The news reached Lightmere on whispering wings—too fast for soldiers, too strange for scrolls.
A Shard Choir had awakened in the Southern Marches.A Crown patrol had vanished.And worse... some returned. Different.
The capital, carved in alabaster and adorned with banners that never saw dirt, responded the way it always did:
With silence first.
And then with steel.
The Hall of Glass, seat of the Crowned Council, glittered under the midday sun. Yet inside, shadows pooled.
High Arbiter Valen of House Eldgrave stood at the center of the great chamber, fingers laced, expression unreadable. His family ruled Lightmere not just with Shard and law—but with silence.
"Send the Watchers," said one voice.
"Too slow," argued another. "The Choir infects. We must burn the Marches."
Valen raised a single finger.
Silence fell like a blade.
"The Choir is not a disease," he said coldly. "It is a message."
He turned to the robed figure beside him. "And messages must be decoded, not erased."
The figure bowed low.
Behind them, the stained glass depiction of the Six Kingdoms shimmered.
But at the center, a new crack was forming—barely visible.
Almost like a Shard, ready to split.
Back in the Southern Marches
Auren awoke to whispers.
Not from Shards.
From people.
Their camp had grown—more scouts, more Lorekeepers, even two Shardbinders from Goldhaven with glittering armor and expressions of mockery.
Darien cursed softly under his breath. "They're here to take over. Crown dogs."
Caelen remained silent, but his jaw clenched tight.
Only Lys greeted them with calm.
"The Rift's echo is spreading," she said, eyes rimmed with sleepless violet. "Other villages are hearing the song. Some are… responding."
"Responding how?" Auren asked.
Lys didn't answer.
But later that day, they saw the smoke.
The first village had emptied.
The second burned.
The third was different.
They found a girl, maybe ten winters old, sitting in the ruins of a shrine.
She was humming.
And floating around her were three cracked Shards.
Three.
Even Auren felt the pull.
She smiled when she saw him. "You heard it too, didn't you?"
He knelt before her. "What's your name?"
She tilted her head. "Names are given. But the Choir said I can choose now."
Auren didn't know what to say.
But when she stood, her bare feet stirring ash, she pointed north.
"They're coming. The ones who silence."
In Lightmere
The first Crown's Teeth were deployed that same night.
Elite enforcers bred for silence, trained in Shard suppression.
They didn't wear armor. Just long black cloaks and mirrored masks.
Their arrival in the Marches was like a black tide.
Villages were emptied.
Those who hummed were bound.
Those who resisted… were never seen again.
Darien smashed his fist into the command table. "They're not cleaning up—they're erasing."
Caelen nodded grimly. "Standard protocol. Contain the ripple before it becomes a wave."
"But the wave's already here," Lys whispered.
She turned to Auren, eyes haunted.
"They're not afraid of the Choir because it's dangerous. They're afraid because it's true."
Auren looked at his hands.
Ever since the temple, they sometimes glowed when he wasn't angry. Or afraid.
But when he touched cracked Shards, they sang.
And now, people were starting to follow him.
Not with words. Not with loyalty.
With recognition.
He was like them.
A fracture made flesh.
The Crown's Teeth arrived at the edge of the next village just as Auren and his group did.
No words were exchanged.
No challenge given.
The Teeth moved to bind the girl—Shardborn, unregistered, forbidden.
And Auren stepped in front of her.
Caelen hissed, "What are you doing?!"
Auren didn't know.
He only knew that if he let them take her, something inside him would never be whole again.
"She's not a threat," he said. "She's us."
The mirrored mask facing him tilted.
Then the enforcer moved.
Faster than thought.
But Auren moved too.
The light that exploded from his hand wasn't fire.
It wasn't even a Shardlight anyone had ever seen.
It was memory. Echo. Will.
The masked figure flew back, skidding across earth, cloak in flames.
The rest drew their blades.
And for the first time—
Auren stood to face them.
**
Elsewhere, in a shadowed tower
A masked Watcher knelt before the Council.
Valen turned away from the window.
"Well?"
The Watcher said, "He resisted."
Valen raised an eyebrow. "The boy?"
"He is… changing."
Valen considered this, then spoke the words that made even the stone shiver.
"Then let him. A fracture is a gift."
He smiled.
"But if he sings too loudly, we'll shatter him ourselves."
[End of Chapter 9]