CHAPTER 56: THE NEW CHARTER
News of the hidden letters spread faster than spring wildfire. Within a week, riders were arriving at Black Rock from every corner of the region — from small valleys we had never visited, from holdfasts that had once sworn loyalty to the old keepers, from trading posts and river crossings and isolated homesteads. They came not to fight or to negotiate, but to see the documents for themselves, to ask questions, and to help shape what would come next. For three generations, people had been told that the past was fixed, that loyalty was absolute, and that only a chosen few were fit to lead. Now they saw that even the founders had disagreed, that even the most sacred rules had been debated, and that power was never something given to a small group by right — it was
