Threadless

To write your own story, is to outwit fate.

To cheat fate.

Utter such words in the vicinity of the people of the Land of The Stars, Remoria, and you will be met with nothing but aghast gasps and sharp reprimands.

The Seers will scorn at you for uttering such blasphemy.

The elders will admonish you for disrespecting The Stars.

The Stars will blink at you– silently, mockingly.

But what if you had no fate written into your life to begin with? No life the stars destine you to follow?

Not tethered with a thread.

Free and unbound.

Forsaken and cursed.

Threadless.


✦✧✦


The people of Remoria, known to be bound by their fate with starlit threads, live lives of devotion and obedience dedicated to their divine beings- The Stars.

The divine Loom of Fate stands towering in the heart of the city, loose golden threads and specks of gleaming stardust drifting around it giving it an otherworldly glow. Pristine and unmarked, no blade has ever touched it, no one even daring to approach it in anything less than reverence, for it was said to be the instrument of The Stars themselves.

Endlessly weaving and unweaving destinies of every soul in the Kingdom, it is said that as long as the Loom turns, Remoria has nothing to fear, as the The stars would keep watch over the land.

Even if that safety came at a cost– their freedom.

When a soul is born into Remoria, the child is taken to the Loom of Fate, where the Seers would draw out their thread.

They would dutifully etch all of these prophecies of fate given by the stars into the sacred Starbound Ledgers. Every single one was recorded whether it spoke of renown greatness or unremarkable obscurity.

On the night Remoria welcomed its Crown prince, the awaited child of King Remus and Queen Rhea, the kingdom couldn’t sleep. Bells echoed across the lands, the hushed voices of people uncontained tittering through the air. The sky was littered with nothing but the stars, every nook and cranny lit up with lamp lights to make up for the lost light in the absence of the moon.

"A good omen," the elders had said. "To be born not only during the night, but a moonless night ruled by The Stars."

"A child born under such a night must be chosen by The Stars," a Seer had proclaimed. "The crown prince of Remoria will bring us prosperity, will lead us into a new age."

The bards, to this day, sing ballads of the night that were supposed to be one of joy and celebration.

Upon hearing past the first few lines, one will realise that the tales sung were quite far from being celebratory.

They were songs of a tragic night.


On the night of no moon, a solemn night,
The sky is stretched, endless.
No wane crescent, no borrowed light!
Only the stars that watch and witness.


Oh, the stars, they shimmer across the skies!
Specks on white, burning bright.
Awaiting the Prince– the all seeing eyes,
They fall silent, at the tainted sight.


Marking the hour, with a discordant hush
The Loom stood still, the threads untouched,
The seers, they paled, harried and in rush
For the stars did not speak, and the thread remained uncut

|

“What do you mean there is no thread?”
The King had asked, quiet.
“He’s- he’s my son, he’s of royal blood!”

“The crown prince, to be threadless!”
the elders hissed harshly, away from the ears of the King and Queen.
“This is an omen! A curse!”

“To not have a thread...”
A Seer trailed away, voice haunted.
“To not have fate woven into your soul…”

“Why him?”
The Queen whispered, voice trembling.
“Why my son?”


✦✧✦


“The Stars will guide you, through the paths carved in your fate and to your afterlife.”

This is the first lesson taught to the children of Remoria.

Young little Prince Romulus, barely 5 years old, sits amidst all the eager eyed children in the classroom. Everyone seemed excited to finally take part in the lesson about the Threads of the Stars, about fate and its meaning.

But not him, not Romulus.

If anything, he was scared.

“The Stars, our gods, the most divine guardians– to fulfil their will, is not merely a task in hand,” the palace Teacher declares, voice a smooth cadence yet hardened by fidelity.

“To follow the path they have woven for you, is your duty–your highest purpose in life.”

Romulus sits there, fiddling with the gold trimmed hem of his tunic as the lessons of piety, loyalty and deference continue. Teacher drones on and on about duty and obedience, and Romulus–

What was he to do?

He would have voiced it out, if he were braver, if his voice did not get clogged in his throat.

What was his highest purpose in life if he did not have a thread?

But Romulus was not a brave boy. He knows the names he’s been called- meek, timid, coward. So he quietly sits through the lesson that so very implicitly excludes him–

Until it doesn’t.

Until it’s suddenly pointing right at him.

“What if someone doesn't have a thread?” a little girl speaks up. Quiet. Curious.

Romulus feels eyes on him, from every direction.

Everyone knows who this question points at.

