The Grimmora Series, Book One (Prologue)

Long ago in the old days – in the forgotten days – there was but one world. People dwelled amongst mythical creatures, blending their mundane routines with those of witches, sorcerers, fairies, and beasts that can only be described as monsters sent from the darkest recesses of Hell. All of these beings coexisted in harmony from forest to seaside. There were no battles. There were no wars. But as is the case whenever somebody is deemed as ‘different,’ all of this eventually changed.

Around the time when the wheel became the wave for a new future, the mythical beings of the world grew tired of their human counterparts. People became so consumed with possibilities for the future that they began to forget about the past. They no longer cared about the trees because the trees could be used to make better homes. They no longer cared about the stars because they could work by the light of candles. They no longer cared for their world because they were so busy letting their world care for them. For the Old Ones, there could be no greater insult. The past was the present and the present was the future. That was the way it had always been and the way it always should be. Tired of the human way, the Old Ones devised a plan that would rid them of these self-serving creatures forever.

When the moon was full and the stars were aligned, the three oldest witches gathered beneath the night sky, letting the heavens and their fire guide them. At first they murmured separate chants, each witch in charge of her own critical portion of the spell. Queen Anyanka, the oldest of the witches, kept her eyes closed as she swept her hand up and down her handmade poppet that represented the humans. Diana, the middle witch, poured the blood of man, wolf, lamb, and every other innocent creature into a chalice, careful not to let a drop of blood hit the ground. Sophia, the youngest witch, mashed up a concoction of mandrake, angelica, and rosemary until her herbal mixture was just right.

As their individual chants came to a close, the witches spread themselves out in a triangular shape around the boiling cauldron, simultaneously dropping in the poppet, blood, and herbs as they began a new, louder chant together. The putrid smelling herbs mixed with the blood of every creature from the Old World like a perfectly timed recipe, smothering the poppet and inducing a fog as thick as the blood.

With their eyes burning from the fog and their voices raspy from their loud pleas to the gods, the witches verbally cast out the full-blooded humans in their world. Their chanting grew louder and their voices became like one. As their chant reached its crescendo, the three Old Ones picked up the bubbling cauldron and spilled its contents over the moss covered ground. The blood, herbs, and liquefied poppet remains seeped into the moss, dripping deeper and deeper into the earth.

When the last drop of blood stopped, so did the world.

With the humans completely unaware of what was about to happen, the ground began to rumble. Faintly at first and then more fiercely, the earth shook until it was covered by gaping holes. People from all corners panicked, convinced that the world was coming to an end. And it was. At least, the world they knew was.

Chaos erupted and people fled from their homes. But for every person who ran, there was just another hole to escape. The rips in reality grew larger by the second with zigzags of open earth following the terrified people. They could not outrun the cursed ground. They could not escape. One by one, all the people were engulfed by the world they no longer cared about. The ground swallowed them whole, eating up their screams along with their bodies.

As the last young girl frantically clawed at the dirt, she felt pieces of flesh rip from her petite hands, showering drops of crimson into the ever widening ground. With her hood dangling by the root of an Evergreen, she did everything in her power to keep her grasp on the world she knew and to climb back up. But the world she knew wanted her to disappear; and in a battle between humans and nature, humans rarely win. Unwilling to admit defeat, the small blonde freed herself of her binding cloak and tried to climb upwards. Her golden curls stuck to her sweat soaked forehead, making it hard for her to see, so she used her hands to guide her. She dug her nails so deep into the soil that they tore from her fingers, but still, she tried to climb. Then the gaping hole in the earth shook once more, and giving a final whimper of defeat, she had no choice but to spiral downwards.

And then there was nothing but silence.

The Old Ones crept out from their hiding places and watched with satisfaction as the holes in the ground closed. At a glance, it would appear that nothing had happened. That this was the way it had always been. The humans were gone and for the Old Ones, they were nothing more than a bad memory.

But in the true spirit of magic, no spell comes without consequences. What the Old Ones did not realize was that as that last little girl was sent to another dimension with the rest of the humans, her red cape stayed behind, still rooted to the earth – still rooted to the Old World. As the ground closed up around that little red cape, a loophole was formed. The essence of man had survived.

And as long as that essence was embedded in the Earth, the spirit of humans would still exist. For the past was the present and the present was the future – just as the Old Ones always thought they wanted.