The Theft

One of the jewels went missing.

No door was broken. No guard was killed. Nothing was disturbed and nothing was demanded. The jewel was simply gone, and the sea knew before anyone in the palace did.

The tide came in when it should have gone out. Fishermen drowned in calm weather. A harbour that had held for six hundred years emptied overnight and never filled again.

Inside the palace, 2,222 dragon gods stood in a hall built for one throne and understood the same thing at the same moment. Nothing enters that water without being seen. Nothing leaves it either.

The jewel did not walk away on its own.