Origins and the Stone Heart

The legend

In the beginning there was only the Heart, a great stone that lived and beat, and around it nothing. The Heart grew tired of the dark, and it did the only thing it could: it broke. The largest piece became Mount Cinder, and the fire in it is the Heart's last warmth. The pieces that fell and rolled became the Cinder Highlands, the Eastern Peaks, and the Western Forest March. Where the Heart bled, the Silvershine ran. Where its last beat fell, a hollow filled with water and became Lake Aurelia, gold at evening because it remembers the light inside the stone.

The smallest pieces, the shards, were too many to count. They fell into the valleys and grew warm, and from them came the first Luxians. That is why the Luxian word for heart is cheska and the smallest coin of the Realm is the Shard, and why the motto of the Realm is Cheska Ovar: the Heart endures, in the mountain, in the river, and in every Luxian.

Where the legend lives

• Mount Cinder. The shrine at its base, where the Heart is said to have broken, is the sacred site of the Realm. Luxians leave a small stone there before a long journey and take one home when they return.
• The Cathedral of the Stone Heart in Valdoria, built over a spring said to rise from a fallen shard.
• The Winter Solstice. On the longest night the Realm climbs the mountain with torches to keep the Heart warm, and eats together in Valdoria because the Heart broke itself so as not to be alone.
• The Shard, one hundredth of a Luxfranc.

The legend and the record

The Royal Archives hold the legend as the Luxians tell it and make no claim about its age. Zevi the Great knew it well; he placed the Cathedral, the Charter Square, and the reading stone in a line that points at Mount Cinder, and the Sentinels' oath and the anthem both end on the Heart. The founder built the Realm inside the story on purpose.