Prologue to Fantasy Novel

                                                      Prologue

    Mud covered every area of her and much of the baby, though she had tried to shield it as much as she could.  At least it covered the blood flowing from the gash on her leg.  Someone might stop her and ask questions if they saw the wound.  She limped as fast as she could down the street, the rain pounding at her back and smoke from the fires stinging her eyes.  The baby’s cries were muffled in the cacophony from around the city.  Cassry’s troops were inside the walls and she held cargo worth as much to them as the city was.  A couple of soldiers jogged past her, but paid her little attention.  She had not been sure whether to stay on a main route, but after seeing several other women raped in the alleys where they were seeking sheltered paths to their homes, the decision had been made for her.  The glow from fires silhouetted the buildings everywhere in the city, so much that she was afraid everything would be burnt down, but the glow was brightest where she was headed.  Embers flew by her as she turned a corner and faced the harbor.
    Half submerged ships leaned on their sides in the water.  The fires consuming them were raging and whipping in the wind.  Even the pouring rain could not dampen the glare of the harbor inferno within the night sky.  There were some skirmishes still taking place on the docks, but from what she could see, the enemy had already made their way farther into the city.  She was close.  Her bare feet slapped heavy in the mud as she turned and took the street opposite of the one leading down to the harbor.  She was lucky that the enemy was focused on getting to the castle.  Her hope had been that the enemy would go for it first instead of securing the walls and her instinct had been correct.  Of course, Lord Cassry’s forces were small, relative to the country’s army.  The royal family would be slain though, of that she was sure.  The army could begin a siege upon their return if they chose, but without an obvious heir, the other Lords would not support the army.  After that, there would be no one strong enough to claim the throne from Cassry.  She knew Master Commander Sa’lay would be forced to submit to Cassry, whether he wanted to or not.  Perhaps Cassry would even spare his life for turning over control of the army without an armed conflict.  Maybe.
    Blackness enveloped her as she slipped out of an unguarded servant’s door in the city wall.  There was little chance that one of Cassry’s soldiers would be outside the walls right then, but she still ducked down and stumbled into the drainage ditch beside the road.  The glow from above the city walls allowed her to make her way across the cleared fields to the trees at the other end.  She knew the paths here by heart, having played here often as a child.  She picked her way through the trees, ripping her clothes as she brushed by thorn trees and doing her best to keep the child’s cries muffled within her bosom.  She heard bells from within the city, signaling that the castle had been breached and that all available soldiers needed to regroup there.  Cassry was efficient if nothing else.  Tearing away from a final thorn tree, she stopped at the bank of the river.  She could see little, but that was on purpose.  Torches were too dangerous, even when the battle was centered in the city and there was a forest between here and there.  She placed her fingers up to her mouth and made a series of short, multi-toned whistles.  Chances were that even a whistle wouldn’t be heard over the wind, but if a scout or rear-guard had heard it, they would have interpreted it as a call from one of the native water creatures.  Even if they realized that those creatures burrowed into the mud during heavy rains, they would have a hard job in finding where the whistle originated from.  She stopped and listened, looking around at the little she could see.  Her body twitched when a hand slipped over her mouth and she felt the cold metal of a daggers edge slide up against her neck.  Another set of hands took the baby from her.
    “My mother was a barren boar and yet here I stand tonight…” a rough voice whispered into her ear.  The hand loosened its grip around her mouth.  She struggled to catch her breath, but managed to respond.
    “Should she have met a fruitful bastard, you might not live yet…”
    The hand left her mouth completely and the dagger was pulled away from her neck.  She turned and faced the attacker.  A large bearded man stood in front of her, cloaked, with two other cloaked men to either side of him.  She relaxed, but only a slightly.
    “Simune, thank the Guardian!  I had hoped that you were able to escape the city.  I was close to being trapped when they sealed the castle walls.  I wasn’t even able to bring provisions for the child.”  She swayed a bit as exhaustion from the flight to the river overwhelmed her.  Simune grabbed her and held her up.
    “You can relax now my wife.  The little one is safe for the moment, but we must be off.”  He hoisted her over his shoulder and turned to the other men.  “I know it would be hard for you two to abandon your country and city, but you know the importance of this child.  Yet, I must give you this one last chance to stay and defend your home.”
    The man to Simune’s left stepped forward and grabbed his shoulder.  “Kindness guides your words, my old friend, but even if duty did not bind me to this child, I would follow you to the depths of the Myre.”  The other man placed his arm across his stomach and bowed.
    “I too shall remain bound to my duty.”
    Simune nodded.  “Then until dawn throws light upon a country not infested with a bastard king, we shall not step foot within sight of the city again.”
    Simune waited as the two men dragged a small boat from out of the brush and held it securely in the water.  He stepped into the boat and laid his now unconscious wife in the bow before taking a place with the oars.  The other two men climbed in and the last pushed off from the shore.  Simune started to row.  He uttered a soft prayer to the Guardian for guidance and the safety of the group.  The boat slipped into the night; the rain erasing any trace that anyone had ever been on the bank.

