The Crown We Break

Chapter One: The Anniversary Coin

Chapter One: The Anniversary Coin

Andar shimmered in late spring.

Banners of every house fluttered from the rooftops, stitched together with the new sigil of the reformed kingdom: a crown made of five iron points interwoven with a sixth of ashwood — a tribute to the fallen, the reborn, and the forgotten.

Caelan stood on the balcony of the Hall of Accord, looking down at the city that had once nearly devoured him.

The festival below surged with laughter, music, dancers in the streets. Vendors sold sweet wine and firefruit, children ran beneath floating lights, and every temple in the city rang its bells at once.

One year.

A year since the Crown Council was born.

A year since Sareth was exiled.

A year since Caelan changed everything.

Behind him, a knock.

“Enter,” Caelan said.

It was Lyra.

She wore no ceremonial gown — just a simple dark coat with the northern braid at her shoulder. Her hair was wind-tousled. Her eyes steady.

“You should be down there,” she said.

“I will be,” Caelan said. “I just… needed to see it. Alone. For a minute.”

She stepped beside him, taking in the view.

“They still don’t know what to make of you,” she said after a beat.

“I know.”

“That’s probably good.”

Caelan looked over. “You’re in a mood.”

Lyra smiled faintly. “The council passed your education reforms without a single shout. I’m suspicious.”

“Enjoy it,” he said. “The shouting will return by morning.”

She turned toward the door. “You’ve got gifts to receive. Toasts to endure.”

He made a face. “Can’t wait.”

As she left, he followed — but stopped short when he saw it.

A single silver coin.

Lying at the center of his chamber floor.

Not minted by the Crown.

Bloodstained.

Old.

His fingers trembled as he picked it up.

Engraved on its surface: a sword breaking through a crown.

The mark of the Southern Pact.

He called for his guards.

But in his chest, the old panic returned.

They haven’t forgotten.

⸻

Later — The Council’s Unease

The festival continued. But inside the Hall of Accord, the air grew tense.

The coin sat in the center of the long table, surrounded by the twelve councilors, each silent.

“Where was it found again?” asked Councilor Menal, the trade envoy from the East.

“In my private chambers,” Caelan said.

“No one should have been able to—”

“They were,” he cut in.

Lyra sat across from him, watching. Her face unreadable.

“It’s a declaration,” said the southern general, Elric. “The coin means only one thing: someone in the south is reactivating the Pact. And they want us to know.”

Councilor Vos, the elder from the hill provinces, frowned. “There hasn’t been a sign of rebellion in months. No towns lost. No attacks.”

Lyra leaned forward.

“That we know of,” she said. “There are whole villages without council presence. And Sareth is still unaccounted for.”

The room tensed.

Caelan rubbed the coin between his fingers. “What if this wasn’t just a warning?”

“What, then?” Elric asked.

He looked up.

“What if it was an invitation?”

⸻

The Shadows Gather

That night, as the festival fire danced across the river and Caelan gave the closing speech from the palace steps, somewhere far south, a hooded man stood in the ruins of an old fort.

Before him: fifty, maybe sixty followers. Farmers. Exiles. Mercenaries.

All silent.

All watching.

Sareth raised a silver coin into the firelight.

“They’ll tell you he brought peace,” he said. “That the boy king ended the line of tyrants.”

He smiled.

“Peace is just another word for forgetting.”

He dropped the coin into the fire.

It hissed. Burned.

Then he turned.

“Vire will remember.”

And in the darkness, they raised their voices.

Not in war cries.

In a vow.