The Grand Hall of Silvermere had been polished to a blinding sheen for the occasion. Sunlight, now normal and mercifully subdued, streamed through the high windows, catching the dust motes that danced like gold leaf in the air. The banners of the nine regions hung limp and proud. The air was thick with the scent of beeswax, perfumed oils, and the tense, metallic tang of high-stakes politics.
The lords of Westerol had arrived, each a sovereign power in their own right, now gathered to bend the knee to a fragile crown and the three infants who represented its future. Their entrances had been meticulously staged displays of power.
Lord Theron of Zelts had processed through the city streets in his wheelhouse, scattering silver coins to the masses, a moving river of wealth flowing toward the castle gates. His gift to the King—a chest of flawless gemstones meant to refill the depleted royal coffers—was presented not with humility, but with the air of a banker finalizing a lucrative loan.
Lord Hakan of Vairogs had arrived with the grim cadence of a military march, his Huskarls a wall of scarred muscle and polished steel. His gift was not wealth, but weapons: a dozen exquisitely forged longswords, their pommels carved like snarling wolves. A promise of violence held in reserve.
The other lords followed, each with their tribute, their pageantry, their unspoken agendas. They were all there, a sea of silk, fur, and steel, their eyes fixed on the dais.
Upon the throne sat King Alaric, looking more weary than regal despite the occasion. And on smaller, ornate chairs beside him, held by nervous nursemaids, were the three infants: Julio, Markz, and Dean. The objects of all this hope and hunger.
The ceremony began with the traditional oaths of fealty. One by one, the lords approached, spoke the hollow words, and offered their gifts. It was a dance as old as the kingdom itself. But the cracks began to show almost immediately.
As Lord Theron finished his florid speech about "a new era of prosperity under the wise guidance of Zelts," Hakan could no longer contain his scorn. A low, derisive snort escaped him, echoing in the hushed hall.
"All this glitter," Hakan's voice boomed, cutting through the formal silence. He didn't address the King, but fixed his glare on Theron. "You parade your gold like it wins wars. You forget it is our blood, the blood of Vairogs, that keeps the demons from your gilded doorstep. This court's splendor is paid for with the lives of my sons. Never forget that."
Theron turned, his smile cold and sharp as a razor. "And it is my gold that pays for the steel in your soldiers' hands, the bread in their bellies, and the coal in your forges, Lord Hakan. Without my 'glitter,' as you so crudely put it, your bravery would be a brief and starving affair. My mercenaries and my resources are the only reason your border hasn't collapsed entirely."
"The only thing that will collapse is your skull under a good northern mace," Hakan shot back, taking a half-step forward. His Huskarls stiffened.
"Enough!" King Alaric's voice, though strained, carried the fading echo of command. "This is a hall of unity, not a tavern brawl! You are here to honor my sons, not bicker like fishwives!"
The two lords fell into a seething silence, but the damage was done. The illusion of unity was shattered in front of the entire court. The King took a deep breath, his eyes moving to the three babies. In their innocence, he saw a chance to reclaim the moment, to impose order.
"The future is here," he declared, his voice gaining strength. He gestured to the infants. "And it is time to shape it. By the ancient laws of blood and birthright, I hereby proclaim my firstborn son..." He paused, letting the anticipation build. "...Prince Julio, of the House Silvermere, as my legal heir and the Crown Prince of Westerol."
A wave of murmured assent moved through the crowd. It was the expected move. Theron allowed himself a slight, triumphant lift of his chin. Hakan's jaw tightened, but he had expected this; his hope lay in the strength of his own grandson, Dean, and the future conflicts to come.
For a moment, it seemed the tension had been re-contained. Order was restored.
Then, the great oak doors of the hall groaned open.
A man stood there, silhouetted against the daylight. He was not dressed in court finery. He wore the practical, salt-stained leathers of a sailor, and his face was hard and wind-burned. He held no gift. In his hand was a scroll, tied with a simple cord, sealed with a blob of wax impressed not with a sigil, but with a ring.
The Captain of the Guard moved to intercept him, but the man marched forward with an authority that gave even the guards pause. He walked the entire length of the silent hall, his boots echoing on the flagstones, until he stood at the foot of the dais. He ignored the King. He ignored the lords. His eyes swept over them all with utter contempt.
He unrolled the scroll.
"Lord Tufan of Fregate, Master of the Tidewatch Fleet, speaks," he began, his voice a harsh bark that needed no amplification. He read the message, each word a hammer blow in the stunned silence.
