Chapter Five: A Crown of Silence
864 Words
The bells rang from dawn until dusk.
They rang for a king the people did not choose.
Lucas stood beneath the great dome of the capital, the crown resting easily upon his head, as if it had always belonged there. He wore crimson and gold, the colors of conquest, not mourning. His back was straight. His chin lifted.
When the High Chancellor spoke his name, Lucas did not bow.
He accepted.
“Long live King Lucas,” the court declared.
The words echoed through marble halls filled with nobles and guards, but beyond the palace walls, the sound died quickly, swallowed by unease.
In the villages, there were no banners.
Only soldiers.
They arrived with iron boots and sealed orders, reading decrees aloud while villagers stood in lines with lowered heads.
By Lucas’s command, taxes were raised. Grain was seized. Homes were searched. Men were conscripted without explanation. Women learned to pull their children indoors when armored shadows crossed the roads.
Fear became routine.
No one dared protest.
Not after the first executions.
A farmer in the eastern district was dragged into the square for speaking the late king Liam’s name aloud. Another woman was beaten for leaving flowers near the old shrine.
The message spread faster than any decree: Silence, or die.
Inside the palace, Queen Martha moved like victory itself.
Her face was calm. Controlled. Almost peaceful.
“The people are confused,” she said during council, her voice smooth as polished stone. “Confusion leads to nostalgia. Nostalgia leads to rebellion.”
Lucas leaned back in the throne. “Then we end it.”
Martha nodded. “Publicly.”
She stepped forward as Lucas rose, her whisper sharp and deliberate.
“Tell them this,” she murmured. “If anyone is seen mourning the late king Liam, crying, praying, speaking his name, they will be executed for treason.”
Lucas hesitated only a moment.
Then he spoke.
The decree was read in every town square.
By torchlight.
By swordpoint.
“By order of His Majesty, King Lucas,” the herald announced, voice trembling, “mourning for the late king Liam is hereby f*******n. Any person found grieving, honoring, or speaking his name shall be executed without trial.”
A gasp rippled through the crowd.
A woman clutched her chest.
A child began to cry, then was silenced by his mother’s shaking hand.
Guards watched closely.
The people bowed.
Not in loyalty.
In terror.
That night, the capital was quieter than it had ever been.
No candles burned in windows. No songs were sung. No prayers were spoken aloud.
Grief had gone underground.
Martha stood on the palace balcony, looking out over the city she believed she had finally mastered.
“They will forget him,” she said coldly. “History always obeys the living.”
Lucas said nothing.
But something gnawed at him.
Far away from crowns and proclamations, the world was smaller. Darker.
A single room carved into stone. A single bed. A single life clinging to breath.
A woman knelt beside the bed, her movements slow and careful. She dipped a cloth into a bowl of warm water and gently wiped the blood and grime from the young man’s face.
His lashes fluttered, but did not open.
“Easy,” she whispered. “You’ve been through enough.”
His skin was cold. Too pale. Bruises marked his throat, his arms, his ribs. Someone had tried to kill him properly.
They had failed.
She cleaned his face again, more gently this time, as if afraid he might disappear if she pressed too hard.
The cloth trembled in her hand when she saw him clearly.
The sharp cheekbones.
The face stamped on mourning coins now outlawed.
Her breath caught.
“No…” she whispered.
She sank back onto her heels, staring.
The king they buried.
The king they erased.
He lay here, unconscious, broken, breathing.
Alive.
Later, Lucas slept fitfully in the palace. The weight of the crown pressed down on him, not heavy gold, but the knowledge of murder, fear, and stolen loyalty.
And in the darkness, the nightmare came.
He saw Liam standing on the cliffs, the wind whipping his hair, his armor gleaming in firelight. The boy king’s eyes were sharp. His sword rose.
The kingdom trembled beneath him.
Lucas fell to his knees in the dream, screaming for guards, for mercy, for someone, anyone to save him. But the halls were empty, echoing only Liam’s laugh, cold as the sea.
“Your crown,” the voice said, “was never yours to take.”
Lucas woke choking, sweat soaking his hair, hands clutching at the sheets as if the throne might vanish from beneath him. His chest burned. His heart raced. The image lingered: Liam’s smirk, alive, returning, taking everything back.
Even Martha’s control could not touch dreams.
Outside, the wind howled against the cliffs, carrying the lies of the capital far into the dark.
Inside, the woman brushed the cloth once more across his face and whispered the name no one was allowed to say.
“Liam.”
The kingdom believed him dead.
The crown believed him buried.
But fate had not finished with him yet.
- Writer
