The Obsidian Throne

The throne was older than the kingdom itself, carved from a single block of black stone said to have been torn from the heart of a fallen star. It gleamed faintly beneath the torchlight, as though it drank the fire rather than reflected it. Upon that throne sat King Alaric of House Vaydrall, the Wolf King — unmoving, unblinking, eternal as the stone beneath him.

The hall bowed to his silence.

Around him, the great banners of his house hung heavy with years of smoke and victory. Their silver wolves glimmered faintly, jaws open, fangs bared — a mirror of the man who ruled beneath them. The scent of iron and old fire lingered in the air, and every man present felt its weight.

No herald dared announce him. The king required no words to precede his presence. His very stillness commanded the hall — as if the realm itself paused, waiting for his breath.

He looked not upon courtiers, nor generals, nor servants. His gaze was fixed on the obsidian floor, where the faintest reflection of his own crown gleamed back. The metal was old, its edge notched from war, its gems dulled by time — but it remained unbroken. Like its bearer.

When he finally spoke, his voice was low, roughened by years and battle, yet it filled every corner of the vast chamber. “Too many speak of loyalty. Too few understand its cost.”

None answered. None dared.

He rose — slow, deliberate — and the sound of his armor shifting was louder than any word. “They call me merciless,” he said, his eyes sweeping the hall, gray and cold as winter’s sky. “They are right. Mercy is the luxury of men who have not built empires.”

He descended from the throne, step by step, and the guards straightened like iron rods. “Tell my son,” the king continued, his tone neither warm nor cruel, “that the throne he covets was forged in fire and held by blood. If he would claim it… let him bleed for it.”

The torches guttered, and for an instant the hall was swallowed in shadow — save for the gleam of his crown, like a lone star burning above an endless night.