Thorns of the Moonlit Throne
Volume 5 — Chapter 3: The Warden Who Remembered Nothing
Writer: Sabbir Ahmed
The scream of Velmor was not sound—it was memory tearing itself apart.
The Fragment Warden advanced, its form shifting between light and language, every step rewriting the ground beneath it. Streets straightened. Cracks vanished. Reality bent eagerly, desperate to obey. The people of Velmor stood still now, faces lifted, as if awaiting instruction from a god they could no longer question.
Aryn struck first.
His blade met the Warden's arm, but instead of blood, words scattered—verses unraveling into sparks. The impact hurled him back, the Shadowmark blazing painfully as the fragment pushed against his will.
"It's anchoring itself through them," Aryn shouted. "Through their memories!"
Lyriana felt it then—the pull. The fragment reached for her crown, for her authority, trying to make her part of its false harmony. For a terrifying moment, the world offered her an easy rule: no dissent, no fear, no loss. Just obedience.
She tore herself free.
"Eryon!" she cried.
The shadow-bearer moved like a living eclipse. His darkness wrapped around the Warden, disrupting the flowing script. "It remembers nothing of choice," he snarled. "Only function."
The Warden turned its faceless gaze toward Lyriana and spoke for the first time.
"CHAOS WAS REMOVED," it intoned. "SUFFERING WAS ERASED. WHY DO YOU RESIST PERFECTION?"
Lyriana stepped forward, voice shaking—but unbroken. "Because perfection without freedom is a prison."
She removed her crown.
The fragment reacted violently. The sky fractured further as Lyriana pressed the crown into the ground, channeling not command—but consent. The people of Velmor stirred. Confusion rippled through them like waking from a dream.
Aryn felt the Shadowmark shift—not burning now, but aligning. He drove his blade into the fragment shard itself.
Light exploded.
Memories flooded back—grief, love, fear, joy. The Warden screamed as its form unraveled, its purpose collapsing without obedience to sustain it.
When the light faded, the shard lay cracked and dim.
Velmor remained.
The city sagged, imperfect, scarred—but real.
Aryn fell to one knee, gasping. The Shadowmark had changed again—fractured, unstable.
Lyriana rushed to him, fear tightening her chest.
Eryon stared at the broken shard, grim. "This was only one fragment," he said. "And now the others know we can resist."
Above them, the sky healed slowly.
But far beyond the horizon, something watched—and began to adapt.