Maxon's POV

Not to be cruel to someone who had been a lifelong friend but I didn't know where I could trust him to be besides locked up in one of the prison cells of the palace. There was no explanation as to why he had that key and I had to assume the worst with Southern Rebels having made their presence known within the palace. But I couldn't make heads or tails of it at all. Scott had been born into privilege. He hadn't had to suffer like America did—worrying about where the next meal would come from or how he could ensure that none of his siblings or himself went hungry. He had lived here in Angeles and I had seen him several times throughout childhood and hardly saw a time where he couldn't have exactly what he wanted whenever he wanted it. I ran my fingers through my hair frustrated. I knew that there would be people more loyal to my father that would argue against my way of life. But I didn't think I would have to be worrying about a personal friend of mine betraying me. What could he have possibly hoped to gain through this? I groaned frustrated. I didn't even know what this was. Perhaps I was just jumping to conclusions and he had a reasonable excuse as to why he had that key. Maybe his father had a spare I didn't know about and he had happened to stumble upon it and give it to America. Impractical but I had to give him the benefit of the doubt.

I started pulling at my hair as I walked down the halls. What was I going to say to him? How was I going to act? I tried to control my temper as I took every step. What could I do besides fight back the anger I was feeling and try to understand his side of the story? If I exploded after I heard it or if I thought that he was lying, then I could take different steps from there to help me decide how I was going to punish him if need be. I ran my fingers through my hair one last time hoping that there would be a little control to the mess of it. I waved the guards away and walked through the doors of the prison. Every step to the far back cell seemed longer and longer.

Taking the key off the chain I turned it just as slowly as I possibly could. Luckily his door was steel with only a small window opening. He couldn't see how slowly I was doing this and take offense to whatever friendship that we had always had. I pushed open the door and seeing him sitting on the bed seemed to bring all the anger back to the surface. I trusted him around Kriss. I had sent him to protect her and her family and it was a possibility that he could have gotten close enough to her kill her. There were a thousand things that he could have done to her and it angered me that he would betray me like that. And to top it off, he had cleared gained America's trust and had woken up some feelings towards him inside of her. The fact that someone else would hurt her like that pissed me off. She didn't deserve that, she deserved to be someone's princess.

"How did you get that key," I spat at him, getting his attention. He turned and looked over at me, his teeth biting his lip as if he were trying to settle on which lie to choose. "Don't you dare lie to me."

"Maxon—"

"It's King Maxon to you. Now, how did you get that key."

He shook his head once again looking up at the ceiling. "King Maxon, you're overthinking all of this. If I was a threat to you, I wouldn't have given America my copy. I would have kept it hidden and to myself. Stop assuming the worst of people just because you're afraid that everyone is going to betray you. You don't need to know the way that I got that key, you wouldn't believe me if I told you. But I am not a Southern Rebel, regardless of how negatively you're thinking of me. Just because you're jealous—"

"I'm not jealous, Scott. I'm trying to keep my people safe, trying to rule a country, trying to make change and I am running out of people I can trust! That is all this is about and yet you continue to refuse to tell me the reason that you had that key. If it's not because you're with the Southern Rebels than it shouldn't be such a big deal!" With every word I yelled at him I found myself stepping closer and closer, punching the wall by the side of his head. My face was directly in front of his sneering with anger as he continued to refuse to answer my question. "If you cannot answer my question I will have you tried and convicted of high treason against the crown!"

Still, he didn't budge. I leaned back and paced around the room trying to think of something to say to him to get him to speak. No words were coming to mind and I was beginning to give up on him saying anything at all. At the last moment, the last person that I expected rushed through the door alongside Kriss. There stood August looking back and forth between me and Scott trying to figure out what had gone on between us in the moments that we had missed. I looked at him in confusion and back at Kriss. Why was she here? I didn't ever introduce them and I didn't think that they had met on their own.

"Good evening, cousin," he said with a soft grin as he looked back at Scott.

"What are you doing here?" I forced out still trying to decide what the connection was between all of them. Then it dawned on me in a matter of seconds. August was a Northern Rebel. Scott Alexander was a Northern Rebel. I pulled the chair out from the corner and pinched the bridge of my nose as I sat down trying to decide what to say from there. Why would Scott be a Rebel? How could he have possibly gotten away with that given who his father was? "You're a Rebel."

"Yes, I was a part of the Northern Rebels, Maxon." Scott said sitting up as he slid onto the desk sitting in front of me. "You have to understand that my father, well he wasn't much more of a father than yours. He also had a way of getting around with the maids after my mother died. She was a natural-born Two, we had always had a family of natural-born Twos. So when he got a Six pregnant, he sent her and the baby away to fend for themselves. No one believed that an Officer in the Royal Army would break the law so they sent them both away to be Eights. My sister reached out to me when she was twelve. Ever since I learned how cruel the upper class could be. I knew that things had to change so when she decided to be a Rebel, so did I. August had found her and brought her in."

I sat back dumbfounded. So he knew the suffering that I didn't about the lower Castes. Things that my father had tried for years to keep from me had been revealed to him and he probably wouldn't have ever mentioned any of it to me. I wondered what would have happened if I hadn't ever met America and started to make my own changes. He wouldn't have been there to tell me the things that I needed to know and that only frustrated me further. So much for friendship.

"I had to keep silent Maxon," he continued shaking his head as he got up onto his feet. "Could you imagine how my father would have reacted if he knew that I was a Rebel or that I had met my half-sister? I didn't know what kind of king you were going to shape out to be."

"Did you really think I was as heartless as my father!" I yelled back at him. Out of all of this, that confession irritated and angered me more than anything else. He knew what that man had done to me and was one of the few people who knew about the scars on my back. We had grown up like brothers and he had never realized that I was going to be thought of so poorly by him. Did he not realize what kind of person I truly was? Had I hidden it that well?

"That's not what—"

"It's exactly what you meant. What if I wrote to your father right now and told him what you had just revealed to me? Would it matter to him that I trusted the Northern Rebels now, do you think? Should we run a little test since that's what kind of king you think I am?" I glared getting back into his space and pushing him back with a rough shove. His eyes flashed with a little fear and I stood back smirking but almost instantly feeling guilty for the look on my face. So my threat wasn't empty, I could see it as the fear flashed gently through his eyes. Even as an adult there was a lingering fear of the man.

"That's enough, Maxon," Kriss finally spoke upcoming between the two of us. She put her hand on my chest and looked up at me quietly. "There's a reason that I asked for him to be my personal guard. I knew that I could trust him, we had to hide the same secret from you."

I stopped in my tracks and pulled away from her hand. The words weighed on me like a ton of bricks. Kriss was a Northern Rebel as well. Was everyone in the Selection hiding a secret from me? America had Aspen and now Kriss had this! Was that the only reason she had come here? August and Georgia had said they had a second choice if I didn't pick America and that was simply because that other choice had been one of their own. They could have rigid this competition if I hadn't gained feelings for her by blackmailing me into my choice. I growled with anger as I turned to walk out of the room. "Go home Kriss. Go finish the rest of your visit, I don't want to see you right now."


So I was going to write out some Americott in this chapter too but I figured that most of you would like me to end where I did. :) I'm going to have to push off the wedding for a few chapters (Aspen's) but you'll enjoy chapter 19 now because of it. Reviews will get you there sooooooner! The next chapter will be in America's POV.