Her Majesty of Shadows

The bells tolled at midnight—twelve strokes. And then a thirteenth.

The sound peeled across the spires of Luxaria like a jagged wound in the silence, a thing too ancient to be mechanical, too mournful to be ceremonial. Each toll vibrated through the obsidian bones of the city, awakening the shadows that coiled between alleyways and beneath crumbling cathedrals. On the thirteenth toll, the light above the Blackspire Palace flickered—and the sun, what remained of it, died for the third time that year.

Within the large and beautiful throne room, the Queen suffered a sudden and unforeseen collapse.

Before her body struck the earth, her crown struck the solid surface beneath. There was not a gasp to be heard. No scream pierced the air. No last command rang out in that instance. Instead, there was merely the cold, fatal sound of metal striking the cold marble beneath it.

Queen Lysira, the great ruler of the Endless Throne, famed for her legendary strength as a god-killer, the bringer of twilight, and the masterful engineer who carefully built her own eternity, was decidedly dead.

Once more.

Yet, for all that had transpired, no one volunteered to go get her.

The obsidian-clad sentries remained statues. The gilded courtiers watched with unreadable eyes, their faces painted in ceremonial silence. No one dared approach her crumpled form, even as her blood, slick and black like spilled ink, began to crawl toward the base of the dais. The Queen had always warned them: if she ever fell, let her lie. Anything else might wake something far worse.

And indeed, high above in the rafters, behind a jumbled mess of old machinery and rusty chandeliers, someone really did move stealthily.

Kaelen stood, witnessing the moment of her passing with an unusual sense of placidity—not one of relief or one of despairing grief, but a severe and detached knowledge that the inevitable moment had finally arrived at last.

He had already witnessed her moment of death previously.

On numerous occasions.

Too many.

It was not the first time Kaelen had infiltrated the palace. The Last Archive—if the myths were true—was buried somewhere beneath the royal sanctum, and he had spent the better part of a decade searching for it. But this night was different. The patterns had shifted. His stolen memories pulsed like bruises behind his eyes, flashes of battles he had never fought and a crown he had never worn.

He had ascended the intricate, mechanical veins that coursed through the palace, navigating through smoke shafts and long-abandoned towers. He crawled, following the old schematics that were etched into the very fabric of the location, written in blood and bone. Even now, his fingers still held the scars of the burns from his last rash endeavor.

But, of course, he hadn't meant to see Lysira fall. Not like this. Not now.

He noticed a commotion taking place right beneath him that attracted his attention.

The courtiers were scattering, accompanied by quiet sentinels. The Queen's body was still, her crown sparkling dully under the rotting chandelier. Gradually, the shadows surrounding her started to move.

And then, she moved.

Just her hand. A little twitch. Barely noticeable to the casual observer. But it was more than enough.

Enough to make Kaelen swear under his breath.

Of course she wasn't really dead. The Queen had more lives than titles.

Tell me the real reason you are here.

Kaelen had been able to descend three levels into the darkly lit catacombs, a deadly and ancient graveyard wherein the old gods were entombed in perpetual sleep, when a voice he had not expected suddenly stopped him in his tracks.

It was distinctly feminine in nature. It was flat and smooth, but it had a serrated edge to it, similar to the edges of shattered glass fragments. This sensation was curiously familiar.

He spun on his heel, the blade firmly grasped in his hand. And then there she was in front of him. She was standing gracefully beneath the ruined vault of an ancient and abandoned chapel, her shape shrouded in rich black velvet and festooned in glinting silvered mail, her eyes radiating soft and otherworldly light within the surrounding blackness.

Seren Virelle.

A hunter. A shadow. A girl who had once attempted to kill him and had very nearly done so.

It was none other than the same girl who, three years before, had shown him mercy and compassion when others did not bother to do the same.

At this moment, she expertly directed the sharp edge of her blade towards his throat, doing so with the effortless grace that can only come from a vivid recollection of past experiences.

"I might ask you the same question," Kaelen quietly said, as he drew back his hood to reveal his face. "The last time I was taking note of things, it seemed the Dominion does not typically send assassins into decaying and deserted cities unless there is something of very high value lying beneath the rubble."

Seren's expression did not shift. But her grip tightened.

The Queen is dead," she stated emphatically. "Do you really believe that this is a coincidence?

"I have a strong belief that there is absolutely nothing in this city that can be called a coincidence."

"Then we agree."

They stood in awkward silence, the air between them thick with anticipation and uncertainty, with only the sporadic, distant sounds of dripping water to intermittently break this profound silence. Beneath them, the rubble of centuries groaned with a noise that echoed through the air—screeching metal gears turning somewhere deep below, as if the earth itself was still struggling to function and fulfill its purpose.

Finally, she let her sword fall.

Walk with me and come along," she said.

He paused. Then dropped into step alongside her.

Their path twisted through catacombs etched with ancient glyphs, the walls still alive with bioluminescent veins that pulsed softly in the dark. Here, the dead gods were more than myth; they were whispers in the stone. Seren walked like one born to the shadow, her steps never faltering. Kaelen kept his eyes on her more often than he admitted.

He detested the accuracy with which he could recall the fluidity and gracefulness of her actions.

How many times has she died now?" Seren inquired after a pause of consideration.

"Sixteen. That we know of."

"And still no one questions her rule."

