gently drew me inside.
“Calyx,” he said, his tone low but clear.“Initiate immersion basin.Infuse serenity serum.”
“Sequence initiated,” Calyx replied.
I hesitated.“I wish you could stay with me tonight.And I also know I wouldn’t sleep, feeling like I was inviting the very thing I’ve been afraid of.”
