My Father Ordered His Own Mother's Execution and Forgot My Name—Then the Secret of His Relic Throne Revealed the Terrifying Truth About Our Enclave
Gideon watched the fragment of throne-iron glitter in the lamplight, his expression unreadable.
“A psychotropic ore,” he had said, the words chilling me more than the mountain wind. “It siphons memory. Empathy. Slowly, systematically.”
The thought of my father, the King, wasting away, piece by piece, tore at something deep inside me. This wasn’t the unprovoked madness the elders whispered about. This was a disease. A curse.
“There must be more to it,” I said, my voice thin and raw. “Why would he stay on it?”
Gideon nodded slowly, running a thumb over the polished metal. “Such a relic wouldn’t simply be inherited without reason. It suggests a deeply rooted secret. Something far older than your father.”
He paused, then pulled a worn leather-bound journal from his satchel. Its pages were brittle, the ink faded, filled with a precise, elegant script.
“My uncle, Caleb Hollister,” Gideon murmured, tracing a finger over the first page. “He was Zion’s Rest’s High Scribe before he vanished fourteen years ago.”
I remembered the whispers of Caleb Hollister, the man who disappeared without a trace, declared a heretic for questioning some decree I couldn’t recall. My father had silenced all mention of him.
“He wrote to me, sparingly, in those first years,” Gideon continued, looking up, his eyes holding a new intensity. “His letters hinted at a ‘sacred burden’ and a ‘throne of shadows’ that bound the enclave.”
My breath hitched. “He knew.”
“He feared for the kingdom,” Gideon said. “His last letter mentioned a hidden chamber, deep in the old coal seams, where he went to die with his secrets.”
Finding the abandoned coal seam was not difficult. Its entrance, a gaping mouth choked with brambles and loose rock, lay just beyond the western wall of the enclave. The air inside was heavy, thick with the scent of damp earth and disuse.
Gideon led the way, his lamp casting a bobbing circle of light through the claustrophobic tunnel. The silence pressed in on us, broken only by the drip of water and our own ragged breathing. After what felt like hours, the tunnel widened into a small, makeshift chamber.
An old man, frail and hunched, sat on a rough-hewn stool beside a smoldering fire. His clothes were patched, his hair a wispy white halo around a gaunt face. His eyes, though clouded with age, still held a sharp, knowing glint.
“Caleb?” Gideon’s voice was gentle, a rare softness in his usual detached tone.
The old man flinched, then turned, his gaze fixing on Gideon. A flicker of recognition, then a wince.
“Gideon? You shouldn’t be here. No one should be here.” His voice was a raspy whisper, like dry leaves skittering across stone.
I stepped forward. “Master Scribe. I am Evangeline Danforth. King Malachi’s daughter. I need to understand.”
Caleb’s eyes widened, a tremor running through his thin frame. He looked from me to Gideon, a profound sadness settling on his face. He picked up a gnarled piece of wood and threw it into the dying embers.
“The throne,” he rasped, his gaze fixed on the flames. “It was here before the Danforths. An ancient relic of the mountain’s fury.”
He didn’t make eye contact. He just stared at the shifting patterns of firelight.
“Your father,” Caleb continued, his voice growing stronger, a deep sorrow underlying each word. “He inherited it, girl. As his father did, and his father before him.”
My misunderstanding shattered. I had believed Malachi built it, or at least willingly embraced its power. But he was a victim too.
“He knew what it was doing to him,” Caleb said, finally looking up, his gaze meeting mine. “He felt his memories slip, his love for his family fade.”
A fresh wave of grief hit me, sharper than the last. He remembered. He fought it.
“Why didn’t he destroy it?” I choked out, a desperate plea.
Caleb shook his head, a single tear tracing a path down his cheek. “It is not just a throne, child. It is the seal. The very heart of Zion’s Rest.”
He pointed a trembling finger at the back wall of the chamber, where a faint, almost invisible crack snaked through the stone.
“Below the throne,” Caleb explained, his voice barely audible, “lies the spring of the granary waterworks. The lifeblood of this enclave. The throne’s weight, its specific magnetic charge, it holds the seal. Without it, the mountain trembles. The tunnels collapse. The water runs dry. He stayed to protect us all, even as it stripped him bare.”
The enormity of Malachi’s sacrifice, the silent agony he endured, hit me with crushing force. He had become a monster to save us from a fate worse than civil war. He traded his own mind for the survival of Zion’s Rest.
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