Book I - The Hollow Crown

Chapter Nine: The Unmaking Hour

Time moves differently in chains.

Not slower. Not faster.

Just? heavier.

Veylan sat in silence beneath the throne-city of Mourngarde, where sunlight had not touched stone in centuries. The silver cuffs around his wrists weren't forged - they were sung into existence by the Hollow King himself.

"To bind the Flameborn," the executioner had whispered, "is to bind fate."

But Veylan didn't feel bound.

He felt? unfinished.

Footsteps echoed.

A small, crooked figure appeared beyond the bars - old, skeletal, wrapped in worn robes and chains of parchment. Eyes clouded with age, yet glowing faintly.

The man sat.

"Do you remember me?"

Veylan's jaw clenched. "No."

The old man smiled.

"I was there when you set fire to the sun."

His name was Lareth the Bleeding Quill - scribe, traitor, and last survivor of the Old Rebellion.

He had fought beside the original Flameborn.

He had bled beside the Hollow King when he was still mortal.

And he had watched Veylan - before Veylan forgot who he was - kneel to the Architect.

"You think you're the hero now," Lareth said.

"I don't know what I am," Veylan muttered.

"Good. That means the Architect hasn't finished writing you yet."

Outside, storm bells rang.

Lightning carved black cracks through the sky. But it wasn't rain - it was dust, wind-carrying whispers from a dying border.

Something was waking in the north. Something older than kings and gods.

Something forgotten.

Back in the cell, Lareth leaned in close.

"There is a gate beneath this city."

Veylan looked up, breathing shallow.

"The Hollow King guards it with his own blood," Lareth said. "Because it doesn't just lead below. It leads back - to the first throne. To the day you were made."

"What do you want from me?"

"I want you to break the pattern."

Above, the Hollow King stood at the edge of his black tower, watching the storm.

"Soon," he said to the wind.

Behind him, Clov stepped from shadow, disguised in guard's armor, breathing heavily.

"I was delayed," Clov whispered.

"I expected betrayal," the Hollow King replied.

Clov hesitated.

"Then why let me get this close?"

The Hollow King turned his shattered-glass face. "Because sometimes the dagger must know it is a dagger before it becomes dangerous."

And then, without turning, he added:

"You were built for him, Clov.

But your heart? is still yours."

Back underground, Veylan's cell door creaked open.

Not a guard.

A child.

Skin pale as moonlight. Eyes full of smoke.

They held out a blade made of bone.

"Time to go," they whispered.

"Who sent you?" Veylan asked.

The child smiled. "The Architect wants to see what happens when the page is torn instead of turned."

They fled into the undercatacombs.

Veylan's power still flickered, unstable. Each step forward brought back another life.

A version of himself on a throne of corpses.

A version of himself dead in chains.

A version who never turned around when his village burned.

He staggered.

He screamed.

And then -

For a moment -

He saw her.

The girl with gold eyes.

The one who died screaming his name.

The one the Hollow King once loved.

And he remembered.

In that flash of memory, Veylan's power exploded - not fire, not lightning, but story.

He changed the corridor.

The stone twisted into memory.

The walls reshaped around his will.

Time bent for five seconds.

But it was enough.

He turned the guards hunting him into ash - and fell again, weeping.

Clov met him at the base of the city steps.

They didn't speak.

There was no time.

Above them, the Hollow King began the Ceremony of Undoing.

All would witness Veylan's execution - not as punishment, but as ritual.

Because this death would unmake him in every world, every lifetime.

As they prepared for the climb, Veylan turned to Clov.

"Who are you really?"

Clov hesitated, then smirked.

"I'm the joke that became real."

And then he said:

"But I'll be the punchline that saves you."