The Chipped Crown is not a crown but a cult: pact-breakers, cast out of both Sun City and Moon City. They chisel slivers off the Tear and sell them as “sapphire that burns cold,” preach that the old Sultan was a jailer and the Seal a crime, and tax the quiet roads with speaking-stones. Every stolen shard is a crack in the cage of the Burning One.
You meet them in rising order: the criers and enforcers at the watch-posts, the diggers and the Gemcutter at the Kahf, and the Seer who went down to hear the Burning One. Their cry is “Kneel for the Chipped Crown!” You also meet their chisellers at the old ruin by the Dove Tower, and the Seer’s throne in the rifts.
Their cousins and their neighbours
- The Sons of the Ember: islanders of the Ember Isle, reached by ship, who believe the volcano must be fed a charcoal levy so the Ember King sleeps.
- The Dust-Knife raiders: ochre-bladed bandits who “tax” caravans on the middle roads.
- The plateau lords of the Whites: inherited titles, hence the numerals, each taxing every caravan below.
