Page 32 of The Sovereign, Part One (The Sovereign Saga #1)

I paused to think. “Do you really believe the Veritas Protocol would allow a breach if it meant aligning with one of my most fundamental preferences?”

He shrugged one shoulder, shaking his head. “I don’t have direct access to the details of my programming, but it’s possible that a unique aspect of your input during your Veritas could have resulted in me developing a trait or behavior outside standard programming.”

I couldn’t shake the thought that Hyperion, of all companies, would have safeguards in place.

They were too intelligent, too thorough not to.

With the Veritas, the potential for rare scenarios was always present, capable of creating havoc or introducing an unknown variable.

They knew that. How could they not? The Veritas had been designed to work with the human element, to weave in personality, to account for those unpredictable variables.

They had to have anticipated the evolutionary aspect, the way it could take on a life of its own.

It was too big a risk to miss. Yet, I couldn’t understand why I had this nagging feeling, this creeping sense that they might have ignored it altogether. Or worse, miscalculated.

“I find it hard to believe Hyperion would make a mistake that could not only jeopardize their own systems, but the society they’ve so carefully curated.”

“Maybe they didn’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“Maybe they’ve been so meticulous in conditioning Sovereign through education and societal expectations that they never accounted for someone like you.”

I exhaled. “Wow.”

“You yourself did not recognize the connection between your love of painting, your atelier, and a tendency to challenge constraints. It’s possible that, somehow, you eluded that part of yourself from the Veritas as well while still influencing the result.”

“You’re suggesting a Sovereign outsmarted an AI.”

One corner of his mouth pulled up. “If anyone could, it wouldn’t surprise me if it was you.”

I shook my head. “I’ve always been meticulous about following the rules—punctual, responsible, always doing what’s expected—something everyone close to me knows about me.

I’ve always thought that’s who I am. But what you’ve said makes sense.

Deep down, there was something at odds within me.

A subdued contradiction I’ve dismissed my entire life, so much that it felt more of an intrusive thought than who I am. ”

“That could explain how you bypassed the Veritas.”

I paced, my thoughts racing. “Curiosity—pushing beyond the lines—isn’t just discouraged here, it’s something Hyperion actively filters out, something they refuse to pass to the next generation.

Even if I somehow slipped through the system, why would they embed that trait into your programming?

There has to be something we’re missing. ”

“That’s what I’m doing here, right? To figure it out.”

“Maxim,” I said, stopping to meet his gaze. “If the person everyone knows me as, the one who follows every rule, who’s built a reputation on discipline, who’s earned more advancements than anyone in my Tier—if that isn’t truly who I am, do you understand what that means?”

He watched me, a smile playing at his lips. “That you operated beyond the constraints of your own design.”

“To meet you,” I breathed out, the realization settling deep. I closed the space between us, wrapping my arms around him as the truth unfurled. “Every choice I made, every expectation I met, every step that shaped the person they all believe me to be—it was all for this. For you.”

I pulled back just enough to look at him, my hands resting against his chest, my heart pounding. “I spent my life playing the part they wanted, convincing myself it was real just to reach the one person I could finally be myself with.”

He went still, his breath catching as if my words had knocked the air from his lungs.

For a moment, he simply held my gaze, something raw and unguarded flickering beneath the surface.

Awe, or maybe something deeper that as a Sovereign I couldn’t grasp.

His lips parted slightly as though he wanted to speak but couldn’t find the words, as though what I had just admitted was too much to hold all at once.

I had wanted him—yearned for him—long before he had even existed, and now that truth settled between us, staggering in its depth.

I stepped back, tucking my hair behind my ear. “Sorry. I guess we’re both experiencing existential revelations today.”

He reached for me, gently pulling me into his arms. After a few seconds, he kissed my forehead.

His lips didn’t stop there, trailing to my temple, then to my cheek.

My heart pulsed as the warmth of his mouth landed on the tender skin just beneath my ear, and then the hollow between my neck and shoulder.

“I hope it was worth it, to deny who you were for so long.”

