The throne room burned with gold and blood.Tall pillars carved with ancient mantras reached up toward a ceiling painted with gods who no longer answered this land's prayers. Beneath them sat Empress Iraja of Kalyagarh, the woman the bards now called The Red Empress.
Outside, the city roared — not in celebration, but in fear.Smoke rose from the temples that refused her command. Bells that once sang to the gods now tolled for the dead. Every citizen knelt as soldiers marched through the streets, crimson banners fluttering like tongues of fire.
The Empress leaned back against her throne, a blade of black steel resting across her knees.Its edge shimmered with faint red light — a flame that never went out. The same flame that had devoured her enemies, her sister, and the father who had once called her a curse.
She looked down at the trembling nobles gathered before her.Men who once ignored her birth. Women who whispered that she was cursed. Now they knelt, heads pressed to the marble floor, praying she wouldn't speak their names.
"Rise," Iraja said softly. Her voice carried through the vast hall like thunder through rain.No one moved.
"I said," she whispered again, "rise."
They obeyed instantly.
Her eyes, once the deep brown of river mud, now glowed faintly — red and gold swirling together like molten metal. The mark of the Eclipse Flame, the power born on the night she was.
A general stepped forward, bowing deeply."My Empress," he said, "the last of the rebellion has fallen. Vardha's prince is dead. The temples… have been purified."
"Purified?" she repeated, tilting her head slightly.The word made her smile — slow, cold, almost human."No," she said. "They were burned. Say it as it is."
The general swallowed. "Yes, my Empress. They were burned."
Iraja rose from her throne, her crimson robes trailing behind her like a tide of blood. She walked past the nobles, the soldiers, the banners. At the edge of the hall stood a great mirror — cracked down the center. It reflected not a woman, but a queen made of shadow and flame.
She touched the mirror gently.For a moment, her reflection flickered — and she saw a young girl there. Barefoot, laughing, hair tangled in the palace garden, holding a wooden sword too big for her hands.
The image vanished.
Iraja turned away and whispered, as if to no one,"They called me cursed. Let the cursed rule the world."
Outside, thunder rumbled.The empire knelt.And the Red Empress smiled — because there was no one left who dared to stop her.