He spoke of neglect. He spoke of a lonely daughter. He spoke of a broken alliance. And then, he delivered the final, devastating blow.
"The Crown has made an enemy of the sea. Consider all pacts void. Our fleets are recalled. Our shores are closed to you. The war against the darkness is now your war alone. And know this: any ship bearing the banner of the crown or any of its loyal lapdogs," his eyes swept over Theron and Hakan, "will be sent to the depths."
He let the scroll roll shut. The sound was like a death rattle.
"The Admiral's words are spoken. The war has begun."
For a long moment, there was only silence. The declaration was so immense, so catastrophic, that no one could fully grasp it. The kingdom was split in two in an instant.
Then, chaos erupted.
The hall exploded into a cacophony of shouts, accusations, and panic. The King stared, pale and speechless, his moment of triumph obliterated. The three infants, as if sensing the seismic shift in the world they had just entered, began to cry—first Markz, then Dean, and finally, the silent, watchful Julio, whose clear blue eyes filled with tears for the first time, not of sadness, but of a profound, unknowable alarm.
The stunned silence that followed the Fregate envoy's declaration lasted only a heartbeat before it shattered into a dozen panicked conversations. The Grand Hall was no longer a place of ceremony; it was a pot about to boil over.
Lord Hakan was the first to move, his reaction as swift and direct as a battle-axe blow. He turned from the dais, his face a thundercloud. "Enough!" he roared, his voice cutting through the din and silencing the lesser lords. He cast a look of pure contempt at the spluttering King, then at Theron. "This is what your southern games have wrought! While you count your coins and play at politics, true enemies are made!"
He strode toward his daughter, Asel, who stood pale but resolute, holding her white-haired son, Dean, close to her chest. Hakan's expression softened for a fraction of a second as he looked at his grandson before hardening again with resolve. "This city is a death trap," he announced, his voice carrying to every corner of the hall. "Walled against land armies, but a ripe fruit waiting to be plucked by a fleet. Fregate's ships will blockade the Serpent's Strait. They will starve you out, burn your ports, and rain fire on these pretty towers."
He placed a protective hand on Asel's shoulder and addressed the King, though it sounded more like an order than a request. "My daughter and my grandson will not be hostages to Tufan's wrath or casualties in a siege they did nothing to cause. We return to Vairogs. Today. Now."
King Alaric found his voice, though it was weak. "Lord Hakan, you cannot— the ceremony— the child is a prince of the realm—"
"He is a son of the North first!" Hakan shot back. "And the North is where he will be safe. Where he will learn to be strong, not soft. Where he will understand the real war, not this… this pageantry." He glared around the hall, his gaze daring anyone to challenge him. His Huskarls closed ranks around him and Asel, their hands resting on their weapons, a clear and present threat to anyone who would try to stop them. The message was unmistakable: this was not a negotiation. It was an extraction.
As Hakan began his grim march toward the exit, pulling his daughter and the future of his house with him, Lord Theron Goldwyne watched him go. Where Hakan saw a death trap, Theron saw the opportunity of a lifetime.
He stepped forward, his voice calm and precise, a counterpoint to Hakan's fury. "Run to your mountains then, Hakan. Hide behind your walls and fight your dirt wars." He turned to the King, his demeanor shifting to one of unshakeable, almost arrogant, loyalty. "Your Grace, the abandonment of some does not mean the failure of all. Let the North have its tantrum. Silvermere will stand."
He swept a hand toward the windows, as if already envisioning the coming conflict. "Fregate believes the sea is its domain? Let them test that theory. My gold will hire every sell-sail from here to the Free Cities. My resources will fortify these walls and stockpile provisions for a decade. The city will not fall. It will become an impregnable fortress, a testament to the crown that remains loyal to its true allies."
His eyes flickered toward Leyla, who stood holding her twins, Julio and Markz, her expression a mixture of fear and dawning ambition. Theron's message was for her, too. We are staying. This is our throne.
"The threat is not from the sea, Your Grace," Theron continued, his voice dropping into a conspiratorial tone meant for the King, but loud enough for the surrounding lords to hear. "The threat is from within. From those who would fracture the kingdom at its hour of greatest need. Zelts stands with you. We will defend this city. We will defend your heirs."
The division was now physical, geographical, and absolute. Hakan, with his daughter and the heir of Vairogs, was fleeing the capital to secure his own power base in the North, believing the crown to be a lost cause about to be besieged.
Theron, with his daughter and the proclaimed crown prince, was digging in, using the crisis to position himself as the King's sole defender and the de facto ruler of the heartlands.
