The Weaver of Shattered Moons

CHAPTER THREE

The Hollow Prince

The Lunar Palace felt less like a home and more like a tomb made of light. Kaelen led Lyra through corridors where the walls were inlaid with crushed moon-glass, refracting her reflection into a thousand distorted versions of herself.

"Do not speak unless he addresses you," Kaelen warned as they approached a pair of towering doors forged from obsidian. "And whatever you do, do not touch the shadows."

Before Lyra could ask what that meant, the doors groaned open.

The chamber beyond was vast and circular, open to the night sky above. In the center sat a high-backed throne of cold iron. A man sat there, slumped forward, his head resting in his hands. He was dressed in robes of shimmering silver, but they looked heavy, as if the fabric itself was trying to crush him.

As they approached, the man looked up.

This was Prince Alaric. He was hauntingly beautiful, with hair the color of starlight and features that looked as though they had been sculpted from marble. But his eyes—the swirling grey Kaelen had described—were vacant. There was no spark of recognition, no warmth. Only a vast, terrifying emptiness.

"He is fading," Kaelen whispered, his voice thick with uncharacteristic dread. "The sun set an hour ago. The hollow is taking hold."

Lyra stepped forward, her heart thundering. As she drew closer, she saw them: the shadows. They weren't just the absence of light; they were physical things, like black smoke coiling around the Prince’s ankles and wrists, pulsing with a life of their own. One shadow tendril reached out toward Lyra, snapping like a whip. She flinched back, clutching her bone needle.

"Alaric," Kaelen called out softly. "The Weaver is here."

The Prince’s head tilted. A low, guttural sound escaped his throat—not a word, but a moan of pure exhaustion. He reached out a trembling hand, and for a moment, his eyes cleared. Just a flicker.

"Make... it... stop," he rasped. The effort of speaking seemed to drain the last of the color from his face.

"I need your light," Lyra said, her voice steadier than she felt. If she was going to survive, she had to work. "I cannot weave a soul from nothing. I need a memory. Give me something real, something you want to keep."

Alaric stared at her, and for a heartbeat, the shadows retreated. He reached into the air, and a single, brilliant shard of the Shattered Moon drifted down from the sky, landing in his palm. It glowed with a fierce, golden warmth—a rarity in a world of silver.

"My mother," he whispered. "The scent of the sun-gardens. Take it."

He thrust the shard toward her. As Lyra took it, the heat of the memory surged through her bone needle. It was too much, too bright, too painful. She fell to her knees, the golden light beginning to spin into threads between her fingers.

She began to sew, her needle piercing the very air, anchoring the golden memory to the Prince’s fading essence. But as she worked, she felt something else hidden deep within the golden light—a cold, jagged secret that didn't belong to a garden.

Someone hadn't just stolen the Prince's soul; they had replaced it with a lie.