A Forgotten Shrine Novels & Stories

The one who had been cast out by the other gods for trying to destroy everything. The one who was known only as… The Forgotten. And as the voice faded, the crystal cracked.

The moon shrine lay at the far edge of the castle grounds, tucked behind a stand of old yews that muffled the sounds of the training yards and town below. I’d passed it a few times since coming to Mooncrest—a small, secluded place I’d always given a wide berth. Shrines and I had never had an easy relationship. There are too many prayers that had gone unanswered. Too many people who thought offering me to a goddess was the same as helping me. Tonight, I pushed through the yew branches myself.

Fools. The abandoned shrine sits deep in the woods, a crumbling stone structure older than Fang territory itself. Most pack members avoid it, whispering about curses and restless spirits. Pete discovered it at fifteen while tracking a wounded deer, and he's been coming here ever since. The shrine predates werewolf settlement, built by something ancient that understood true power. He enters through the collapsed archway, and immediately the temperature drops. His breath comes out in white clouds, and frost glitters on broken stone despite no wind reaching this far into the structure. Moonlight filters through gaps in the roof, painting everything in shades of blood and shadow.

“What are they?” Elara stepped forward. “The Forgotten.” Her voice barely carried, yet it reached every ear. “They are what remains when power becomes memory. When gods fall, and their echoes find shelter in the bones of the world.” The first creature raised its head. Still faceless, yet its focus was unmistakable — centered on Elara. A voice — not spoken, but planted inside their minds like an old seed awakening — pulsed through them. “We remember you, Daughter of Ash. We remember the pact broken. The blood unspilled. Why have you called us again?”

Caleb whispered, brushing cobwebs off an archway carved with runes neither of us could read. “No,” I said. “But it feels like a necessary one.” Asha trailed behind us, sword drawn, eyes alert. She didn’t speak. Her silence was its own kind of trust or warning. I hadn’t decided which yet. The shrine had once been a place of lunar offerings. That much was clear from the stone rings, the dried moonroot vines hanging from the corners, and the central pit that led down into the underchambers, where Matrons once came to bury their relics.

All this, because no one would remember them, so with them the powers that still inhabited some regions, or sustained several places, lost their power, with them came disasters, the end came to each of them, with them, the places that once existed, no longer exist, their worlds have come to an end. So, with them their meanings, then, there were no gods, there were no dates to remember, there was no place to return, with them, disasters and evil happened, from him one day worlds lost what sustained them and with them, its inhabitants died, so the temples of Zarathanis were home. When the place of the forgotten for all to be remembered, which was a contract between them, lest they be forgotten

Whilst the churchyard still had mourners and the odd funeral due to instructions in a will, the land was mostly left untended and the old memorials were lost in a mass of weeds and ivy. Those below were dust now, or crumbling bone. If any ancestors remained, they were long forgotten. Memories didn't bow down or perform duties. "I have gotten nowhere by hesitating," Am-Heh whispered to himself as he dragged a claw across the prominent vein in his wrist. Blood spilled from under the jagged point, cascading in droplets onto the parched ground.

Maybe the pictures I am seeing are not really photoshopped and something about it was true. After my company became a success. I did my best to get rid of the terrible memories that I had about my past. I forced myself to try and forget a lot of painful memories because I was scared that I would never heal from my pains if I could not forget Liam. He was the main reason I had wanted to forget everything and just move on and now, it was beginning to look like that was the worst mistake of my life. Because now, I dont know which parts of my life I had washed away and drowned in memories I suppressed. I didnt know fully what was true and what wasnt anymore.

The stench was overwhelming now, a sickening mix of death and rot that clung to the back of my throat. Jarred’s light darted from one corpse to another, his voice shaking. “Rohan, what the hell is going on here?” I stood, my jaw clenched as I scanned the grim scene. The bodies weren’t random—they were dumped, piled carelessly in this forgotten ravine. My flashlight caught the glint of another bite mark on a nearby corpse, confirming what I already knew. This wasn’t a coincidence. This was a pattern, a grotesque collection hidden just outside our borders.