The Empty Throne Beckons
The throne wasn't large.
It wasn't made of fire or stone or divinity. It was simple. Vow-tokens warped with use. Bits of old Chronicle leaves woven into its shape like forgotten prayers etched into kindling.
And it was empty.
Kye stared at it, shoulders trembling, throat thick with the kind of silence that isn't lack of sound—but lack of permission to speak.
The child stepped away.
Their golden eyes never left him. "You don't sit to command. You sit to remember."
The Market stood still.
The air pressed in on all sides. People who had traded names and stolen memories now turned inward, waiting to see if he would collapse—or ascend.
Kye moved.
One step.
Then another.
Each one felt heavier. Not because of fear—but because each footfall resonated with memories that weren't his.
He saw a girl drawing lines in dust with her fingers, whispering truths no one had taught her.
A man folding a feather into flame.
A voice shouting "Let the flame speak!"
He reached the throne.
Stopped.
A voice in his skull—his own, but older—whispered:
> "You carry a Chronicle that was never yours to begin with. But you bled for it. That is enough."
He sat.
And the world bent around him.
Flame erupted—not from the throne, but from the Market itself. The very structure began to tremble as every forgotten wager sparked memory.
The crowd gasped. Some knelt. Some ran.
Kye closed his eyes.
The Market whispered in a thousand voices:
> "Welcome, keeper. Begin the retelling."
He spoke aloud.
Not a command. Not a speech.
A memory.
"I was given a chance to live someone else's life. I thought I was lucky. But luck is just mercy dressed in debt."
The air surged.
Article fragments swirled through the room. Flames formed into symbols, then into names.
A woman in the crowd shouted, "I REMEMBER!"
A man collapsed sobbing, clutching a token he had forgotten how he earned.
The Market burned.
Not destructively.
But redemptively.
And in that flame, the Chronicle began writing again.
> ENTRY ONE: MERCY IS THE MEMORY OF A LIFE YOU DID NOT DESERVE, GIVEN ANYWAY.
> ENTRY TWO: THE THRONE IS EMPTY UNTIL SOMEONE ADMITS THEY WERE NEVER MEANT TO FILL IT.
> ENTRY THREE: THE MARKET IS A PLACE WHERE REGRET BECOMES LAW.
The child stepped to Kye's side.
"Do you know what you are now?"
He nodded.
"I'm not Sykaion. I'm the wager he left behind."
She smiled.
And the flame wrote one more line.
> ARTICLE XVIII: WHEN THE WAGER REMEMBERS WHY IT WAS PLACED, THE GAME ENDS.
The Market dimmed.
The throne cooled.
And Kye, alone with memory, whispered:
"Then I'm not playing anymore. I'm writing."