While the continent of Westerol turned its eyes to the twin miracles and the northern heir in Silvermere, while Lords Theron and Hakan began their fateful journeys, a different kind of fire was kindling in the west, on the storm-lashed islands of Fregate.
The Fregate Isles were not like the other regions. Their power was not measured in acres of grain or regiments of soldiers, but in the might of their ships—the great war-galleys with their dragon-prow heads, the swift cutters, and the formidable, castle-like dreadnoughts that ruled the Serpent's Strait. They were the kingdom's shield against maritime invasion and its greatest hope for striking the demonic forces along the coastal blights. Lord Tufan, a man with salt in his beard and the sea's fury in his eyes, commanded respect born not of love, but of necessity. The Crown needed his navy.
The celebration had reached Fregate, of course. The official proclamation, adorned with the royal seal, had been read in the main square of Tidewatch, the capital city hewn from black sea-rock. There had been cheers, toasts raised with sharp, clear brine-ale, and the ringing of the great harbor bell. Lord Tufan had stood on the balcony of his keep, watching the muted festivities below, his face an unreadable mask. Three heirs. More players on a crowded board. It changed little for him; his duty was to the sea.
But then, a different message arrived. It did not come on royal parchment but on a sheet of fine, scented paper, carried by a Fregate captain whose expression was grim. It was from his daughter, Arin. Sent not to the Lord Admiral, but to her father.
Tufan took the letter to his war room, a chamber mapped with nautical charts, littered with astrolabes and the skeletal models of enemy ships. He broke the seal and read. And with each word, the calm, controlled demeanor of the admiral began to crack.
The letter spoke not of politics or heirs. It spoke of profound loneliness. It described the gilded cage of the royal court, a world of whispers and sly insults where a daughter of the islands was seen as a rustic curiosity. It told of being overlooked, of conversations that died when she approached, of balls where she stood alone by the pillars, watching the southern lords and ladies swirl in their games. "They see my accent as coarse, my manners simple," she had written, her script elegant but the words aching with pain. "Father, I am surrounded by a thousand people, yet I am besieged by a loneliness more profound than any ocean. The King has his new heirs, the court has its new favorites, and I am forgotten. This place is unbearable. Does anyone at home even remember me?"
Lord Tufan's hand, calloused from a lifetime of gripping ropes and rails, trembled. He saw not the words, but the image of his fierce, bright-eyed daughter, who had climbed rigging before she could properly read, now diminished and isolated in that den of vipers. He had sent her to secure an alliance, to be a beacon of Fregate's strength. Instead, she had been made to feel small. Insignificant.
The King had his heirs. The other lords had their celebrations. And his daughter had her silence and her sorrow.
The cold, logical mind of the strategist was consumed by the white-hot rage of a father. This was not merely an insult; it was a betrayal. The Crown had taken his child, his only link to a wife long lost to the sea, and broken her spirit. It had consumed his sacrifice and offered nothing in return but neglect.
He stood abruptly, the letter clutched in his fist. He strode to the great window that looked out over his fleet, hundreds of ships resting in the harbor like slumbering leviathans. This was his power. This was his voice.
He summoned his scribe, his voice a low, dangerous rumble like distant thunder. "Take a message. Now."
The scribe, sensing the tempest in his lord, hurriedly prepared his ink and parchment.
"Do not use the words of court," Tufan commanded, his eyes fixed on his armada. "Use words they will understand. Use my words."
He began to dictate, each sentence a hammer blow.
"To the Court of Silvermere and the King who rules it."
"You feast and celebrate your future while you let the pillars of your present crumble. You seek heirs to save a kingdom you yourselves are destroying with your neglect and your arrogance."
"You have taken the daughter of Fregate, a treasure beyond your comprehension, and you have left her to wither in the shadows of your vanity. You have forgotten the loyalty of those who hold the true lines."
"If the Crown cannot honor its debts, if it cannot protect its own, then it is a Crown not worth serving. If my daughter's tears are the currency of your joy, then we will have no more of it."
He paused, the finality of his next words hanging in the salt-air of the room.
"The alliance between Fregate and the Crown is broken. Our ships will no longer guard your coasts. Our sailors will no longer die for your causes. Consider this our declaration. Not of fealty, but of war. You have chosen to make an enemy of the sea. Now you will drown in its wrath."
"Lord Tufan of Fregate, Master of the Tidewatch Fleet."
He did not sign it. He took the heavy, silver Admiral's ring from his finger and pressed it into the warm wax of the seal, leaving not a sigil, but an unmistakable, brutal impression.
The message was sent not by raven, but by the fastest cutter in his fleet, its sails black as a storm cloud.
That night, in the midst of the kingdom's joy, a single, unequivocal word echoed from the western islands, a word that would shatter the fragile peace and plunge Westerol into a chaos far more immediate than the demonic threat: WAR !!