Chapter 23:

  "The Council of Death"

  Arc 3: Chapter 2

  POV: "???"

  Luna did not climb the stairs; she stormed them, her silhouette a blur of furious determination against the pale stone. The great doors of the Council Chamber, carved with the symbols of the Five Houses, stood ajar. The scene that revealed itself was a stab: there, around the ebony table that symbolized the kingdom's unity, sat its leaders. And her chair, at the head, was empty.

  She burst into the circle of power like a storm.

  "What is happening here?" Her voice, trained to project over crowds, echoed in the perfectly acoustic chamber, shattering the heavy silence. "Why was my presence dispensed with?"

  Bruce Darking rose from his position to the right of the empty chair. The movement was fluid, like a predator rising from its den.

  "We invoked the Fourteenth Amendment, Luna." The name of the legal article fell like a blade. "You know the text. 'In the face of an irrefutable and imminent threat to the existence of humanity, the Council of Houses may deliberate and act without the consent of the reigning monarch.'" He leaned slightly forward, hands resting on the table. "And here is the threat. Your hero... the creature you so advocate for... was the bearer of a Universal Stone. Not a fragment, not a legend. The Stone of the Future. An artifact with the theoretical power to rewrite the very fabric of reality. He possessed it. Hid it. And used it. This, under the Laws of Containment of Stones and Artificial Powers, is a capital crime. The sentence is death. Something that, in any case, his biology is already carrying out."

  Luna felt the fury rise like acid in her throat, hot and sharp.

  "Death? He's already dying!" The shout came laden with visceral anguish. "Yes, he hid the stone! It was a mistake, a violation! But does that erase the rest? If not for him, I would be dead in the Infernal Zone! Raphadun would be dead! We would not have recovered a single centimeter of cursed land, let alone the 10% we celebrate! He was a hero, and you want to stain his memory with the title of traitor? Condemn him to oblivion as a calculating monster? Is that the justice you defend, Bruce?"

  "Your blind passion is a danger to this kingdom," Bruce began, but was interrupted.

  Luka raised his hand, a gesture of mediation, but his face was tense.

  "Luna has a point, Bruce." His voice was measured, the voice of the strategist trying to find common ground. "Empty erred. Gravely. Nothing undoes that. But neither can we ignore the good he did. He fought for us. Died for us, drop by drop. The use of the stone... from the reports, it seems to have been a final act of desperation, not a Machiavellian plan. And in the end..." He paused, choosing his words carefully. "Turning off support would only anticipate the inevitable by a few hours. It would be an act of... human mercy, not execution."

  "They gave him a year, and he still has five months! Are you really going to take five months of someone's life for this, Luka?!" Luna questioned, shouting.

  Aldert Fingard, of the House of Exploration, slammed his fist on the arm of his chair.

  "Mercy? For an anomaly? Our expeditions found creatures that looked like stones, that looked like plants, that looked like water! All of them were killed! The fact that he seems harmless doesn't make him so! He is an unknown power, and the unknown on the frontier is killed. It's the first law of exploration! If he had a Universal Stone, he would be a threat, period."

  Ver?nica, of the House of Science, rested her chin on her hand, her purple eyes calculating.

  "Aldert is brutal, but logically sound. Empty was a set of contradictory data. He healed the land, but emanated primordial darkness. He saved lives, but possessed the most dangerous artifact in history. In science, anomalies are not protected; they are studied and then contained. He is beyond our study now. Containment remains. Definitive."

  Theodora remained in overwhelming silence.

  Bruce seized the cue to regain control, his voice dominating the murmur.

  "The discussion is irrelevant, Luna. You brought this problem to us. You introduced a curse into our core. His 'goodness' was the naivety of an animal or the cunning of a parasite. And today, the mask fell. He used you. Used your brother's affection to manipulate him." Raphadun, who had arrived, listened to his grandfather's words with a look of sadness upon his arrival, but Bruce continued, "...making a prince of the blood completely violate what we defend in this kingdom and in our history! If not for Luka's vigilance, what would he have done with the Restoration Stone? Fused it with the Future? You are complicit for refusing to see the monster he was."

  The words were carved to hurt, and they struck home. Luna looked around the table. In Aldert's eyes, she saw fear of the unknown. In Ver?nica's, the coldness of dehumanized logic. In Luka's case, the conflicted loyalty between her and duty. And in Bruce's, the implacable certainty of the executioner judge.

  The fury within her overflowed, not as tears, but as a verdict.

  "You... are all rotten inside!" her voice trembled, not from weakness, but from an emotion so pure it was violent.

  Aldert slammed his hand on the table—"Rotten for thinking?" he said.