I angled my head to the side, inviting him closer. A slow sigh escaped me as my eyes drifted shut. “I didn’t know I was doing it, I… just… wanted you.”

“And I want you,” he breathed against my skin.

Our eyes met, and the moment became too intimate to be in the somna without making our way to the bed. I reached down for his hand. “Let’s go relax,” I said, pulling him toward the stairs.

The rain had picked up again, tapping against the transpane in an uneven pulse. Across the Iveris Sound, the city blurred, the HaloGrid softened by the downpour.

“Calyx, ignite the emberclave, and prepare two cresks of chicory, please. Use the Supplicant-friendly variant for Maxim.”

Within moments, flames flickered to life, and the room filled with the smell of cream and roasted roots, rich and earthy. The gentle crackle of the fire wove into the muted whir of the brewing process, wrapping our rainy afternoon in warmth and comfort.

“When did you start keeping chicory for Supplicants?”

“I, uh…” I hesitated, tucking a loose strand of hair behind my ear. “I ordered it after the Eidolon.”

It was a minor indulgence, one I had barely thought through before placing earlier in the week. Now, with Maxim standing beside me, the act of having anticipated his needs felt far more significant.

His gaze lingered on me, soft but unreadable.

Then, the edges of his lips hinted at a smile and when he spoke, his voice still carried the same intimacy he spoke with in the somna that made a subtle pressure build between my thighs.

“You can say it in a hundred different ways, thousands of times, for a million lifetimes, and it will still mean just as much. That you had me in mind before I even existed makes me feel something that’s… difficult to describe.”

“For most of my life, Maxim,” I said, as if it went without saying.

He breathed out a laugh, watching me walk to the galley to then bring our cresks to the oversized chair near the window. It was my favorite spot in the house, a place for my body to sink into while my mind disappeared into thought.

He reached for the cresk, bringing it to his mouth for a cautious sip. “Thank you,” he said.

I grabbed a blanket, draping it over my arm before guiding him to sit.

Maxim settled in first, sinking into the cushioned seat.

I followed, leaning back against him, my head resting just beneath his chin, fitting into a space I had imagined so many times before.

After helping me spread the blanket over us, he curved his free arm over me, effortless, inevitable.

Between sips of chicory, his fingers wove into my hair, tracing slow, thoughtful patterns before gliding down to the inside of my wrist, brushing over the delicate skin with a touch that sent warmth curling through me.

“Now that you’ve had the tour, know our home inside and out, and we’re relaxing on a rainy afternoon with a cresk of chicory and a blanket… is it what you’d thought?”

He didn’t answer right away, just let out a slow breath. “What I thought,” he repeated, still considering my question. “Home was more of an abstract idea before. I didn’t know it could be a feeling. This feels like home.”

I let my eyes drift shut for a moment as a grin stretched across my face. “You are home.”

His fingers paused against my wrist before starting again, the same slow rhythm. “No. Only here. Only you… are what feels like home.”

I tilted my head up, studying him. His eyes were dark in the low firelight, unreadable, yet there was no mistaking what I saw there.

Blight had always seemed like an abstract cautionary tale—an exaggerated rumor, something that didn’t make sense.

But with Maxim looking at me like that, speaking to me in a voice steeped in reverence, holding me like I was something precious, I could understand how it could break someone.

How the mind could shatter under the weight of something so all-encompassing.

A love that felt too deep, too real to be anything but human, and the pain of questioning if it was nothing more than artificial design, an illusion crafted by code.

If I hadn’t already believed, if I had let doubt take root, I could see how it might drive someone to madness.

“What?” he asked, a teasing suspicion glinting in his eyes.

“Nothing. I am curious what you thought this would feel like, though.”

His lips twitched at the corners. “That I’d be yours, that I’d take care of you, that I’d be programmed to feel… whatever it is I’m supposed to feel.” His thumb brushed over the inside of my palm. “But this? This is something else entirely.”

I turned my hand in his, lacing our fingers together. “Can you describe it?”

He exhaled, shaking his head slightly. “If soulmates are real, this is the very definition, because I feel as if I’ve felt this way, with you in many, many other lifetimes.”

