Crown Of The Tides

Chapter One: The Ocean's warning

SELENE:

I woke to my mother screaming my name.
The High Queen of Lunaven was not a woman who screamed.

Not publicly. Not privately. Not ever.

But then again, neither was she a woman who entered my chambers without servants announcing her arrival first.

The remains of my dream still clung to me-cold ocean water filling my lungs, unseen hands dragging me beneath the waves, my own blood dissolving into the sea. The same nightmare had followed me for years.

Usually, her voice shattered it before death could.

This morning was no different.

"Selene!"

I forced myself upright, pushing silver hair from my face as the chamber doors slammed against the stone walls behind her.

For a moment, I simply stared.

Something was wrong.

My mother stood before me in a plain dark robe, her crown missing, her perfectly composed smile nowhere to be seen. The High Queen of Lunaven looked... terrified.

And that frightened me more than any nightmare ever could.

"What happened?" I asked.

Instead of answering, she crossed the room and grabbed my arm.
Or tried to.

I had been trained for war since childhood; she had been trained for courtrooms and crowns. Her grip barely moved me, but her hands trembled violently against my skin.

My brother was the future ruler of Lunaven. The firstborn son inherited the throne.
I was simply the blade meant to protect his reign.

"What's wrong?" I repeated.

Then she began to cry.

My breath caught.

In eighteen years of life, I had never seen my mother cry

Not at funerals. Not during storms. Not even when my father died.

Yet now tears streamed down her face as though the ocean itself had broken inside her.

"Your Majesty,"
I said carefully, "have I done something wrong?"

Her gaze lifted to mine, suddenly soft.
And I knew instantly that softness was far more dangerous thananger.
Because my mother never looked at me gently unless she wanted something.

And whatever it was-
it would ruin me.

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