Tangled Crown Novels & Stories

We both moved out of car and with our back against each other we were surrounded by ten rogues and a man who rested on a tree like there leader of sort “What do you want?” I hissed while looking at him, knowing that the surrounding rogues moved like they were waiting for some kind of order from him. “Your crown” “What?!” He barked off the tree and walked towards me. “You heard me right, Queen. We want the crown, or you die trying to protect it” The crown belonged to Queen Iris, Dante's mother. It was worth more than anyone could think of and the crown in the wrong hands was trouble and there was no way I was giving them, especially not knowing whether they were working with Victor or not

“The witch is dead, her blood is gone, my father’s lab is next, we burn it, we break the rest of his work, you get your minds back.” Murmurs. Hope. Draven steps to me, careful. “The crown,” he says. “Can you take it off.” I touch it. It burns. “I don’t know.” “Try,” he says. “For me.” I pull. Pain rips through my skull, and the crown comes away, blood on the tines. It crumbles to ash in my hand. The ferals gasp, some falling, some crying, as if a string got cut.

“You should have seen the look on Tiffany’s face when they declared you the winner. Her mouth puckered like she was eating sour lemons.” Everyone snickers and settles down. Juliet takes the large crown with its glimmering rhinestones, places it over her head, and waves around her as if she’s waving at a real crowd. The crown is at least eleven and a half inches with a swirling heart pattern. A beautiful Waterford teardrop dangles in the center of it, gleaming with the light of the moon. Kell turns the crown on Juliet’s head, playfully tilting it to the side. “There you go. Now you have a gangsta crown.”

*"The Weavers lied. The Crown was never yours. It was *hers*." The truth detonated. The Crown wasn't a relic of the First Wolves. It was a fragment of the Rootmother herself, a seed planted to fester. And I'd let it take root. Jason's choking gasp snapped the thread. There was no choice, no victory-only sacrifice. I plunged my scarred hand into the nest of roots at my feet and unleashed the storm. --- The Crown screamed.

Gasps, shouts, steel drawn. “Don’t—” Elira started, but another stepped forward. A warrior this time. He seized the Crown with both hands and gritted his teeth. His muscles swelled with the effort of holding it, but then his eyes rolled back, and smoke bled from his mouth. He dropped, body charred from the inside out. The Crown didn’t move. It didn’t tumble. It sat perfectly upright, as if gravity obeyed it differently than the rest of the world. Zara’s jaw was clenched so tightly Elira thought she might crack a tooth. “This isn’t a trial. It’s a culling.”

Suddenly, there it was - amidst the riotous weather and foreboding wilderness - a shimmering glint caught my eye. Through the heart of the storm, nestled between the gnarled roots of an ancient oak was the Alpha's Crown, gleaming with an ethereal light that cut through the darkness. The Alpha's Crown – a legendary artifact of our kind, imbued with the collective strength of countless leaders. It was said to hold the essence of every pack leader who'd ever worn it. Now, it sat nestled between twisted roots, caught in the spectral dance of lightning that fractured the darkness every few moments. The crown was an intricate weave of silver and gold, studded with rare gems that glowed with ethere

The ground was carved very deeply. Vino stared up to where the poor individual fell. Tania looked down. There was demonic smile on her pale face. 'Tania!' She moved regally. She had a crown on her long braided hair. A crown made up of small bones of--children? Or babies? Her scepter was made of a leg bone of an animal. It had a shrunken head on the tip. Her gown was dirty white and splattered with red. Tania looked like a cannibal queen!

**Chapter 15: Thorns in the Crown** The spires of **Eldarhold** glinted under a pale winter sun, cold and sharp as the whispers that drifted through its marble halls. Deep beneath the Royal Citadel, the **Crown Tribunal** gathered — not in the public council chamber where laws were judged, but behind sealed bronze doors, far from the ears of the realm. The meeting room was circular, its domed ceiling painted with a celestial mural — twelve figures forming a broken ring. Eleven seats were filled. One remained forever empty.

"That crappy orchard your brother bought. It’s got quite a bit of rosemary in it. Ha! Not only has that dump never made a single dime, we still have to pay a crew to maintain it every year." A thought flickered in my mind. I knew that place. The orchard sat on a ruined silver mine, its trees drawing on the soil and the breath of silver for years, gaining a power to ward off evil. The Haunts came with the wind, but silver tamed the wind. Those trees were worth far more than my mother and brother could ever imagine. If my infant spirits had wielded weapons made from that wood, they would have been unstoppable.

I reached out— Just as the Eagle did. We moved in unison, shadows colliding. Both of our hands shot out but Phina’s roar ripped out of my chest, not ready to lose and then my fingers touched the crown. My heart skipped as my fingers curled around it first I got it…I got the crown!! Happiness filled my heart but suddenly the crown started melting in my hand. My smile disappeared. Why…why was it melting?