Teacher stills. He looks everywhere but at the little prince’s golden eyes, which are now fixed on Teacher with a resolution it did not have before. The answer to the question Romulus always feared to ask.

“To not have a thread,” Teacher states, voice strained and forcibly blank. “Is to forsake the stars.”

“To betray them.”

Later that night, in the emptiness of his overly large bedroom, Romulus would wonder how it is that he betrayed the stars, when it is them who let him go threadless.


✦✧✦


One night, a 7 year old Romulus was desperate enough to sneak away to The Loom of Fate, to get a thread for himself, if that meant he wouldn't be threadless anymore..

The night sky stretches, starry and moonless, and little Romulus bounds down the stairs leading to the arena where even in the middle of the night, the unmovable Loom turns.

He reaches through the stardust floating around– tries to get the thread from the Loom.

Get the thread, he does, but it doesn’t merge with his being when he touches it, like it does when the Seers pull it out for the newly born child.

The thread instead wraps around the full length of his right arm, sudden and angry, like a vicious snake coiling around its prey. It had sunk into his skin, sizzling and burning.

Romulus, fear stricken, could do nothing but scream.

He doesn’t remember much from that period of time– everything felt like a fleeting blur.

He remembers being rushed to the palace medic.

He remembers his father’s hand around his uninjured arm, in a vice grip.

“Don’t test The Stars,” King Remus had hissed, his voice quivering with shock, fury, and even– fear.

“Don't put yourself under their gaze, foolish boy, have you no brains? Have you no shame? To steal another's thread?!”

Romulus had never seen his father this furious.

Distant, cold, austere– yes, but never this furious.

His grip on Romulus’ intact, unmarred hand kept him from physically shrinking away from his father.

“Do you even comprehend how disastrous this could have been?” Remus seethes, shaking his son. Anger radiates from himself like heat from a lantern. “Did you think–”

“My lord,” the Queen interrupts, sudden.

All this while, she’d stood to the side– quiet and unmoving.

No words of fury, no words of sympathy.

Romulus turns to her, with a flicker of hope in his tear stained eyes. Surely, she would speak for him? Offer words of consolation, or atleast still the storm brewing inside this room, the storm that threatens to swallow Romulus as a whole.

Surely, she would say something to him?

But when she opens her mouth to speak again, her steely gaze although directed at Romulus, feels like it was passing right through him as if she was looking at something else much past him.

The flicker in his heart dies out just as quick as it had appeared.

“This might be what The Stars want us to see,” she says, voice so thin it almost gets lost in the breeze drifting by. “This might be an indication.”

Queen Rhea’s eyes are set ablaze with something suddenly alive in them.

One could describe the glint in her eyes to be almost crazed. Like a desperate person finding the one thread that keeps them tethered to sanity. Her eyes are fixed at Romulus and he finds himself wanting to shrink away from this more than he did from his Father’s grip.

“A child born threadless, seeking a thread. Claiming a thread.”

The room is eerily silent, every single pair of eyes trained on the queen.

“The crown prince must prove himself worthy enough to have a thread.”

And so had begun, the palace elders and Seers and their frantic methods to make Romulus worthy enough of a thread.

So had begun the years Romulus tasted true misery.


✦✧✦


However quiet the palace had tried to keep their newfound ways to get their prince a thread, words spread very quickly.

A different sort of gaze began to follow Romulus around.

A gaze filled with heavy expectation.

Having only felt the cynical eyes on him, Romulus at first preens at this new type of attention. He does everything he was told to, dutifully. But, the two things Remorians held in high regard, Duties of a Seer and Martial prowess, were unfortunately not things Romulus excelled in.

He gave his everything when they made him wield a sword, but his scarred and vitiated right arm, his dominant arm, trembled like a leaf in the storm, blows too weak, deflections too haste.

He gave his everything when he was told to learn all the chants of divination, to learn the ways of a Seer, even though how many ever words he spoke the stars never responded.

Endless lessons, day after day.

Failures and failures, day after day.

He was not a warrior.

Neither was he connected to the stars enough to be a Seer.

Romulus would come to realise he could never be what the kingdom wanted him to be.

But yet–

Romulus tried and tried and tried.

So did everyone in the palace.

Until one day, another prince was born.

A one with the thread.

The true heir, they called him.

And just like that, Prince Romulus, The Threadless, became an hapless forgotten speck in the palace– everyone in the kingdom more than eager to forget the cursed anomaly.

