Prologue

Lady Xavia Blå Ashgrove and her goblin kill squad stepped casually over the shattered remnants of Tusmørke Castle’s gate. She smiled to herself. The battle had been short but brutal, the Estrisden forces surprised and overwhelmed within an hour. Lady Ash slowly approached the last of the defenders her Goblin escort spreading out around her. Lord Damien Blå Estrisden stood surrounded by the last of his household guard in what remained of a once beautiful courtyard. The battered guards stared in fear at the goblins as they flitted in and out of the shadows. Lord Estrisden glaring resolutely at her. His blue eyes shining in the lamplight. Ashgrove suddenly laughed. Months of planning and it was over so quickly. She almost felt cheated. A goblin extinguished the only lamp. The screams and yells began almost immediately and lasted only a moment. In the three beats it took for her talent to activate, all the soldiers were slain. Estrisden had backed away from the goblins. Using the destroyed masonory to control their numbers. His own talent allowing him to see. She was impressed and a little disgusted with his resolve. After taking his land, power and soon his life she had assumed he would give up. She would have enjoyed that.

Estriden almost chuckled. It was too ironic he had spent hours going over reports of the fae taking a hand in mortal affairs. He remembered snorting at the mere mention of goblins. Now they were here to kill him. Well... he decided his expression hardening they would try. Using his talent to boost his speed and strength he swung at the nearest goblin. The goblin danced out of reach and disappeared into shadow. Well that wasn’t strictly true. It created shadow. Even with his talent boosted vision he couldn’t penetrate the darkness. The goblin with a mad cackle returned his wild swing with a throwing knife. Which hurt. A lot. He could feel the blood begin running down his arm. Lady Ashgrove’s laugh still rang in his ears. In sheer anger and desperation he suddenly rushed at her. She never even drew her sword.

It was perhaps 4 seconds before he realised he was frozen. He stared in dismay at the unnaturally glowing sword portruding from his chest. It was slowly withdrawn and with it, his legs gave out. As he lay on the ground his last sight was a breathtakingly beautiful woman with pale white hair staring curiously at the growing puddle of blood. Holding a bloody sword.

Chapter 1

8 year old Aloys Lilla Estrisden sat silently in Castle Tusmørke’s safe room. He stared into the green eyes of his pet kitten and slowly stroked the midnight black fur. Twilight, the kitten, had sat quietly in his lap even as the screams and clashes of steel had grown louder over the last 2 hours. They had both been silent since Aloys’ father had given him a bag of food and told him to hide. At first Aloys had trembled in fear until that fear turned into boredom. Now the fear was returning as his child mind realised that his father was very likely dead and the battle lost. The room had been gradually getting colder even to the point that frost had spread over the walls, shining in the light of the rooms sole candle. There was a sudden foreboding silence, the room’s temperature dropped even further and Aloys shivered. Twilight pushed herself even closer to his warmth while the boy tried to warm his hand over the candle. The silence was unnatural, it was like the entire castle was holding its breath.

30 metres away through 2 stone walls a white haired women in a green dress watched as golden armoured soldiers tore apart Aloys’ room. The woman reverbated cold and the floor she stood on was covered in a sheen of frost. After 20 minutes of standing in absolute silence. She stepped backwards and slowly faded from sight. Daemi the Queen of Winter had left the mortal realm. The world released its breath and the noise of the world returned. After another several minutes of breaking possessions and furniture in their vicinity the golden armoured soldiers followed.

In the astral plane of the immortal realm a green eyed girl sat opposite a massive mirror. Her chest heaved from extertion and sweat slowly beaded on her forehead. It had been fortunate that Daemi had not stayed much longer. The effort of hiding the boy had drained her. On the floor beside her lay a portrait of 30ish year old women. At the bottom of the frame lay the name Anya Blå Estrisden.

It was two days before Aloys was brave enough to crawl out of the hiding space behind his wardrobe. Even with his mind fogged in shock and grief, the contemptuous desecration of his belongings struck out at him. The contents of his wardrobe lay strewn across his bedroom floor. At the realisaton that his mothers portrait was missing, the shock suddenly returned. With slow unsteady steps Aloys stepped over his unhinged door and began walking towards the castles courtyard. His unseeing eye ignored the bodies and blood, his steps unconsciously avoiding strewn limbs.

