The Prince spent hours beside him.
They talked.
Not enough to recover seven years.
Nothing could.
The Prince learned his father had escaped the Black Star through a sea cave after surviving the mutiny.
He reached the capital secretly because he no longer knew whom to trust.
The Regent intercepted him.
The King realized too late that his oldest adviser had orchestrated everything.
Before capture, he hid his seal behind the bronze sun and sent his bow toward the Old Archer through a servant.
That servant disappeared.
The King had never known whether the message succeeded.
“Why the symbols?”
The King smiled.
“You liked puzzles.”
“I was eight.”
“You were irritating at eight.”
“I’m nearly thirteen now.”
“Terrifying.”
The Prince grinned.
Then became serious.
“Why didn’t you surrender the Oath Stone?”
The King looked toward the sea.
“Because the Regent wanted its roads.”
“For war?”
“For control.”
The King explained.
The Founders’ Roads connected grain vaults, mountain tunnels, naval caves, emergency wells, and hidden passages across the kingdom.
They had been built centuries earlier so rulers could move food and people during invasion.
In the wrong hands, they could also bypass every city wall.
The Regent intended to control the kingdom permanently.
Not through a crown.
Through infrastructure.
Through hunger.
Through fear.
The Prince thought of the traitorous sailor whose family had been threatened.
“He likes making people obey without appearing to force them.”
The King looked at him.
“Yes.”
The boy understood then why his mother had feared the Regent more than open enemies.
Open enemies needed armies.
The Regent needed only leverage.
Back in the capital, the Queen had problems of her own.
Three days after the Prince sailed, the Regent’s allies announced that the royal ship had sunk.
They produced witnesses.
Debris.
Even a torn piece of the Prince’s brown cloak.
The city panicked.
The Regent returned secretly through another route.
He appeared before the council wearing mourning black.
“The Queen has lost husband and son.”
The Queen sat motionless.
The Regent bowed.
“For the stability of the kingdom, she must step aside.”
The Queen looked at the cloth placed before her.
Her son’s cloak.
She touched it.
Then smiled.
The council stared.
The Regent frowned.
“What?”
The Queen lifted the fabric.
“This is not his.”
Silence.
“You expect us to believe—”
“My son tears every cloak at the right shoulder because he hooks the clasp incorrectly.”
She turned the cloth.
Perfect seam.
“He has done it since he was seven.”
The Regent’s jaw tightened.
The Queen stood.
“If you intend to forge my child’s death, at least learn how badly he dresses.”
Several council members laughed.
The Regent did not.
His coup slowed.
But it did not stop.
He controlled grain officers.
Three city gates.
Half the treasury guard.
Then winter stores began disappearing.
Bread prices doubled.
Riots began.
The Queen recognized the strategy.
Hunger.
Leverage.
She opened the palace granaries.
The Regent’s faction claimed she was wasting emergency reserves.
She opened them anyway.
She sold half her personal jewelry to purchase grain from southern merchants.