The King looked between the retreating back of Lord Hakan and the calculating face of Lord Theron. He was no longer a monarch commanding his subjects; he was a prize fought over by two stronger men. The hall was split, lords looking to each other, unsure who to follow: the military might of the North or the boundless wealth of the South.
The three infants, the cause of it all, continued to cry. Their wails were the sound of Westerol tearing itself in two. The war with the demons was now a secondary concern. The first civil war of the new age had just begun, and its opening move was a northern lord walking out of the king's court, taking a piece of the future with him.
The weight of the crown had finally cracked him. The pressure of the demons, the scheming of the lords, the shocking declaration of war from Fregate—it was a torrent that broke the last dam of King Alaric's sanity. He was no longer the Steadfast. He was a cornered animal, lashing out at the only thing he could still try to control.
As Lord Hakan turned, his hand on his daughter's back, guiding her and his grandson toward the exit and toward safety, the King's voice ripped through the hall, shrill and unhinged.
"You will NOT!"
Every head snapped toward the dais. King Alaric was on his feet, his body trembling, his face a grotesque mask of fury and desperation. He pointed a shaking finger at Hakan.
"You are my subject! That boy is my son, a Prince of Westerol! You do not take what is mine! This is not a request, it is treason!" Spittle flew from his lips. His eyes were wide, unseeing, glazed with a madness no one had witnessed before. "Guards! Seize them! Seize the traitors! Bring me my son!"
For a heartbeat, no one moved. The royal guards looked at each other, confused. They were trained to fight demons and rebels, not to apprehend a ruling lord in the middle of the Grand Hall.
It was Lord Theron who acted first. He saw not chaos, but opportunity. Hakan's removal, by any means, cleared the board. A sharp, almost imperceptible nod from him to his own captain was all it took.
Zelts guards, interspersed with the royal knights, drew their swords. The metallic shing of steel being unsheathed was the sound that broke the world.
"Father!" Asel cried, clutching baby Dean tighter, her eyes wide with terror as she saw the glint of advancing blades.
Hakan reacted with the instincts of a lifetime at war. He roared, a sound of pure, feral rage, and shoved Asel behind him, drawing his own greatsword in one fluid motion. "To me! To me!" he bellowed to his Huskarls.
What followed was not a battle. It was a slaughter.
Hakan and his two dozen Huskarls were the finest warriors from the hardest front, but they were outnumbered ten to one. The royal guards, galvanized by the King's screamed orders, and the Zelts soldiers, eager to please their lord, surged forward.
The glorious hall became a charnel house. The polished flagstones grew slick with blood. The air, once perfumed, filled with the coppery stench of death and the screams of the dying. Hakan fought like a demon himself, his greatsword carving a bloody arc around him, shattering shields and ending lives with every swing. For a moment, he was a force of nature, unstoppable.
But a spear thrust from his blind side brought him to his knees. A royal knight's sword found a gap in his armor. The Lord of Vairogs fell, his lifeblood pooling around him, his eyes fixed on the northern exit he would never reach.
Asel screamed, throwing her body over her child as blades descended. She was cut down without mercy, her life extinguished atop the son she had tried to protect.
The fighting died down as quickly as it began. The last of the Huskarls lay dead. The hall was silent, save for the moans of the wounded and the heavy breathing of the killers.
In the center of the carnage, amidst the twisted bodies of his mother and grandfather, lay Prince Dean.
He did not cry. He lay on the cold stone, swaddled in now-crimson linen, his shock of white hair a stark contrast to the blood around him. His black eyes were open, staring up at the vaulted ceiling, as if silently recording the horror. He was utterly still, a small island of terrible silence in a sea of violence.
King Alaric stood panting on the dais, the madness receding from his eyes to be replaced by a dawning, horrifying comprehension. He looked at his hands as if seeing them for the first time. He had not just killed a rebellious lord; he had murdered the mother of his own child and made an enemy of the entire North, forever.
Lord Theron watched, his face a carefully constructed mask of solemnity, but triumph glittered in his eyes. His greatest rival was gone. The path was clearer.
And from her place beside the throne, Leyla of Zelts held her two sons tighter, Julio and Markz, shielding their eyes from the sight. Her heart hammered not just with fear, but with a terrifying, thrilling understanding. The game had just been reset. It was more vicious, more bloody than she had ever imagined.
The future of Westerol, represented by three babies, was now irrevocably stained. One was crowned in hope, one was a spare, and the third was now an orphan, lying between the corpses of his family, his legacy not of royalty, but of bloodshed and betrayal. The point of no return had not just been crossed; it had been drowned in it.