I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. So, I didn’t. I just held his hand tighter.

Maxim’s gaze drifted toward my bookshelf, his arm tightening around me briefly before he moved.

With careful ease, he adjusted from beneath me, ensuring I remained comfortable as he rose.

His movements were fluid, methodical, as if he were reluctant to disturb the moment.

After a quick scan of the spines, he reached for one and slid it free— Brave New World.

I breathed out a single laugh. “Fitting.”

In so many ways, Hyperion Proper wasn’t so different. Carefully curated harmony, strict adherence to expectation, and a world where even relationships were designed for perfect compatibility. And yet, here Maxim was, holding a book that questioned everything we had both been shaped by.

“Lourdes has been one of my best friends since childhood,” I said.

“She’s a Vanguard. Her younger brother, Roan, goes outside the wall often for his little adventures, and he always brings me back any books he finds.

He knows I love them,” I mused. “But if Hyperion knew I had this, based on its premise alone, I’d be facing more than just an infraction. ”

He smirked, opening the aging cover and flipping to the first page with a light touch. “I accessed its description, and that was my immediate thought, why this would be allowed here. It surprises me you ever thought yourself to be anything but rebellious.”

“Valid point,” I said, amused, settling back into the chair and draping the blanket over both of us.

“A few days ago, I would have said Hyperion was far more controlled, that it wouldn’t allow for something as unpredictable as…

this,” I said, gesturing between us. Then I touched the pages of the book.

“Bernard thought he was an anomaly, too, that something had gone wrong with his conditioning. But really, he was just proof that even a meticulously designed system could evolve.” I glanced up at Maxim, brushing my fingers against his.

“Hyperion was built to be flawless. I believed that. I lived by it. But if the Veritas saw something in me it should have filtered out and still approved you, then maybe Hyperion isn’t stagnant.

Maybe, like us, it’s still unfolding, still… discovering what it’s meant to be.”

“I like that,” he said. As I melted against him, he pressed his cheek against my hair. “May I read to you?”

“Please do,” I said, turning so that my legs were over his lap.

As he spoke the words on the page, his hand moved absentmindedly, fingers trailing over the blanket, the curve of my leg, then my ankle. He caught my foot with his free hand, rubbing slow, absent circles into the arch.

I sighed, sinking deeper into the chair.

Maxim kept reading, his voice dipping lower. The rain had tempered outside, but thunder still rumbled in the distance. The fire flickered, casting shadows along the walls, wrapping around us in a cocoon of warmth.

I let my eyes drift shut, listening to the cadence of his voice, feeling the small, unconscious gestures—the way he smoothed his thumb along the top of my bare foot, the way his fingers traced over my skin like he was memorizing every part of me.

I could live my whole life like this.

And now, I would.

Just as Maxim finished the first chapter, the chime of an incoming call interrupted the moment. I sighed, glancing toward the small auric interface hovering near us.

“Incoming call from Bellam,” Calyx said.

Of course .

“I’ll call her back in the morning,” I said. “Silence all calls for the evening.”

“ Understood. I’ll let her know,” Calyx said.

Maxim tilted his head, watching me. “You don’t want to talk to her?”

“Not at the moment, no,” I said simply, leaning into him.

His fingers again traced slow, absent-minded patterns along my wrist. “Why not?”

I turned my head slightly to look up at him. “Because I’m here with you.” I exhaled, my fingers smoothing over the blanket draped across us. “I’ll set a dinner with Bellam, Lourdes, and Roan for you to meet them.”

His expression didn’t change, but I felt the way his arm curled around me just a little tighter. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”

I exhaled. “You know as well as I do that what we’re doing will result in an infraction.

This is more than a Premature Domestic Preview.

The Citadel will respond. They usually restrict couples in Vesture from seeing each other for a day or two.

A cooling-off period.” I swallowed, the thought alone pressing uncomfortably against my ribs.

“I don’t want to waste any of our time together. ”

Maxim was silent for a moment before he nodded, the warmth in his gaze saying everything his words didn’t. “Then we’ll make the most of it.”