Storm

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A long time ago—when the stars still argued over who should shine the brightest—there was an island in the Sea of a Thousand Currents, a mountainous shape cloaked in mists and crowned in storms. Its name was Aetherhold, though few dared to speak it aloud. Steep cliffs shielded it from invaders, and deep reefs whispered warnings to any ship that strayed too close. But behind those jagged walls, Saltreach endured—a city carved from black stone and lit by the molten breath of a sleeping volcano.

Yet life in Saltreach was not always kind.

The city, once proud and rich with craft and magic, had fallen under the rule of kings who loved only coin. Gold was piled in towers while the streets crumbled. Hungry mouths were ignored for the sound of new treaties signed with blood-stained ink. The cliffs wept with smoke, not rain, and the sea carried more bodies than ships. The old court ruled from their palace high atop the bluff, far above the cries of those below. They called it order. The people called it a cage.

But in the heart of that storm, a fire took root—not in the forge, but in a dragon named Ghassan. He was not born noble, but neither was he quiet. With grit in his scales and fury in his veins, he saw what Saltreach had become—and refused to let it remain. His rebellion began not with thunder, but with whispers: in alleyways, in smithies, in the mouths of dragons too tired to hope. And when the time came to rise, rise they did.

At Ghassan’s side stood a dragon whose name still carries the weight of wind and wisdom—Saffiyeh, once a princess of Tidehollow, where philosophy shaped empires and magic was as common as breath. She chose Ghassan not out of duty, but conviction, leaving behind silk-draped halls for firelit war councils. Together, they toppled the crown that had ruled Saltreach from shadowed heights, and placed in its stead something fiercer: a kingdom forged by choice, not lineage.

Saltreach is different now.

It is still wild. Still storm-swept. Still perched on the edge of the world, where salt and stone and magic mingle. But its people walk taller. The Stormwake Palace, once a fortress of greed, now hums with life—council halls, gardens, libraries, forges, all open to the wind and the will of the dragons who built them.

They say Saltreach remembers everything: the cruelty, the fire, the rising tide of change. It remembers the scholar who stayed to teach, the smith who forged revolution in secret, the sailor who lit the lighthouse for those lost at sea. Dragons like Godric, whose family helped turn the old court inside out. Dragons like Aquilo, born to the gilded halls but who chose the streets. Dragons like Sage and Onyx, who followed the Queen across the sea and brought stories to the shelves of a new home.

Now, traders, wanderers, outcasts and artists arrive by sail and storm alike. Some come seeking answers. Some come seeking sanctuary. All find something in Saltreach.

Because here, the tide doesn't just carry things away.
It carries them home.