A Crown of Shattered Thrones

The air in Blackspire Keep tasted of sulfur and secrets. Alaric's boots echoed through the narrow stairwell as he descended into the underbelly of the fortress, clutching the Syndic's decree like a shackle. The parchment demanded his presence in the Archives of the Unspoken—a vault buried deep beneath the keep, where the Syndicate stored the histories too dangerous to burn.

He paused at the threshold. The door was iron, its surface etched with warnings in dead languages. Here lie the truths that kings erased. The lock clicked open with a hiss of steam, releasing a gust of air that smelled of rust and rot. Inside, the archives sprawled like a carcass picked clean by vultures. Shelves sagged under cracked scrolls, shattered tablets, and maps stained with blood. In the center of the room, a pedestal held the Syndicate's latest prize: a jagged shard of shadowglass, its edges glowing faintly with trapped light.

Alaric leaned closer. The glass was not black, as he'd always known it, but a deep violet, swirling with flecks of gold. Like a storm frozen mid-scream. He reached out, but a voice stopped him.

"It's not meant to be touched."

The woman stood in the shadows, her face obscured by a hooded cloak lined with silver fur. Her accent was northern, sharp and cold. Kael's people, then—the icebound clans of Hollowreach. She stepped into the dim light, revealing eyes as pale as ash and a scar that split her lip like a crack in porcelain.

"You're the historian," she said. Not a question. "The Syndic thinks you can read the Old Tongue."

"I've deciphered dead languages before," Alaric replied, wary. "Who are you?"

She ignored him, gesturing to the shadowglass. "This was found embedded in the chest of a Frozen Warden—one of the soldiers guarding the glacier. It killed three men before they pried it loose. The glass sings, they say. A hymn that drives minds to madness."

Alaric frowned. "Shadowglass doesn't sing. It's inert. A tool."

"Not this." She drew a dagger from her belt—a crude thing, its blade serrated and nicked. "The icefire miners uncovered a chamber beneath the glacier. Walls lined with this… corrupted glass. And something else." Her gaze flicked to the archives' darkest corner. "A mural. Of her."

He followed her stare. Propped against the wall was a slab of stone, its surface carved with a relief of a woman crowned in flames, her hands raised as though conducting a symphony. At her feet lay shattered thrones.

Lyrra.

Alaric's pulse quickened. "You've seen her before?"

"In dreams." The woman's voice dropped. "She stands at the edge of a cliff, singing a storm into the sea. The song is not kind. It does not forgive."

Before he could press her, the door groaned open. Syndic Malvar entered, flanked by two guards whose faces were hidden behind mirrored masks.

"Ah, Alaric. I see you've met Fira, our guest from Hollowreach." Malvar's smile was a thin veneer over threat. "She's here to ensure our… collaboration remains fruitful."

Fira's jaw tightened, but she said nothing.

Malvar gestured to the shadowglass. "This artifact is the key. The texts you translated speak of Blackspire's Heart—a forge where Lyrra tempered the first shadowglass with her own blood. Find it, and we'll wield power beyond the Syndicate's wildest greed."

"And if it destroys us?" Alaric asked quietly.

Malvar's gaze hardened. "Then we'll die as kings instead of rats."

Rain lashed the stained-glass windows of Kaelthar Manor, turning the panes into a kaleidoscope of fractured light. Veyra traced the edge of a shadowglass dagger, its edge so sharp it split the candlelight into prismatic shards. Eryk's manifests lay scattered on her desk—shipments of icefire, salted meat, and one entry circled in blood-red ink: Twelve crates, unmarked. Origin: Hollowreach. Contents: "Ecclesiastical relics."

Ecclesiastical relics. The Syndicate's euphemism for plundered corpses.

A knock interrupted her thoughts. Ser Joron, her household guard, stepped inside. His armor, polished to a merciless sheen, clinked as he bowed.

"My lady. The Silent Sisters have arrived."

Veyra's lips curved. "Show them to the solarium. And bring wine. The bitter vintage."

The Sisters stood in a semicircle, their hoods damp from the rain. Their gloves were pristine, but Veyra knew what lay beneath: fingertips stained black from tracing Dynast hymns onto flesh. The tallest among them stepped forward, her face a porcelain mask of serenity. She pressed a hand to her chest, then extended it, palm up—a request.

"You want payment already?" Veyra sipped her wine. "You haven't earned it."

The Sister tilted her head, her silence a blade.

"Very well." Veyra tossed a velvet pouch onto the table. It spilled open, revealing shards of corrupted shadowglass—the same violet-gold ore from the glacier. "A token. The rest comes when the Syndicate's convoy burns."

The Sister scooped up the glass, her breath catching as it hummed against her skin. She gestured to her companions, and they began to sing. Not with voices—with hands. Their fingers danced, weaving signs in the air that left faint trails of smoke. The shadows deepened, coalescing into a figure: a man in Dynast armor, his face obscured by a helm shaped like a screaming wolf.

Veyra's pulse quickened. A Blooded. One of the Dynast descendants.

