PROLOGUE — Ashes of the Violet Tide
The smell of baked bread and salt clung to the air of Port Damaya,
a sleepy harbor town curled between a crescent bay and rolling green hills.
Behind the clamor of merchant stalls and the drunken chants of sailors
stood a modest inn called The Violet Tide.
Its owner, a young woman with kind eyes and calloused hands,
was once known simply as Reyna.
She was not born noble.
No bloodline, no coin.
Just grit and stubbornness.
She poured ale for crusty old fishermen,
swept floors while humming lullabies,
and learned to smile even when her belly ached.
It was there, in that inn, that she met Sir Callan Virell—
a minor noble with more heart than holdings.
Cast off by his own kind for choosing duty over pride.
He sought shelter from a storm.
He found it not in the hearth,
but in Reyna's eyes.
Their courtship was quiet.
Honest.
Built on laughter, long silences, and late-night stories.
He married her—against his family's wishes.
Gave her no crown, but something grander:
a name,
a home,
and a love untouched by greed.
In time, Reyna gave birth to twin daughters.
The birth was hard.
The midwife shook her head—one child didn't survive.
They said she was stillborn.
They took the body away.
Reyna screamed.
And though her arms ached for what was lost,
she raised her surviving daughter, Lyra,
with fierce, radiant love.
For a time, their lives were simple and whole.
Reyna—now Lady Virell—still worked the inn.
Callan spoke for the people.
And Lyra, wild and willful,
ran barefoot through garden soil like she was chasing the wind.
But joy—true joy—is a fragile thing in a world built on greed.
---
One night, a ship docked under a foreign moon.
No nation's flag flew.
Only the symbol of a spice cartel known for bribes and blood—
The Indigo Syndicate.
Backed by corrupt officers of the Mariner's Ward.
They didn't come to trade.
They came to take.
The raid came swift, without warning.
Callan was the first to fall—
cut down trying to reason with wolves.
Reyna ran through smoke and screaming with Lyra in her arms.
Mud splattered her nightdress.
Blood soaked her fingers
as she clutched a kitchen blade like a sword.
She begged the gods.
Screamed to the sea.
She hid Lyra in a wine barrel—
and turned to face the men with torches.
They struck her down.
And for a heartbeat,
she thought that was the end.
---
But fate is cruel—
and strangely generous.
She woke days later.
Burned.
Broken.
Breathing.
The Violet Tide was ash.
Callan lay in a shallow grave.
And Lyra… gone.
They told her the child was taken.
Maybe drowned.
Maybe sold.
No one knew for sure.
---
That was the day Reyna Virell died.
Only ashes remained.
And from those ashes,
something darker rose.
> A name whispered on the wind.
A ship with black sails.
And a vow carved in flesh and flame:
"I will burn the sea before I let them forget me."