The Selection - Maxon's Story

Prologue

An excerpt from The Prince; A Selection Novella:

The palace was quiet. If I didn't know better, I wouldn't have guessed that we had so much company. Maybe things wouldn't be so different if I didn't focus on the change.

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"The letters have been delivered, your highness." I look up from my book to see the short man standing at attention. The letters, I think. What letters? The man must see the confused look on my face. "The letters to all eligible for your Selection, sir."

"Ah yes, thank you. Dismissed." I say, and go back to reading my book. It was a book my father had given me, and although I have never quite understood or trusted his choices, it was a rather good tale. It was a moment of life and death when there was another knock on the door. Instead of telling them to come in, I put down my book and answered the door myself.

In front of me were three, lanky women, Sixes and dressed appropriately, to dress me. For tonight was the Report. The Selected wouldn't be announced until this fortnight, but knowing Illea, there was always some news to be shared.

I sat on my chair, a throne, but less regal than my mothers, which was a lot less fancy than my fathers. I wiggled my back a bit, my muscles growing numb from the hard seat. It was cushioned, but over the generations of royals who had sat on it it had worn till it was nothing more than a rag and some foam. I watched the guards at the door as they marched in a long line of men, women and children dressed in rags.

Eights. The word registered in my mind. These people are, or will be Eights if they are not sentenced to life in jail or execution. So this was the focus of tonight's Report. Sentencing traitors to a sad, lonely life. Or, no life at all.

I looked around the room, trying to avoid the gaze of the radicals when my eyes caught my fathers. He nodded at me, but his eyes were fierce and conveyed a simple message; Do this, or else. I shivered. I didn't even want to go where the or else went. It was cruel and mean, and worst of all, a secret. A royal secret. People always think they're about secret weddings or children, but fairy tales aren't always happy. Nor the people in them.

First was a boy my own age, with dirt all over his face and scratches covering his limbs. "Name and crime." I state, the words coming out of my mouth without even trying, set in my brain like the wounds on his skin.

"Peter, sir." His eyes looked up at me in a pleading way. "I got my girlfriend pregnant." My eyes, which had been resting on the floor to avoid his, flicked up, now unafraid. He is a criminal, I think, he did wrong and he shall be punished.

I look at the way his wrists droop and bleed from the aching of metal cuffs, the way his head hangs low in shame. He knows he broke the law, but he is sorry, I tell myself, unsure of what to do. "Two years." I announce. The hall gasps and cameras flash, no doubt catching the look of surprise on my parent's faces. I continue to send the criminals away, but I do so wisely. I do not send a man who stole a loaf of bread to execution, as my father would, but send him to a year in prison. Until the last child comes up.

"Grace." She says meekly, her eyes red and puffy, her cheeks tear-streaked and 7-year-old skin roughed. "I stole a doll for my baby sister, Lily." I feel my eyes sting and look up at the hall.

"This is a child!" I cry. "A child, who stole for her dear sister. All she wanted was for her sister to be happy, and now, with Grace in prison, she will never be! Therefore, Grace," I kneel down in front of her. "You are not going to be sent to jail. You are to go home, and you may keep the doll, but you must promise me to never steal again."

Her eyes look at me in awe and gratefulness. She nods vigorously. "Of course, Prince Maxon. I promise, Prince Maxon!" She turns and scurries away. I stand and look at my parents. My mother nods in approval, my father hides his anger behind the mask he wears, his eyes dangerously sharp. Or else, he mouths. I stare idly at my shoes.

Gavril closes up the Report, and as soon as the cameras have stopped rolling and are cast downwards at the floor, my father storms over and grabs the hem of my sleeve, dragging me behind him. He kicks the door of his study shut. "What did I tell you?" he says angrily and undoes his belt.

"She was a child!" I counter.

"But the others, the real criminals!" He steps forward and I take a step back, only to have my back press against the wall. Trapped.

"You don't get it! Those things they stole are pitiful to us, but only dreams for them!" I cry.

He steps closer and puts a finger on my chest. "Don't you dare tell me what I do and do not get again." He says in an angry, quiet tone he reserved only for these times. With that, we grabbed my shoulder and flung it so my stomach was against the wall. His cold fingers grabbed the seam of my shirt and yanked it upwards so it stayed off my back without being held. And then he released himself.

The cool leather struck against my back with force, but not as hard as I had experienced before. With each whip the pain grew stronger and stronger, like a fire with wood being continuously added. Finally I knew he had left by the sound of the door clicking shut but not locking, and turned around, refusing to cry. I snuck back upstairs to my room and started to clean my freshly acquired wounds.

"God, Maxon." I mumbled to myself as the antiseptic stung my skin. "What have you gotten yourself into?" I close my eyes and rest my head on my knee, finally letting the sob escape my lips, when the face of little Grace comes across my mind.

She's counting on me. I tell myself. She's relying on me to make things better. For all of us. I finish up cleaning my wounds and wrap some bandages around my waist, wipe my eyes, scrub my face with the palm of my hand and some water, leaving it a remarkably crimson colour, and then walk over to my book shelves.

I let my fingers glide across the smooth, cold marble, along the edges to the painted plaster of my wall. Corners of photographs lift up as my fingertips slide underneath them as I run my hand along the wall. Say you do find your wife in this lot, I think, how many pictures of her will you have up here? Will you even take her picture? Will you like her enough to put her picture up here? And just like that, millions of thoughts begin to run through my head. About the Selection, my father, I even let my fingers drift along with my thoughts to how tired I am and they brush against the velvet covers of the perfectly made bed.

Will she sleep in here? Will she drape her arm around your neck, lay her head on your chest? Will you obsess over the way or mouth parts when she's sleeping, or the way her eyelash flutter when she opens her eyes every morning?

And at that very moment I knew. I knew that I was a hypocrite. Two hours ago, I didn't want the Selection to ever start. But now, all I wanted was for it to be over, to have made my choice. So it could be someone, who would drape their arms around my neck, lay her head on my chest. Someone I could obsess over the way those lips parted every time she took a breath in her sleep, the way her eyes batted when she opened them every morning. I wanted it so bad. The only problem was, I still hadn't met her. I didn't even have the faintest clue. The lottery was yet to be drawn.

Will she be your first pick? Or will she be the underdog, slowly creeping up on you, only to steal away your heart?

I can see her, almost see her, smiling as she wakes up. The splash she creates as she jumps into the pool with me. The way she pulls the pins out of her hair at the end of a long day. I felt a longing, a need for her.

"Max?' My mother says softly as she knocks on the door. I look up and beckon for her to come in. "I just wanted to let you know, I know what happened. He — he does it to me too."

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Hey guys I hope you've enjoyed the first chapter of my new fanfiction, I'm really going to be dedicated to this. I'm going to try and keep it like right exactly to the book but yeah :) hope you like this chapter, remember to vote and comment thoughts <3