*                                        *                                        *
    The cavern was bright with the illumination of the ceremony.  The veins of Forging were being molded to bring forth the Dark Ones.  He wished he could be part of the ceremony, but time had placed the mantle of authority upon his shoulders.  With that authority came the responsibility to oversee these ceremonies, to make sure that the right proportions were used and that the proper timings were observed.  He sighed.  The prophecies seemed to indicate that he and those who followed the Midnight sect would have their reward soon.  The prophecies, of course, were always prone to misinterpretation.  One of the men he was watching forged too much earth into the crux.
      “Fool!  Do you have eyes?  It seems you do, thus, you must instead be missing a mind!”  The wright this tirade was directed towards adjusted the amount of Earth he was forging in order to balance the difference.  “Good, now keep your focus before the Overseer decides we’re too incompetent and denies us our place in the Myre!”  The man did not even flinch.  He just kept forging.  Pathetic simpleton.  These ceremonies are the foundation of the Elevation!  They must be precise or the links will not come together.  The wrights had been forging for almost half of the day, but he met excuses with no tolerance.  He had once forged for two days straight and never once did he lose his concentration.  It was true that he had had to lie in bed weak as a newborn for two weeks afterwards, but he had still done his job.  The door at the end of the cavern swung open and a messenger hurried in, holding a rolled scroll.  He knew it had to be important.  Orders had been given that the ceremony was to be disturbed under no circumstances.  The messenger had full authority as well, else he would have been incinerated the moment he touched the door.  He walked towards the man and met him near the entrance.
    The messenger immediately fell to his knees and extended his arms towards him.  “Forgive me master, but this message was given to me to deliver under penalty of torture and admittance to the living Myre.  I do not know who the sender is.” 
    The master took the scroll from the man’s outstretched hands.  The messenger had kept his eyes lowered, as his rank dictated, but now dared a glance upwards to see if he could catch an indication about who the message may have come from.  Under normal circumstances, he would have had the man flogged for such a departure from position requirements.  However, he could not leave the cavern chamber unattended and the message intrigued him.  He waved his hand at the messenger.  “You may leave.  Serve he who promises you the world for your kingdom and alter not your path to the Elevation.”  The messenger placed his head upon the ground.
    “Yes master.  May the Overseer guide us all.”  He stood and hurried back through the door, knowing he was lucky to get away with the breach in protocol.
He looked at the seal on the scroll.  It was one of the generic seals meant to mislead anyone who happened to intercept the message, one failsafe out of several.  He cracked the seal and opened the message.  On the surface, it looked like nothing more than a rather indecent letter from a soldier to his mistress.  Forging a vein of earth in with a vein of ether and flame, he touched the message with the crux.  A series of changes occurred on the scroll, transforming the letters into a picture of an owl clutching a jeweled crown within its talons.  This was the real seal and he now understood why the door had allowed the message in.  He forged another vein of ether, but this time touched the owl’s eye with the crux.  Again the ink on the scroll transformed and turned back into words and phrases.  It only read:

                          Blood runs dry, yet a trickle remains.  Hasten the faith.  The
                          Spider remains in her web.    Alter not.
         
    The master forged one last time and the scroll fell to dust.  The incompetence runs thick tonight.  It seems though, that I will get to forge in the ceremony tonight despite my responsibilities.  He smiled as he climbed the path to the outcrop overlooking the center of the ceremony.  Hastening the ceremony would result in several flaws in the Dark Ones, but the prophecies were interpreted by almost all to show the same thing.  If a trickle of the blood were to remain, certain ceremonies must be complete by the rising of the full moon, else the foundation would crack.  The flaws would create considerable weakness, but compared to the halt of the Elevation, they were nothing.  He raised his arms and all of the wrights paused their forging.
    “There has been a change in our plans brothers.  A trickle remains and as such, we must complete this ceremony before the moon rides the highest point of the sky.  You all know the procedures, but follow my lead.”  The wrights all nodded.  While it was not possible to actually speed the process of the forging, certain parts of the forging could be foregone and others could be left unrefined.  It took a Master Wright to determine these areas with skill and with the most efficiency.  He pulled a crimson, crystalline disc from the leather pouch on his side and slipped his fingers into the leather straps on its back.  Though he knew how it functioned, it always amazed him that though the disc appeared translucent from both sides, the images it showed were not those it was surrounded by.  Instead of seeing the palm of his hand through the front, he saw what looked to be a clear forest pool.
    The master held the disc over the outcrop and began forging an intricate series of veins into the crux.  The wrights around the crux altered their forging accordingly.  Arcs of light began to twist around the crux and fog began to emanate from it.  Shadows that were not from anything present within the cavern began to flit across the walls.  From somewhere within the vast abyss of the Myre, the deep vibrations of a humming sound began to shake the room.  They were coming.