The vision shifted—a canyon in the Sundered Sands, where the earth split like a wound. From the fissure rose a spire of twisted shadowglass, pulsating with a soundless melody. The Sisters' hands trembled, blood seeping through their gloves, before the image shattered.

The lead Sister collapsed, her mask slipping to reveal a face ravaged by blackened veins. She pressed a finger to Veyra's palm, leaving a smudge of ash and a single word scrawled in the Old Tongue: Hollow.

That night, Veyra dreamt of fire.

She stood in a field of molten glass, her bare feet blistering as the ground splintered beneath her. A figure emerged from the haze—a woman with Lyrra's face, her eyes twin voids.

"You court annihilation, little liar," the woman hissed, her voice a chorus of screams. "The song remembers. It hungers. And you've fed it a feast."

Veyra woke drenched in sweat, her throat raw. Beside her, Eryk slept soundly, his neck bandaged where she'd marked him. She slipped from the bed, her reflection warped in the shadowglass mirror.

A trickle of blood ran from her nose.

.....

The Archives of the Unspoken had no windows, no clocks, no breath of fresh air—only the suffocating weight of centuries. Alaric worked by the dim glow of a lumen orb, its blue light pooling over the corrupted shadowglass shard. Fira hovered nearby, sharpening a dagger with methodical precision. She hadn't spoken since Malvar left, but her silence was louder than any threat.

"The Old Tongue here," Alaric muttered, squinting at the glyphs etched into the glass. "It's not a hymn. It's a recipe."

Fira paused. "For what?"

"Transmutation. 'Blood of the Sunderer, tempered by flame, binds the song to the vessel.'" He traced a symbol resembling a serpent devouring its tail. "Lyrra didn't just shatter the Eldersong. She trapped it. In shadowglass. In stone. In…" His voice faltered as he pieced together the fragments. "Gods. She turned the Dynasts' own power into a prison."

Fira sheathed her dagger. "And the Syndic wants to break it open."

"He's a fool. The Eldersong isn't a tool—it's alive. It wants to be free." Alaric's hand trembled as he reached into his tunic and withdrew Lyrra's hidden page. "She wrote this before she died. 'The song cannot be controlled. It can only be…'"

The lumen orb flickered. The shadowglass shard flared violet, its light slicing through the archives like a blade. A low, resonant hum filled the air, and for a heartbeat, Alaric saw them—ghosts of the past, their mouths stretched in silent screams. Dynast soldiers. A queen with Lyrra's face. A child clutching a broken crown.

Then the vision snapped.

Fira gripped his arm, her fingers icy. "We need to leave. Now."

"Why?"

She pointed to the stone mural of Lyrra. Fresh blood dripped from the carving's eyes, pooling at the base like tears. "The dead don't weep for nothing."

...

The Silent Sisters were gone by dawn, taking their shadows and secrets with them. Veyra stood at her chamber window, watching the Syndicate's convoy assemble in the courtyard below. Carts laden with icefire and "relics" creaked toward the gates, guarded by mercenaries wearing the Draemar wolf. Fools, she thought. You're hauling your own graves.

Eryk entered without knocking, his collar high to hide the bandages. "It's done. The Sisters planted evidence of a Forgotten shrine in the glacier. The Cultists will swarm the convoy by nightfall."

"Good." Veyra didn't turn. "And the manifests?"

He tossed a scroll onto her desk. "Twelve unmarked crates. Headed to the Sundered Sands, not Hollowreach. Whatever they found in that glacier, it's bound for the desert."

The desert. Where the earth split like a wound and a spire of twisted glass haunted her dreams.

"My lady…" Eryk hesitated. "The Cultists won't discriminate. They'll slaughter everyone. Even the slaves."

Veyra finally faced him, her smile knife-sharp. "Then pray the Syndicate dies quickly. Mercy is a luxury we can't afford."

As he left, she pressed a hand to her throbbing temple. The Silvertongue's toll was worsening—her vision blurred at the edges, and the taste of copper lingered on her tongue. She opened the scroll, her eyes snagging on a single line:

Crate VII: Contents recovered from Glacier Chamber A. Identity confirmed via blood seal—Subject "Kael-vyr."

Kael-vyr. The Old Tongue words for "Blooded King."

The ambush came at twilight, as the convoy navigated the jagged pass between Blackspire and the Sundered Sands. Cultists descended like carrion birds, their robes stained with ash, their mouths sewn shut in imitation of the Silent Sisters. They fought in eerie silence, slitting throats and hurling vials of icefire that erupted into cerulean flames.

Amid the chaos, a Syndicate guard pried open Crate VII—a desperate act to find weapons. Instead, he found a corpse.

Not frozen. Not ancient.

A man in pristine Dynast armor, his chest rising and falling. His eyes snapped open, pupils glowing with fractured light. The guard stumbled back, screaming, as the Blooded's hand closed around his throat.

"The song…," the Blooded rasped, his voice a chorus of dissonant notes. "It's time to finish the verse."