  "He is a threat, not an object of your deviance, Definitive!"

  Ver?nica merely observed, intrigued.

  Luna, ignoring him, continued—"Empty gave everything! And his payment was contempt, was street violence, and now is this... this inquisition! Even after being beaten, he smiled at me! He believed in us until the last instant! And I am going to condemn him for an act whose reasons we, in our 'superior wisdom,' don't even bother to understand? His powers were always a mystery! That was the only truth we ever knew!"

  It was then that she drew her final weapon. From the inner pocket of her mantle, she pulled Empty's diary. She did not throw it; she placed it on the ebony table with a solemn thud that silenced the room.

  "This is who he was. Look. Just look."

  Luka, closest, pulled the book. As he flipped through the pages, his face lost color. Hundreds, thousands of faces, each unique, each with an expression of peace or silent gratitude.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  "Who... who are all these people? There are no records, no correspondence..."

  "Exactly!" Luna cut in, her eyes flashing. "Until I saw this." She turned the pages forcefully until she found the one she sought and pointed. "My parents. Andrew and Alice. How did he know them? How could he draw them with such... intimacy?"

  All eyes turned to the page. The portrait was astonishing in its emotional precision.

  Bruce looked. This time, a tiny reaction: an almost imperceptible narrowing of his emerald eyes, as if focusing a sight. Seeing the image of his son drawn in that notebook, trying to contain any emotion upon seeing it.

  "This only proves my point, Luna." His voice became a low and dangerous growl. "Empty was not a poor wretch. He was an entity with access to memories, to truths that were not his. With capabilities we cannot even dream of comprehending. We harbored an archetypal and uncontrollable power in our midst. And the only safe answer, the only rational answer, is to eliminate him before it is too late. Before the 'empty man' rises full of a power we cannot measure. He was always a monster. He just wore different armor."

  Luna saw the tide turn definitively. Faces hardened. The logic of fear triumphed.

  Luka closed the diary with a deep sigh. When he raised his gaze to Luna, there was genuine pain in his eyes, but also the resignation of duty.

  "Luna... I understand you. Believe me, I too saw him as a friend. I think, deep down, that his heart was pure." He swallowed hard. "But we cannot afford 'I think.' The law is clear. The threat, in the eyes of the Council and before history, is real. We must do what needs to be done."

  Bruce nodded, a final head movement that sealed the fate.

  "If you, as Queen, wish to annul this decision using your absolute veto power... You have the constitutional right." He raised his gaze, and in it there was no challenge, only the cold mechanics of politics. "But that would place you in direct opposition to the unanimous will of the other Four Houses. And, under the Twenty-Ninth Amendment, a royal veto in matters of maximum security must be ratified by the popular will." A thin, coldless smile touched his lips. "And you know, better than anyone, what the people would vote for when confronted with the story of a 'curse that possessed the weapon of the end of the world,' don't you, my Queen?"

  The title sounded like the deepest of affronts.

  Luna froze. The weight of the crown, which she had carried as a mission, transformed into an adamant cage. She was cornered between the desperate appeal of her heart—and the justice she knew to be true—and the steamroller of the "greater good," fueled by fear and ignorance.

  She saw, in that moment, the same reflection of panic and rejection she herself had once felt upon first seeing Empty, now amplified and institutionalized. She remembered her own initial blindness with cutting shame.

  This was the true burden of the Definitive Light. It was not bringing hope. It was carrying the weight of seeing the truth shine, blinding and clear, while everyone around insisted on remaining in the shadows of fear.

  Bruce Darking's words resounded in the room like the closing of a cell door. The debate that followed was distant noise, a buzzing of voices from Aldert and Ver?nica, that did not reach Luna. Her mind was no longer in that room of stone and power.

  She fled to a memory. A refuge of gray and quiet.

  She and Empty sat on rusted chairs, pulled from the ruins of his house. It was a month after the Pursuer's fall, during the long walk back. The sky was a low dome of gray, but the air, for the first time, did not smell of imminent death.

  "Empty…" Luna began, her fingers intertwined in her lap. "I'm sorry. For what I said during the final fight. The horrible things I shouted. I was… blind. Revenge was all I saw." She raised her gaze to him. "I never stopped to think that curses… were once people. Like my parents. That maybe, deep down, they no longer even knew what they were doing. I'm sorry for my words. For the hatred."

  Empty merely watched her. There was no hesitation, no rancor. His eyes, visible through the cracked mask, simply curved. It was an easy, wide smile, an arc of pure acceptance that dispelled the weight of her guilt before she finished speaking. A pre-ordained forgiveness, inscribed in his nature.