One would think, for Romulus who so badly wanted to prove his worth, would find this the most disastrous outcome. But, at that time, it was far from it. Romulus watches how the cheer spreads through the palace, how quickly the hopes and expectations placed on him snuffs out. Seeing all this, it is not disappointment he feels– not betrayal either.

He feels relief.

But a forgotten child is not a silenced one.

Romulus, now having no duties– no weapons to wield, no starlight to chase– finds himself roaming the quieter wings of the palace. He spends most of his days at the Royal Library or the Archives, leafing through scrolls and books about treaties and policies, memorising trade routes and networks.

One day, Romulus stands in front of the Council Meeting chamber, ears pressed to the doors, keenly listening to the discussions held inside when someone taps him on the shoulder.

He jumps, whipping around to face an old woman, one of the Palace Teachers.

Excuses for his actions begin to tumble out of his mouth in panic but the woman raises her hand to silence him, before beckoning him to follow her.

They walk through corridors in silence and when they are much farther from the room she speaks up.

“Boy, if you wish to seek knowledge, there are more efficient methods.”

Master Silvia, Romulus would learn, was a woman of few words and even fewer smiles. She had no idle chatter to spare, no rules to bestow upon Romulus for him to follow.

She would teach him about the delicate etiquette of negotiations, teach him about the strategies of war, drill into him the power of words and how the right whisper at the right time could change even fate's plan. When he fumbled, she would correct him with patience and precision. When he would succeed, he would get a minute nod of appreciation.

She was not kind, nor was she warm.

But with her, Romulus for the first time experienced how to be someone, rather than being someone useful.


✦✧✦


“Why do they say I am cursed?” Romulus had once asked Master Silvia, in the quiet of the Library.

She had given him a vapid look, and replied, “Because they are afraid. Afraid that the stars are tired of leading and guiding us."

“They cannot fathom having freedom.”


✦✧✦


When Romulus came of age, a decision was made for him.

An honour, they called it.

But Romulus knew better.

Behind half-hearted words of encouragement and blessing, Romulus knew this was just an elaborate method to get rid of the cursed prince, so that he would be far away from anyone’s sight.

A clean exile cloaked in lies and diplomacy.

“The Land of Eclipse is falling apart,” King Remus tells him, with no remorse in his eyes. “You will go there as an envoy of peace and offer aid on behalf of Remoria.”

Lunas, the Land of Eclipse. Also known as the godless land.

Everyone knew there was no saving it, no aiding a kingdom that was nearing its end, that has been falling into shambles for decades.

Yet, Romulus does not resist.

He accepts his duty, with grace.

“Fitting isn't it?” people whisper behind him as he packed his things to set off. “A boy with no thread, sent to a place with no future.”

“Let the eclipse have him,” people whisper behind him as he goes to board the ship. “He was of no use to The Stars anyways.”

“My dear boy,” Master Silvia whispers, one hand clutching his shoulder in a tight grip, on the dock in front of the ship. “Remember everything I’ve taught you.”

She locks eyes with him, as Romulus smiles at her. “Don’t worry Master,” he says. “You’ve taught me well.”

She nods. “You will succeed,” is all she says before she lets him go.


✦✧✦


Romulus enters Lunas expecting destruction, and he is met with such.

A broken land, a shadow of what was once something great. The air was cold and solemn, the skies were darker and the stars distant. From here, he could barely make out the gaze of the revered Stars.

Yet the people here still lived to their utmost. They lit their houses up with colourful lights, gathered outside in front of the fire to sing songs filled with hope. The incandescent desire to keep living, burned bright in their hearts.

In the middle stands the Palace of Lunas, modest, and quiet in its elegance but it looked worn, reflecting its kingdom looking like it’s being held up by sheer will alone. The Princess of Lunas, young and wary, finds him as soon as he steps into the palace

“There is not much for you here,” she tells him, straightforward, tone clipped. “This land has nothing to give.”

“I’m not here to reap,” Romulus tells her. “Consider me an advisor– of sorts.”

She studies him, gaze filled with mistrust. “Why must I accept your word? Disloyalties will never cease.”

She looks weighed down at this, at the mention of disloyalties. Her regal face, that looked forged and not inherited, speaks of the ways she had clawed through to be where she is now.

“Why must I trust you?” she repeats, tired.

“Because I have nothing to lose and nothing to gain,” he meets her gaze, calm and steady.

Honest.

“Nor do I have nothing to offer, but myself.”


|


Lunas was still a kingdom on fire, and Romulus could most certainly not perform miracles. He could not snuff the fire out in an instant, but together with the Princess, he realised they could tend to it.

She had not immediately pretended to trust him, instead she asked him to prove himself worthy of the trust.

