Chapter 7: The King's Fever

The heavy glass doors hissed shut, the sound a sharp, mechanical finality that cut Nikos off from the garden’s false freedom. He stood in the transition hallway, his chest tight, feeling the weight of the King’s stare like a physical brand on the back of his neck. He didn't turn around. He couldn't. Looking back meant acknowledging the shadow on the balcony, and Nikos wasn't ready to see the satisfaction he knew would be etched into Andreas’s face.

His legs felt like lead as he began the walk toward the inner sanctum. The palace guards didn't say a word, their armor gleaming under the recessed LED strips of the corridor, but their presence was loud. They moved like sharks in expensive suits, their eyes tracking his every micro-movement. Nikos kept his head down, his focus locked on the polished obsidian tiles beneath his feet. He felt like a glitch in the palace’s perfect matrix—a noble-born ghost haunting a house that had already been sold to the highest bidder.

As he reached the double doors leading to the State War Room, the atmosphere shifted. Usually, the guards here were statues, but today they were twitchy. One of them was pressing an earpiece into his skull, his face pale.

"Yo, move it," the guard muttered, shoving Nikos roughly toward the side entrance of the King’s private wing. "The King’s on some weird energy today. Just get inside and stay out of the way."

Nikos didn't argue. He didn't have the clout for it anyway. He slipped through the door just as a muffled thud echoed from the main meeting room. It was followed by a silence so heavy it felt like the air had been sucked out of the building. Then, the shouting started.

"King Andreas!"

Nikos froze. He edged toward the heavy oak partition that separated the hallway from the meeting chamber. Through a crack in the door, he saw the unthinkable. Andreas, the man who had looked like a god on a throne only hours ago, was slumped over the mahogany table. His face was a sickly, translucent grey, sweat beading on his forehead as he gripped the edge of the wood so hard his knuckles looked like they were about to burst through the skin.

"Get the medics! Now!" Eleni Markos’s voice cut through the room like a blade. She wasn't her usual composed self. She looked rattled, her eyes darting toward the security cameras. "Lock down the West Wing! No one gets in or out. If the council hears the King has folded, this whole place is cooked. You hear me? Deadass lockdown!"

The guards moved with frantic precision. The heavy security shutters over the windows slammed shut with a series of metallic clangs that vibrated in Nikos’s teeth. The palace was going dark.

Before Nikos could retreat, Eleni spotted him. She didn't look angry; she looked desperate. She grabbed him by the arm, her grip bruising. "You. You’re the only one he hasn't been paranoid about today. He’s been moving mad, talking about poison, refusing to let the staff near his food. He’s sick, Nikos. Some kind of infection from the old battle wounds or whatever, but he won't let the royal doctors touch him. He thinks they’re all opps."

"What do you want me to do?" Nikos asked, his voice shaking.

"Care for him," Eleni hissed, shoving him toward the bedroom suite where the guards were currently carrying the semi-conscious King. "If he wakes up and sees a doctor with a needle, he’ll kill someone. But you? You’re his pet. He’s obsessed. He’ll trust you. Don't fumble this, Nikos. If he dies, the next guy in line will have your head on a spike before the body is cold."

Nikos was pushed into the King’s bedroom, and the doors locked behind him with a heavy, electronic thunk.

The room was dim, lit only by the low glow of the floor lamps. Andreas lay on the massive bed, his chest heaving. He’d been stripped of his heavy coat, leaving him in a silk shirt that was soaked through with feverish sweat. The sight was jarring. This was the man who had destroyed the Stavros legacy, yet here he was, looking like he was one bad breath away from the end.

Nikos approached the bedside slowly. On the nightstand sat a tray with a glass of water and a vial of clear medicine—the King’s specialized antibiotic.

I could do it, Nikos thought, his heart hammering against his ribs. I could just not give it to him. Or I could find something in the bathroom, something to mix in. I could end this right now.

He looked at the vial. His hands trembled. The memory of his father’s betrayal—the documents Andreas had shown him—flashed in his mind. His family hadn't been the saints he thought they were. They were just as dirty as the rest of them. If he killed Andreas now, in his sleep, like a coward, would he be any better?

"Nikos..."

The voice was a dry rasp. Nikos jumped, his eyes flying to Andreas’s face. The King’s eyes weren't open, but his head was tossing back and forth on the pillow. He was deep in the delirium.

"Nikos... don't go..."

It wasn't a command. It was a plea. It sounded human. It sounded like the man behind the crown was actually in there somewhere, buried under layers of blood and conquest.

Nikos felt a surge of something complicated—not quite pity, but a recognition of a shared, broken reality. He picked up the vial. His sense of honor, that annoying, ingrained Stavros trait, wouldn't let him do it. He wouldn't kill a man who couldn't fight back.

He sat on the edge of the bed and lifted Andreas’s head, bracing him against his shoulder. The King was burning up, his skin radiating a terrifying heat.

"Drink this. No cap, Andreas, you need to stop acting like a main character and just swallow the meds," Nikos muttered, his slang a defense mechanism against the intimacy of the moment.

He pressed the glass to Andreas’s lips. The King sputtered, his hand flying up to catch Nikos’s wrist. His grip was weak, lacking its usual crushing power, but he managed to swallow.

For hours, Nikos stayed there. He dipped a cloth in cool water and wiped the King’s brow, watching the rise and fall of his chest. He watched the way the light caught the scars on Andreas’s arms—marks of a life spent in the trenches, not just on a throne. The palace remained silent, the lockdown still in effect. Outside those doors, a coup was probably being whispered about in every corner, but in here, it was just two boys playing a game of life and death in a golden cage.

As the fever began to break in the early hours of the morning, Nikos found himself drifting off, his head resting against the bedpost. He was exhausted, the emotional toll of the last few days finally catching up to him.

A sudden movement jerked him awake.

The room was bathed in the grey light of dawn. Andreas was sitting up, or trying to. His eyes were bloodshot but clear, the fever-haze replaced by a sharp, focused intensity. He looked at Nikos, then at the empty medicine vial on the tray.

"You didn't do it," Andreas said, his voice still cracked.

"Do what?" Nikos asked, rubbing his eyes, trying to play it cool. "Kill you? Bro, I’m too tired for a funeral."

Andreas didn't smile. He reached out, his hand surprisingly fast, and grabbed Nikos by the front of his shirt. Before Nikos could react, the King pulled him onto the bed, dragging him across the silk sheets until they were face-to-face.

"You stayed," Andreas whispered, his breath warm against Nikos’s skin.

"I was locked in, what was I supposed to do?" Nikos tried to pull away, but Andreas’s strength was returning with a vengeance. The King wrapped an arm around Nikos’s waist, pinning him against his side. It wasn't a servant's position; it was a possessive, territorial hold.

"You stay right here," Andreas commanded, his eyes closing as he pulled Nikos closer, refusing to let go even as the last of the fever shivers left his body. "Don't even think about moving."

Nikos lay there, his heart drumming a frantic rhythm against the King’s ribs, realizing with a sinking feeling that the lockdown outside might be over, but his own imprisonment had just entered a much more dangerous phase.