The first time Kael touched a noble, the man was already dead.
That was the rule.
Nobles were not to be looked at, spoken to, or acknowledged by those like him. Even in death, they remained sacred objects. Property of the city. Property of the system.
Kael's job was simple. Drag the body. Dump it. Wash the blood from the stone so no one important had to see it.
He had done it a hundred times before.
This time, the corpse twitched.
Kael froze.
The corpse pit lay beneath the eastern wall of Blackspire City, a hollow carved into rock where the unwanted ended up. Criminals. Slaves. Failed soldiers. Anyone without a name worth remembering. The air always smelled of rot and ash, and the flies were thick enough to darken the ground.
The noble lay on a slab of cracked stone, throat opened cleanly from ear to ear. His silk robes were ruined, soaked black with blood, gold embroidery clotted and stiff. A signet ring still clung to his finger, unclaimed. That alone told Kael something had gone wrong.
No noble died without scavengers arriving first.
Kael tightened his grip on the iron hook embedded in the corpse's shoulder and told himself it was nothing. Nerves. Hunger. He hadn't eaten since yesterday, and yesterday's meal had been mold bread and water that tasted faintly of rust.
The corpse twitched again.
Not a reflex. Not the settling of flesh.
A deliberate movement.
Kael stepped back, heart hammering. His slave brand burned faintly on his collarbone, as if warning him. Run, it seemed to say. Don't look. Don't be here when this goes wrong.
The noble's eyes snapped open.
They were wrong. Too clear. Too focused for a dead man.
"You," the noble rasped, blood bubbling at his lips. "You're not supposed to be here."
Kael didn't answer. Slaves weren't allowed to speak to nobles. Living or dead.
The noble's hand shot out and clamped around Kael's wrist.
The grip was iron-strong.
Pain flared as something cold and sharp surged into Kael's arm, crawling under his skin like hooked wire. He cried out despite himself, dropping the iron hook as his knees buckled.
"Thief," the noble hissed. His eyes burned gold now, veins of light spreading across his face. "You don't know what you're touching."
Kael tried to pull free. He couldn't. The noble was dead. Kael could see the wound, the slackness of flesh, the way blood no longer flowed. And yet the grip tightened, crushing bone.
Something inside Kael snapped.
Not his arm.
Something deeper.
For his entire life, Kael had endured. Hunger. Beatings. The brand. The knowledge that he would never rise above this pit, never be more than a disposable tool in a city built on hierarchy and cruelty.
He had endured because there was no alternative.
Now, faced with a dead noble trying to kill him, endurance was no longer enough.
"I don't care," Kael said, voice shaking. "Let go."
The noble laughed. A wet, broken sound. "You think this ends with me? You think death frees anyone?"
The pain surged again, sharper, angrier. Kael felt something being pulled from him. His warmth. His breath. His existence, being weighed and found lacking.
Instinct took over.
Kael grabbed the broken edge of a bone shard lying near the slab and drove it into the noble's eye.
The resistance was minimal. Soft tissue gave way with a sickening sound. Gold light spilled out, flooding the pit with blinding radiance.
The noble screamed.
The sound was not human.
It echoed with layers, with voices overlapping voices, as if something vast and ancient were howling through a broken throat.
The grip loosened.
Kael didn't hesitate. He stabbed again. And again. He drove the shard deep, splitting bone, destroying what little life—or unlife—remained.
The noble convulsed, then went still.
Silence fell over the corpse pit.
Kael collapsed backward, gasping, staring at his hands. They were slick with blood and glowing faintly gold.
"What did I do," he whispered.
The answer came unbidden.
Not as a voice, but as a pressure behind his eyes, a weight settling onto his spine.
Something ancient stirred.
Something that had been dormant for a very long time.
The world went dark.
Kael dreamed of a throne.
It was not made of gold or stone.
It was made of absence.
Broken crowns floated around it, half-devoured, their symbols unraveling into ash. Chains of light stretched from the throne into an endless void, each chain connected to something screaming on the other end.
When Kael stepped closer, the throne turned toward him.
It was waiting.
You have killed above your station.
The thought pressed into him, heavy and absolute.
You have consumed what was not yours.
Kael tried to speak. No sound came out.
Do you accept the weight of stolen authority?
Images flooded his mind.
The noble's life. His name. His power. His place in the city's hierarchy. All of it was there, laid bare, stripped of protection.
And beneath it, something rotten. A flaw. A crack in the system.
Kael understood then.
This was not a gift.
It was a consequence.
"Yes," Kael thought, because there was no other answer he could live with.
The throne pulsed.
The Devouring Throne acknowledges you.
Agony tore through him.
Kael screamed as something burned itself into his soul. Not a mark like the slave brand. This was deeper. Colder. It wrapped around his heart and spine, rooting itself in who he was.
Knowledge followed the pain.
He had not gained the noble's strength.
He had taken his authority.
Not all of it. Just enough.
Just enough to be noticed.
Just enough to be hunted.
The dream shattered.
Kael woke choking on ash and blood.
The corpse pit was no longer quiet.
Bells rang above, sharp and frantic. Shouts echoed from the walls. Torches flared to life, their light stabbing down into the pit like accusing fingers.
Kael staggered to his feet, vision swimming. The noble's body lay where it had fallen, but it looked wrong now. Smaller. Diminished. Like an empty husk.
On Kael's chest, beneath his rags, something pulsed.
A presence.
Footsteps thundered closer.
"Inquisitors!" someone shouted. "The authority spike came from here!"
Kael's heart slammed against his ribs.
He didn't know what an authority spike was.
He didn't need to.
They were coming for him.
And for the first time in his life, Kael understood a terrible, intoxicating truth.
If they caught him, he would die.
If he ran, the world would change.
Kael turned toward the darkness at the far end of the pit and started running as horns blared and divine light spilled into the night.
Behind him, something vast and hungry stirred.
Every Power Stone tells me you want this world to burn deeper, darker, and faster.
👉 Vote. Bookmark. Keep reading.