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His mind was a thick inpenatrible fog and inside it memories of his parents. Of better days. But his peace was constantly penetrated by shattering glimpses of the world around him. People he had loved lying dead on the ground while he moved progressively towards the courtyard. He mentally recoiled from these glimpses. Pulling the fog tightly around him. He clung tightly to one memory resonating stronger than all the rest. He had never been sure if it was real. It was a memory of a fairy singing him to sleep the night after his mother died. She was beautiful and tiny. Only three or four inches tall with dragonfly wings. Skin as dark as night with yellow eyes like stars. In the memory she sang and she sang and he heard it long after he fell asleep.

Aloys woke to a familiar mrow and head bump. Twilight was bumping her head into his cheek a little frantically. It was around noon the sun high in the sky but giving little warmth. He sat up and realised he was lying in a field, the castle was visible in the distance. He sat up in confusion, his hands groping the wet grass. He tried to remember how he got there but the night before was blank. All he could remember was the echo of the fairy’s song. His throat hurt. It burned with a strange intensity. Out of curiosity and some fear he tried to speak. It burned hotter than before, too hot for an 8-year-old. Tears formed at the corners of his eyes and his voice came out as less than a croak. One hand found the small leather and cotton bag of food his father had given him while the other hand stroked Twilight’s fur.

He sat for nearly an hour nibbling bread before the child inside him realised that nobody was coming to save him. That there was nobody left to come for him. With the decision made he started stumbling away from the castle and his home. By late afternoon he reached the North bank of the Teutoberg River and he stared into the vastness of Teutoberg Forest on the Southbank. His feet and legs ached. The quietness of the walk had left him frightened. He was old enough to realise that he was in very real danger but too young to be able to solve the problems. His instincts were telling him to flee the castle but the solitude and the nearness of the forest was rather terrifying. He remembered his father telling him it was the largest in Veldidena.

In the middle of winter, the river was incredibly fast flowing. As Aloys travelled East on the river bank he often saw trees and flotsam being swept past. Twilight spent most of the time nestled in the crook of his arm not wishing to get her fur wet in the damp grass. The boy and kitten would stop when his legs got sore or he felt like eating. His father had obviously thought ahead, the food in the bag was designed to last. The constant roar of the river was a comfort as it broke the dreaded silence. For Aloys, tears were barely held in check and he feared that if he released them he would fall back into shock or even worse, release the memories of the night before.

On the first night Aloys and Twilight sat shivering under a tree. He had been unable to start a fire no matter how hard he tried. On the second night he found the flint and steel his father had left him but he was unable to light the wet tinder. He woke coughing. On the third evening he had a roaring fire but a terrible cold. Looking into the blazing fire Aloys grinned in between coughs. Twilight mrow’d in concern and gave him a friendly head-butt. He burnt the bread he tried to toast. He ate it anyway and the grin never faded.

It was a week before he saw the first sign of civilization. A docking bay for river barges. It was obviously derelict whether this was because of the season or it was abandoned was unclear. Aloys took it as a hopeful sign although he was filled with trepidation about coming across people. Aloys was faced with a conundrum. He had only a vague idea where he was going. He had memories of following the river to the city of Florence on the East coast of the continent and that the city was downriver. Unfortunately, he had no idea how far it was. There is a big difference between a barge ride and the speed of 8-year-old walking. Three days later he came across the city of Luna.

He never would have even realised it was Luna unless there had been a massive signpost sitting neglected by the roadside. Luna was the home of Lady Sara Blå Domita. She was an ever smiling friend of his family. His mother’s best friend. She had spent a great deal of time at Castle Teutoberg but he had never visited Luna. He wanted to run into the city and fall into her arms. Let her solve all his problems. Aloys spent the evening in deep contemplation. Aloys realised the danger he was in, the danger he would put Lady Sara into. The problem was he had nowhere else to go. His plan to travel to Florence had truly been naïve. What would he have done when he got there. “What do you think Twilight?”, he whispered into her fur. The kitten gave him a quiet mrow in return. Aloys made camp for the night in copse of trees just out of sight of the city walls. He could hear the distant sounds of a bustling metropolis as he fell asleep.