THE DAY LEGEND IS BORN

The Lost Throne: Season One

Episode 1: The Crimson Night

The kingdom of Aethermoor fell on the night of the Blood Moon, though its people did not know it yet.

Prince Caelan Virelle, second son of King Aldric the Wise, stood upon the eastern parapet of Thornhaven Castle watching the crimson orb rise. At twenty-three, he had accepted his place in the shadows of his brother's greatness. Crown Prince Seraphin was the golden heir—charismatic, battle-tested, beloved by the people. Caelan was the spare. The scholar. The prince who preferred the company of dusty archives to courtly intrigue.

Below, the capital city of Velmora glittered with festival lights. The Blood Moon meant the Feast of Remembrance, honoring the ancient pact between Aethermoor's first kings and the Sylvaine—the forest spirits who had granted the throne its power. Caelan should have been celebrating. Instead, he felt a wrongness in the air, like a violin string stretched to breaking.

"Your brother asks for you in the throne room," said Mira, his sworn shield, emerging from the stairwell in her leather armor. Her dark skin bore the ritual scars of the Ashford clan, mountain warriors who served the crown for three centuries. She alone treated Caelan as more than an afterthought.

They found Seraphin standing before the Throne of Roots, the living seat carved from the heart-tree of the First King. Vines still grew from its oak frame, silver leaves that never fell, pulsing with faint luminescence. The throne was Aethermoor's heart. Without it, the kingdom would wither.

"Caelan." Seraphin's smile was tight. "Father wishes to speak with you. Privately."

King Aldric waited in the solar, gaunt and gray. The wasting sickness had claimed his strength over two years, but never his sharp mind. "The throne has shown me a vision," he whispered. "A darkness coming. The Sylvaine grow silent. And Seraphin..." He gripped Caelan's hand. "Watch him. The crown changes men."

That night, Caelan woke to screams.

The castle burned. Through smoke-choked corridors, he fought toward the throne room, Mira cutting down black-clad assassins at his side. They burst through golden doors to find Seraphin standing over their father's body, the royal sword Oathkeeper buried to the hilt in the king's chest.

"Brother," Seraphin said, blood dripping from his coronet. His eyes were wrong—pupils swallowed by gold, like a serpent's. "You should have slept deeper."

The throne room erupted in shadow. Not ordinary darkness, but living void that swallowed the guards whole. Caelan felt Mira grab his arm, felt her leap with him through the stained glass window, forty feet down into the Thorn River. The last thing he saw was Seraphin seating himself upon the Throne of Roots.

The heart-tree screamed.

Caelan woke on a muddy bank miles downstream, Mira's body shielding his from the cold. Above, the Blood Moon still hung, but now it wept. Crimson tears fell like rain across the kingdom.

The Lost Throne had claimed its first king.

And Caelan Virelle, the spare prince, was now the only hope Aethermoor had left.