In Bonneville without power you are nothing, without money you're considered a limitation and without a name, you're good for nothing. “Inject him and let's get the fuck out of here!” “But we've got to see if it actually works, that's the rule.” “Fuck the rules man! Do you want to go to prison?” He paused, looking at his partner waiting for a response. “That's what I thought, so inject him and let's get the fuck out of here, they don't pay us enough for this shit!” The police sirens grew louder as it drew closer to the downtown vicinity, the place where the two accomplices and their victim currently were, as he was slowly losing his life. “Fine,” he grumbled, crouching down to the ground, injecting a blue liquid substance into the arm of a young skinny boy that lay helplessly on the ground on the brink of death. “Let's go!” They both skedaddled away running for their lives. The police stopped at the alleyway where Axel Knox lay on the ground as he gasped for air. The alley on

In Bonneville without power you are nothing. Without money you're considered a limitation. And without a name, you're good for nothing.That was the unwritten law of the city, everyone who mattered knew it and the ones who mattered most came from the five founding families. The Falcones, who ran the ports and the unions. The Beauforts, who owned the banks and the judges. The Hawthornes, who controlled the media and the truth. The Marlowes, who held the construction and the land and the Windsors which were the oldest, the proudest, and the dead.The other four families had erased the Windsors twenty years ago, not with fire or blood, but with betrayal. A single piece of information, whispered in the wrong ear, at the wrong time. The Windsor fortune vanished overnight, their name became a curse and Harrison Hawthorne had been the one holding the match.Axel still tied to a wooden chair, wriggling, trying to set himself free as he dug fingers into the carved armrest. “Don’t call me t

The meeting room was deep underground, there were no windows, no clocks that could tell of the time. A single round table sat in the middle, surrounded by five chairs. Three of them were occupied, Harrison was a representative of his own family, the Hawthorne, while the fifth, while the fifth, which was the Windsor chair, remained empty. It had been empty for twenty years.Harrison Hawthorne stood at the head of the table. The three figures across from him sat in shadow. Their faces were hidden, one of them hid their face wearing a hood, another by the angle of the light and the last person was by choice. That was how these meetings worked. Power didn't need to see faces. Power needed results.“Report,” said a voice from the left. Harrison clasped his hands behind his back. “The boy survived.”Silence. Then a woman spoke from the right. “The elixir?”“Fully absorbed, there was no rejection, no side effects either, it was beyond what we expected.” Harrison paused. “His powers have aw

Harrison dropped through the broken ceiling and landed on the dirt floor like a cat. His blue eyes swept the room. Behind him, two more figures climbed down not Vince or Leo. New men, which were much bigger, they looked harder, Their eyes also glowed faintly blue.“You've been busy,” Mariette said, stepping in front of Axel. “Building an army of vessels.”“Not an army.” Harrison brushed dust off his jacket. “A collection of some work. Most die, but your son? Our son?” He looked at Axel. “He's the first one who survived with his original mind intact. The others become… empty. Hollow shells. But Axel has this rare ability that allows him to keep himself with his mind intact. That's why he's special.”“I'm not your experiment,” Axel said. His voice was low. The hum in his chest was slowly building again.“You're my son and that makes you whatever I say you are.” Harrison took a step closer. “Come home, Axel. Your mother abandoned you, for fifteen years of your life she left you with stra

The Hawthorne estate sat on a hill overlooking Bonneville. It wasn't just a house, It was a fortress. Stone walls, iron gates, and towers that had stood for over two hundred years. Axel had seen it from the highway as a kid, always wondering who lived inside. Now he knew, a father he never knew existed.Harrison led him through the main doors. The inside were even bigger, marble floors, chandeliers, paintings of stern-faced men and women who all shared the same cold eyes.“Your ancestors?” Axel asked.“I wouldn't particularly call them that, we prefer to be called the Hawthornes. My bloodline but your bloodline is the one that matters tonight.” Harrison stopped in front of a large wooden door. Behind it, Axel could hear voices. Low. Serious. “They're waiting.”“What do I say?”“Nothing. Just show them what you can do.” Harrison opened the door.The room was round, like the underground meeting chamber, which smelled of riches and generational wealth. It had velvet chairs, a fireplace a