Now this was something he knew he could prove, he could be worthy off, unlike the countless other things he was asked to prove. After all, he had no other intentions. Cast off here by his kingdom, Romulus had decided to do the best he could, to help bring life back to Lunas.

To give himself a new purpose.

Even though this ‘new purpose’ was also in a way, given onto him. Not something he’d found by himself.

But he let such regrets be, and worked on gaining the trust of the princess.

The first few months Romulus spent in Lunas was much different from back home.

In remoria, people would look at him and the first thing they would see is what he lacks– a thread. But in Lunas, where a thread was nothing more than a strand of fibre, Romulus feels free. Truly unbound, untethered, and for the first time, he feels that might not be a bad thing.

It might not be a bad thing, being untethered to the path of the stars.

When the barkeep in the tavern had asked him where he was from, during the first few days of arriving in Lunas, he had replies with hesitance clear in his tone, “I hail from Remoria.”

He was preparing to hear words like, "Oh you’re the threadless prince! They sent the cursed prince here to help?"– and such.

But instead, the man had snorted and said, “Ah, the place where the stars decide if one can sneeze or not.”

Romulus had choked in his drink, hearing such blasphemous words about The Stars said out loud for the first ever time.

After that, Romulus had not bothered to keep his identity. If the people asked, he would divulge, not only because it was an efficient way to quickly gain trust, but he truly did not mind talking about it to people who just did not care about it like Remorians did.

The Land of the Eclipse did not have a divine being they followed. They instead revered the Sun and the Moon, but not as gods, but as forces.

As keepers of rhythm, in the way they danced in tandem every passing day.

They were not divine. But they were life. They gave life, and built life.

So they were respected for it.

The time of the eclipse, the moment the Sun and the Moon meet, is celebrated as a result.

The stars were nothing but mere spectators to the dance of the sun and the moon for the people of Lunas and Romulus couldn’t help but chuckle at the simplicity of it all.

Winning the friendship of the locals was a step in the right direction. The princess had softened her hard looks, when she had seen how Romulus behaved with the people of her land.

“You treat my people well,” she had told him one day, appearing like she had blinked into existence behind him.

Romulus was startled out of his engrossed reading session in the Palace Library. He had taken a calming breath, settling his nerves while also secretly appreciating her stealth and said, “They treat me well.”

She had regarded him, gaze astute.

“Come to the council meeting with me,” she’d said after a beat.

And he had accompanied her, to witness the first council meeting in person.


✦✧✦


It had taken time, but eventually Romulus and the Princess, had found their cadence, found the power they had when they would work together. Where Princess Hersilia lacked, Romulus filled. And where Romulus fell short, Hersilia covered.

Hersilia was unlike him in many aspects. But thankfully, that did not lead to their clash, but rather made them fit like pieces in a lost puzzle.

Where Romulus was slow and calculative, she was quick and gallant. When he would weave words around in circles, carefully crafting them to get him what he wants, she would be unwavering and direct, not caring for falsities and embellishments.

Romulus was known to be smart with his words, but that was not how he gained Hersilia’s trust.

Instead, it was the little things, like showing up to every Council meeting after she’d invited him for the first time, remembering the names of every single one of her people he’d met.

And also, never believing in the lies and slander the palace officials had tried to spread about the princess.

The reason for the fall of Lunas was this, power struggles and betrayals. The one reason Princess Hersislis is so wound up about disloyalties.

But if there was one thing Romulus was good at, it was observing.

Months of watching the palace officials and the remaining royals, and relaying his information to the Princess, weeding the traitors out was a task Romulus found a lot of joy in.

“You think it's him?” Hersilia would always ask, incredulous, when he would go to her with a new target. “He looks like he can't even hold a smart conversation for 2 minutes.”

“Exactly,” Romulus would reply, smiling. “The perfect facade.”

Hersilia would shake her head, but take his word for value nonetheless.

And like this, the rot was carved out, one by one.

Not with swords and destruction, but with patience and meticulous plans.

Lunas was pulled out from its pathway to destruction, finally put on the path of restoration.


✦✧✦


It had come one ordinary morning, when the most eventful thing happening was the new variety of Jam served for breakfast.

It had come, like how most disastrous things do.

Quiet and sudden.

The arrival of a large, royal envoy.

From Remoria.

They’d met in the palace council room. Romulus stood beside Herislia, watching his Father who in turn watched him back. There was a feature of surprise on King Remus’s face. Perhaps he was surprised to see the Kingdom he thought was in ruins to suddenly be flourishing. Or perhaps he was surprised to see the son he cast away, so different from when he’d seen him last.

