The Coastal Child. Tales of the Minted Realms, #1

*Tales of the Minted Realms: Volume One* follows Joey of Millhaven, a twelve-year-old half-elf druid raised by his herbalist grandmother on the edge of a quiet farming village. Barefoot and instinctively attuned to the natural world, Joey discovers an ancient hidden chamber beneath the local forest, an anchor stone keeping something vast asleep in the deep earth, and a conspiracy by the Crossfield Merchant Guild to exploit sacred druidic sites for their own ends.
Along the way he finds Mira, a fiercely self-sufficient girl living alone underground, whose practicality and quiet courage make her an indispensable companion. Together with her father Brennan, a conflicted Guild merchant named Aldric, and Cob - an old druid and thirty-year guardian of a sacred coastal well - Joey races to protect the Tidewell before the Guild can destroy it. The Tidewell recognises Joey as the first coastal druid in three hundred years and changes him permanently.
The Hollow is sealed. But six corrupted druid circles remain, their guardians turned against the land they were sworn to protect. The road ahead is long. The book closes warm and unhurried, with supper on the table and six names in a journal.