I'd prepared for physical trials, magical contests, and mental duels. But this—this was something else. What didSir Lioranvalue? What memory could I sacrifice without revealing too much of who I truly was? And would the Moonshard protect me?
Arthur stepped forward. There was something in his expression I'd never seen before: not sternness or command, butgravity—as though this trial carried weight even for him—as though he understood the sacrifice he was asking of us.
“A knight who serves at my table must place Logres above himself. Loyalty to the realm must outweigh even the fiercest personal bonds.”
His gaze passed over each of us, stopping on no one—and yet, somehow, I felt it pause on me.
A silver bowl rested at the altar, gleaming where the stained glass caught it. Its surface seemed to ripple faintly, as if lit from within, as if ithungered.
“Each candidate will approach alone,” Mordred said. “But the memory you surrender will be witnessed by all.”
Gareth was the first to step forward.
I watched his broad shoulders tense as he approached Mordred and Arthur. He placed his hands on either side of the silver bowl, his knuckles whitening with the force of his grip. His jaw worked silently as he closed his eyes, reaching inward—searching for a memory he could bear to lose.
Mordred’s spell activated as soon as Gareth spoke the incantation, his voice low but steady:
“Veil of shadows, bind and unmake. From this chalice, a grim choice I take. Memory bright, now dimmed and gray— Let joy be lost, and fade away.”
Immediately, a soft blue light rose like smoke from the bowl, twisting and curling in hypnotic spirals. The vapor coalesced into a luminous image that hovered above the altar for all to see.
A young boy stood in a sun-dappled clearing, no more than twelve. Auburn hair caught the light, and even in youth, his handsome features were unmistakably Gareth’s: the determined chin, the defiant tilt of his head.
Beside him stood a tall, imposing man—his father, no doubt. The resemblance between them was undeniable: the same proud stance, the same piercing eyes that measured the world like a battlefield.
In the memory, golden light danced between the boy’s trembling hands—fire magic, raw and new, flaring for the very first time. Embers of fire spun between his fingers like captured stars. It was a moment of wonder, trembling with meaning.
The father's weathered face—usually stern and unyielding—was lit with unmistakable pride. His eyes shone, not with command or instruction, but with something softer: approval, awe,love.
I could feel the weight of the moment: a son’s triumph, a father’s acceptance, the birth of a legacy.
Gareth stared at the image in silence, his fingers clenched around the edge of the bowl. The chapel seemed to hold itsbreath. His younger self’s face was alight with joy. His father’s rare smile lingered like a blessing. The golden magic pulsed between their hands.
And still, he didn't look away.
There was a war raging behind his eyes—a reckoning of cost and consequence. What would it mean to forget this memory that was obviously sacred to him? To lose the ability to recall the first time he'd made his father proud?
Finally, with a shuddering breath that seemed torn from the depths of him, Gareth nodded.
“It is decided,” he whispered, barely audible.
The memory began to unravel.
It dissolved at the edges first, like leaves caught in a rising wind. The boy’s joy, the father’s pride, the golden fire—each fragment broke apart and rose into the air as pure magical essence. A brilliant corona burst outward, illuminating every corner of the ancient chapel.
The stained glass windows caught fire with color. Reds, golds, and blues flared in brilliant patterns across our robes, our faces, the cold stone beneath our feet.
And then, abruptly, darkness.
When the light died, tears welled in Gareth’s eyes, glimmering. His broad shoulders remained squared, his chin lifted in defiance of his own grief. Though his expression remained stoic—a knight’s mask firmly in place—the hand that dropped from the chalice curled into a fist at his side, as if trying to grasp something that had already slipped away forever.
I pressed my lips together until they ached. The truth of what I was witnessing settled like cold stone in my stomach. These sacrifices weren’t symbolic gestures or temporary surrenders—they were permanent, irrevocable losses carved from the essence of each knight. Whatever was given in this ancient chapel, beneath the watchful eyes of the saints and thesorcerers in the glass, would be truly lost—leaving behind only the hollow ache where something cherished had once been.
I saw it in Gareth’s rigid posture and in the way his eyes bemoaned an absence he was already beginning to feel.
Next came Percival.
His gentle face remained serene despite what he’d just witnessed. As he stepped forward, there was a peculiar grace in the way he moved—light, precise, almost reverent—belied by the slender frame that made others underestimate him.
