Chapter 3 - The Architecture of Secrets
The next week was a dance of shadows. With Aris gone, the house felt like it was holding its breath. Nathan was gone for days at a time, managing his "business" in the city, but he was always present in the way the guards watched me.
Ethan was kept in the west wing, under the watchful eye of a new physician, a woman who seemed more interested in healing than in maintaining the status quo. But the secrets of the Blackwell household weren't just in the medicine. They were in the walls.
I found a crawlspace behind the paneling in the study—a place where Nathan kept the files that weren't meant for the public eye. I didn't go in to steal; I went in to understand.
I found records of shipping manifests, offshore accounts, and, buried deep in the back, a file labeled Project Lazarus. It was a report on a failed experiment in neural-regeneration—technology that had been stolen from a research lab in Switzerland five years ago.
Ethan wasn't just a sick child. He was an experiment.
I was reading the file when the study door opened. Nathan stood there, his hand on his holster. He didn't look angry. He looked defeated.
"You weren't supposed to find that," he said.
"Is that why he can't walk?" I asked, my voice trembling. "Was it the procedure?"
Nathan walked to the desk and poured two glasses of scotch. He didn't offer me one. He drank his in one swallow. "He was in a car accident. He was dying. I had one choice—let him go, or use the tech they said was a decade away from human testing. I chose."
"You chose to make him a prisoner in his own body," I whispered.
"I chose to keep him alive!" Nathan roared, the sound echoing off the high ceilings. He composed himself instantly, the mask snapping back into place. "And now, he’s waking up. The neural pathways are re-firing. He’s standing, Vivi. He’s standing because the experiment worked, but at what cost?"
I didn't answer. I knew the cost. I saw it in Ethan’s eyes every morning.
"I need you to stay," Nathan repeated, his voice now a plea. "He trusts you. He’ll listen to you. If he gets scared, if he starts to realize what he is, he’ll spiral. You’re his anchor."
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"I’m a maid, Mr. Blackwell. Not a handler."
"You're whatever I need you to be, as long as he stays safe."