“I come, not to destroy,” King Remus speaks, voice deep and regal. “The stars have spoken, a thread has changed.”

Hersilia glances at Romulus, who cannot help but frown. Threads don't just– change. That was incredibly rare.

“And that concerns us how?” Herisilia asks, chin held high.

King Remus eyes her, with slight annoyance, before speaking like he was reciting a chant.

“Eclipse must cease for the stars to shine brightest.”

“Why must we listen to your stars?” barely contained anger brims in her voice.

The King scoffs, disdainful. “You godless fiends will never know the importance of divine words. When it speaks, we will listen.”

He gets up from his seat, “We’re showing Mercy by proposing annexation. You may retain your title, but your land and your people will belong to Remoria and The Stars.”

They leave, promising to return in a week's time.

Romulus, still lingering in the council meeting room long since the envoy had left, feels something ancient stirring inside him.

Not fear, not anger, but exhaustion.

Even here, he couldn’t help but think bitterly. Even here the stars chase me, and now Lunas was in trouble.

Was he truly a bad omen?

Will he never break free from the shackles of the thread?

“Romulus,” Hersilia’s voice cuts through his haze of thoughts. She clasps his shoulder, gentle and steady. “We will find a way. Lunas will not fall.”

In the dead of the night, Romulus was struck with a thought.

A thought he did not dare voice, out loud in the emptiness of his room. So he rushes outside, to the Library where he knew the Princess would still be up.

He bursts in, startling her, whispering the words, “We will destroy the Loom of Fate.”

Hersilia looks at him, surprise and confusion lacing her features.

Romulus walks closer to her, and continues, “End the cycle of being bound to fate, once and for all.”

Hersilia watches him, in curious silence. “Will your Stars not take offense??”

Romulus remembers Master Silvia’s words about The Stars being tired of leading people. “I have a feeling, The Stars will not mind.:

“You would go that far?”

“For Lunas, yes.”

Silence encompasses them for a moment before Hersilia laughs. “That’s a daring plan, how unlike you.”

Romulus smiles, but he slumps into the seat next to her. “I'm not good with the sword,” he says, “to destroy the loom.”

Hersilia gives him a sidelong glance. “Fortunately for you, I am.”

“You would do this?” he asks, the ‘for me’ goes unsaid.

Hersilia shakes her head, fond. “Romulus, if you think I wouldn't do anything for you after you helped me build my kingdom back, you think of me as an ingrate.”


✦✧✦


When destroyed, the Loom does not wail, nor does it scream.

It sighs, in sweet relief.

The golden threads unravel, the people fall apart with it.

With Romulus’ meticulous planning and Hersilia’s sharp blade, they had succeeded in destroying the Loom of Fate, much to the anguish of the Remorians. When the Loom disappears into stardust, its last echoes fading away like it never existed in the first place, cries rise from the Remorians witnessing it.

Shock, rage, fear.

But before it could formulate into something, The Stars speak.

Not with anger.

But with a softness of a divine being.

“The Loom is broken, but do not weep,” they say. “You chained yourself with threads, and called it divine. But now that they are cut, will you stand up by yourself? Or perish?”

“The boy with the uncut thread chose his own path, his own story. Now you take the Quill from him, and write yours too.”


✦✧✦


Romulus was not, or perhaps never, getting used to the brand new type of attention he was receiving after The Stars had spoken.

The Saviour, they call him now.

The one who makes his own thread, the cheer.

The locals wouldn’t leave him alone, even the ones who only had harsh words reserved for him in the past. Escaping one such crowd, Romulus had taken refuge in the Palace Garden, sitting on a bench ruminating in his thoughts.

“Hiding here?” Hersilia’s voice comes, and he looks up to see her casually leaning on the pillar nearby.

“This attention gives me no joy,” Romulus groans. “One woman just asked to touch my thread-seared right hand for good luck and guidance.”

Hersilia grimaces, although there is a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. “You should have let her. It might have started a new fad.”

Romulus gives her an unimpressed look as she makes her way towards him.

“I’d like to go home,” Romulus sighs, after a moment.

She sits next to him, and gives him a questioning look.

Romulus understands what she’s asking. Home, isn’t he technically home, right now in Remoria?

He meets her eyes, lips slipping into an easy smile. “To Lunas.”

Hersilia holds his gaze for a moment, before returning his smile. “Let's leave soon then. Go back, and continue writing our story.”


✦✧✦