The Last Crown of Eri Isle: A Tale of Love and Sacrifice

In the far North Sea, shrouded in mists and glistening with pale dawn light, lay the secretive Eri Isle, a land where valleys were soft gold and narrow bays glimmered like cut jewels. Merchants who brought silks and rare fruits could not dock easily, for the isle’s fog would hide it from the world. Instead, fair-haired islanders rowed to the waiting ships, exchanging produce for jewelry so intricate that traders wondered how human hands could craft such miracles.

The truth was that the people of Eri Isle were not just craftsmen; they were children of magic. For on this isle, the flowers hardened into gemstones upon being plucked, and the leaves turned into gold under moonlight. It was here that Princess Caramel, the bright-haired daughter of King Magnus, would often slip away from the palace into the fields, searching for adventure among the dew-kissed grasses.

One day, as sunlight scattered across the hills, she found a boy already resting on the soft grass, a bluebell in his hand. His eyes, clear as her own, looked up with a calmness that annoyed her at first, until he offered her the flower. As she held it, the blue petals hardened into sapphire, the stem turned to white gold, and she realized she had witnessed the isle’s deepest secret.

The boy, Clement, was the son of Donan Diamondflower, the island’s most skilled jeweler. As seasons turned, Caramel and Clement grew inseparable, exploring golden meadows where cows with gilded horns grazed, and climbing cliffs to watch waves break in sprays of liquid diamonds. Clement would gather flowers to bring to his father’s workshop, and in return, Caramel received jeweled pieces where she recognized the blossoms she had once held.

Over time, their friendship became a quiet, wordless love, unacknowledged by either, as Clement began working in the forge, shaping gold and weaving the flowers of the isle into necklaces and crowns that glowed with an inner light.

Yet tradition loomed over them like a gathering storm. When Caramel turned seventeen, King Magnus reminded her of her fate. She was betrothed from infancy to Prince Ulrik of Arland Isle, a fierce warrior who would secure Eri’s safety with his sword in exchange for Caramel’s hand. The marriage was to take place when she turned eighteen.

But Caramel, blessed with the blood-given magic of her maternal line, saw glimpses of Ulrik’s soul through the iron betrothal ring on her finger: a man of cruelty, driven by greed for gold, whose smile was sharp and cold. She devised a plan.

Standing before her father, Caramel demanded a crown made from diamond roses, the rarest treasure of Eri Isle, as her wedding adornment, knowing the roses were thought extinct. King Magnus sighed, but fearing his daughter’s threat to burn herself in shame, he announced to the jewelers of the isle that whoever crafted the crown would have any wish granted.

That night, Caramel found Clement and told him of the bargain, whispering that she would never marry Ulrik, that she loved Clement, even if the world would not allow them to be together. Clement, however, said nothing, retreating into a silence heavy with resolve.

In secret, he sought the Diamond Roses, climbing the mist-veiled slopes of Mount Brann. Guided by ghostly will-o’-the-wisps and the ancient saying of his grandfather, “In fire and light, blooms the diamond,” he discovered a hidden cave aglow with warm light, where crystalline roses bloomed under layers of mountain crystal, kissed by eternal sunset and guarded by the hush of ancient magic.

On Caramel’s eighteenth birthday, while the palace echoed with music and laughter under golden lanterns, Clement returned, holding the diamond rose crown wrapped in cloth. Before the king and nobles, he unveiled it, its light illuminating every face with cold, radiant beauty.

As the hall fell silent, King Magnus, delighted, asked Clement to name his wish.

Clement fell to one knee, voice trembling yet firm. “O King, my wish is to take Princess Caramel as my wife.”

Shock rippled through the court. Nobles protested, reminding the king that a princess of Eri had never wed anyone but a prince of war. But Caramel stood, her voice clear, declaring she would honor her father’s promise, that she would marry Clement.

Magnus, caught between promise and tradition, tried to twist the bargain. He demanded Clement bring him the Crown of White Light, a mythical artifact said to grant infinite power, promising that only then would he consent.

Caramel’s face fell as Clement, pale and determined, promised to find it, casting a final, aching look at her before departing the isle under cover of night.

The crown did not exist, but Caramel’s father believed this impossible quest would rid them of the boy forever.

Not long after, King Magnus died, and Caramel, alone and grieving, was crowned Queen of Eri. The first act of her rule was to break her betrothal to Prince Ulrik, inciting his rage. Soon, Ulrik’s black-sailed ships were sighted on the horizon, bringing war to Eri Isle.

Caramel, using her birthright magic, stood atop the North Watch Tower, prepared to cast herself into the sea if her people fell. But as Ulrik’s forces invaded, Caramel’s voice rose to the moon and the winds:

“O my sister Moon, help me in this noon!
O my brother Wind, your brisk breath I need!
O my sister Frost, lives are at the cost!”

Moonlight flooded the isle as frost and wind wove a veil of cold light across the land, transforming Eri into a frozen phantom realm of diamond towers and streets of silent ice. The invading warriors found themselves in a city of ghosts, their swords shattering against the diamond-forged blades of Eri’s defenders, and many perished, frostbitten, lost in the enchanted silence of Caramel’s sacrifice.

But the cost was high. Caramel’s hair turned silver, and fear of her magic spread among her people. She walked the streets cloaked, unrecognized, peering into windows, longing for the warmth of a home she could never reclaim.

One evening, unable to bear the whispers of her people, she fled to the Diamond Wood, seeking solace among the transparent pines, the only beings who seemed to understand her sorrow. In grief and desperation, she begged the pines to take her, and the magic of the isle answered her plea, transforming her into a diamond pine, her tears forever frozen in the cold wind.

It was then that Clement returned, the Crown of White Light in his hands, forged in distant lands with the power of a promise. He learned of Caramel’s disappearance and King Magnus’s death, and hearing that Ulrik planned to claim Eri’s treasures, Clement, with tears in his eyes, shattered the Crown of White Light upon the shores of Eri, releasing a wave of brilliant light that swallowed the sea and sank Ulrik’s fleet, protecting the isle one last time.

The next morning, the sea was calm, the sky clear, and the waves whispered ancient songs of love, loss, and sacrifice, as Eri Isle stood quietly under the sun, its golden grass shimmering in the breeze, waiting for the return of those who would remember the queen who gave everything, and the boy who loved her beyond all else.