  "Empty…" she continued, her voice reduced to a confidential whisper. "I'm afraid. A fear that consumes me. Fear of not being strong enough. Of being crowned queen and failing. Of not saving the world. Of having to make decisions… decisions that will hurt the people I love." She swallowed hard. "I want to be strong like you."

  Empty tilted his head, a gesture of genuine curiosity. He did not understand the complexity, but he felt the shadow in her. He stood, took his thick diary, and with the total concentration of a child, began to draw. He showed her: two figures. One small and awkward (clearly hers), and one large and imposing (clearly his). Both shot giant waves of power from their hands, one of light, the other of darkness, merging in the air.

  Luna laughed, a brief and surprised sound that broke the tension.

  "Hahaha, no, Empty. Not strong like that. Strong… here." She touched her own temple. "And here." She touched her chest. "To do the right thing. Even when the right thing hurts more than any blow. You were strong with the Pursuer. With the wolf. In that quiet, patient way… that I couldn't be. I only knew how to scream and hit." She sighed, looking at the gray horizon. "But… I want to learn. So I make a promise. Now. Here."

  She turned completely to him, kneeling on the cold earth to meet his eyes. Her green gaze was intense, serious, seeking in those dark slits a witness, an archivist for her most solemn oath.

  "I promise, Empty. One day, I will be strong like you. And I will be a great queen." The words came out clean, clear, a vow engraved in the silence of the Infernal Zone.

  The voice of that Luna, full of youthful determination and raw hope, echoed in her mind now, in the present, precisely when Bruce's voice dragged her back to the nightmare of the Council Chamber.

  "Final vote," Bruce's voice sounded like a tolling bell. "On the proposal to execute the already decreed death sentence on the entity known as 'Empty,' to be carried out by immediate deactivation of his artificial life support. All in favor… raise your hand."

  One by one, like dark puppets, arms rose.

  Aldert Fingard raised his hand with the pragmatic firmness of one eliminating an obstacle on the map. Ver?nica raised hers with clinical precision, like one closing a dangerous case study.

  Theodora's hand rose. Slowly, trembling, as if each inch weighed a life. Her eyes were closed, and a single silver tear descended the deep furrow of her wrinkles, tracing the map of a life of losses. It was the vote not of a leader, but of a grandmother crushed by the weight of the "greater good."

  Bruce raised his arm, a monument of unshakable decision. His gaze then pierced Luka.

  All eyes at the table followed. Luka seemed to have aged a decade in the last hour. He stared at the polished surface of the table, where his own reflection was distorted. Then, slowly, he raised his eyes. He met Luna's. There was no speech, no justification. There was only an ocean of sorrow and the terrible resignation of duty. His hand rose, slow, heavy, as if chained to an invisible weight. It was the fifth vote. The majority was secured.

  Alfredo, watching from his position against the wall, did not vote. His gaze, sharp as the blade he carried, was fixed on Luna. There was no judgment, only assessment. He watched her as if waiting to see, in that moment of fire, the final forging of the queen her niece had promised to be.

  And then, the master of ceremonies turned to the last chair. To the Queen.

  "Majesty," his voice was neutral. "Your vote."

  The promise from the past, "One day I will be strong like you," burned in Luna's throat like live coal. The diadem of Definitive Light on her head was no ornament; it was a crown of thorns piercing her bones.

  She saw the faces around the table. Aldert's petrified fear. Ver?nica's icy logic. Theodora's silent pain. Bruce's cold certainty. Luka's devastated resignation. And in her mind, she saw Empty's easy smile on the rusted chair. The impossible illuminated shadow rose. The final "It's all right."

  To be strong like him. What did that mean now? Did it mean carrying the burden he always carried: the burden of seeing the truth and acting out of love, even when the world screams for revenge and fear? Or did it mean Bruce's cold strength, the strength to sacrifice the one for the supposed good of many?

  Luna Lighting took a deep breath. The air in the room was poisoned.

  She raised her arm.

  Her hand did not tremble. It rose into the air with terrible firmness, a straight and pure line against the oppressive backdrop of the room. It was not a gesture of anger, nor fear. It was an act of supreme will. By raising it, she was not just sealing Empty's fate. She was murdering the last part of herself that believed the world could be saved by simple goodness. She was accepting the monstrous burden of power: the ability to order death, with a steady hand, in the name of a future that might never be worth the price paid.

  The master of ceremonies announced, his voice echoing in the funeral silence:

  "The motion is approved. By unanimous vote of the Royal Council, including the Crown. The sentence will be carried out immediately."

  Empty's death was decreed. And in that act, something inside Luna Lighting, the girl who dreamed of being a great queen, also died.