"She took on the Herculean task of remaking the very laws that preside over life itself. Who among us could possibly challenge the authority and actions of a queen who is effectively beyond the reach of death?"

Seren shifted her gaze to him, her black eyebrows raised inquiringly.

"Somebody who has nothing to lose."

He did not respond.

They reached a chamber sealed in iron and frost. A throne room buried beneath the real one—a forgotten sanctum built before even the first Queen ascended. Kaelen stepped forward, his fingers brushing the ancient mechanisms embedded in the walls. This was it. The Last Archive was near.

S wait," Seren said suddenly. "We are not alone.".

Kaelen froze. And then he heard it—a soft, cadent tapping, like nails on stone.

From the shadows emerged a figure clad in tattered red, its face obscured by a porcelain mask. It moved with an unnatural grace, its presence off in a way Kaelen couldn't quite pinpoint.

"What the—"

Yet the figure lifted its hand in a deliberate gesture—and to this, the walls began responding as they ought.

Glyphs burned to life. Chains uncoiled. And the air turned to frost.

The Archive was awakening.

They barely made it out.

The room caved in behind them as the glyphs surged over, reality warping in twisted bursts of displaced time. Kaelen staggered, spitting blood. Seren grabbed his arm, wild-eyed with adrenaline.

"You nearly got us killed," she said angrily.

"I didn't exactly invite the masked freak."

You've activated the Archive," she sneered with a tone of significance. "The Queen will hardly ignore that. You've essentially provided both of us with a shining spotlight, and she's been attracted to it.".

Kaelen looked at her, his chest heaving up and down.

"Then we run."

But Seren did not move. Her eyes clung to him, hard, hot, unresponsive.

"Not until you choose to tell me the truth that I am looking for."

He flinched.

There is not an iota of truth remaining in the world.

"Kaelen."

He turned away.

"My name is not Kaelen," he said, his voice low. "Not really."

They sought refuge in the devastated remnants of the old observatory, where still the painted glass mosaics clung to ceilings long since fallen into decay. The stars overhead glowed weakly, as if dying coals struggling to hold on to their last vestiges of warmth. There in that setting did Kaelen gain the courage to finally admit his feelings to her.

He had, at some point, belonged to the privileged royal bloodline.

A hidden heir. Conceived in rebellion. Raised in silence. And then—erased.

The recollections he cherished, the legacy that flowed through his veins, and even the name he was given—these were all locked away and concealed by Lysira herself at the moment when the uprising was about to overthrow all. This was either to protect him from harm or perhaps to guarantee that he would never awaken to contest her authority. He could not say which of these sour truths brought a sharper pain to him.

Yet the Archive recalls," he said, gazing sternly at his hands, which were red with blood. "And it is striving to return me to my own.".

Seren remained silent for a very long while and didn't utter a single word.

When she was finally able to talk, her voice was considerably quieter than usual.

"Then you're a danger to all she's created."

"She was not meant to reign forever."

Seren turned and walked away, her jaw tightening.

What do you get if you win?

He looked up, startled. "What?"

“If you take the throne. What happens then?”

"I utterly and entirely destroy it."

She blinked.

"Is that truly what comes to mind as your concept of justice?"

No, he replied. "It's mercy.".

Their eyes locked, their silent understanding humming in the space between them. The distance between them at the moment seemed too constrictive, as if the space had condensed to a near-nonexistent point. There had forever been this tension between them—a dark, jagged tension that wounded even as it struggled to make amends and find peace.

She moved forward. Guardedly.

"If I were in her shoes," she whispered softly, "I would kill you right this minute."

Kaelen didn't move.

So why haven't you?

Her hand touched the hilt of her sword. And halted.

Because the truth had changed and could no longer be viewed in the simple terms of black and white. Because love, particularly when it rises up from the darkness, must always become this intricate type of conflict or war within itself. Because in the complex area that exists between the emotion of betrayal and the idea of belief, something important has irrevocably changed.

None of them said it.

But the two of them knew.

They were not enemies anymore. Not exactly allies. Additionally, it is much too dangerous to be considered anything more than that. The Queen woke up at sunrise. Her wounds closed. Her blood burned. Her eyes, when they opened, were not entirely hers. Something had been awakened. She stood in her shattered throne room and breathed quietly into the void beneath her palace. The Archive had shifted. Kaelen was close. And worse—he was no longer alone. Let them come," she softly murmured in a low voice. The crown was reshaped to fit around her forehead like gold that had been melted. Shadows bowed. And the city of Luxaria, exhaling smoke and quiet, waited to select its next ruler. The game had begun. And there would only be one name that would survive it.

The towers of Luxaria stood like broken teeth against a toxic sky, each peak a gash against the sun's dying light. Beneath the devastated skyline, in the veins of the expiring city, Lysira floated like a whispered ghost.

The transmission came at the witching hour.

She had been alone, tracing the ancient paths between the empty relay chambers far beneath the Throne Bastion. Hours and dust accreted on her boots; static hissed across the air, the whispers of a dying universe. She would have ignored the beat entirely, if not for the glyphs glowing softly beneath her skin — old, forbidden sorcery that had been stitched into her bones so many years before.

The screen coalesced without her, it's hard, wild energy humming through her. A coil of letters flowed out, inscribed in Umbra glyphs no living intelligence had ever viewed.

Her name.

Lysira.

And beneath, one word long taboo to Dominion jurisprudence: The heir lives.

Her throat constricted. No l