Prologue

.......The chill air of late autumn rushed past Aiden's ears as he ran, but he hardly noticed it over the pounding of his heart, and the burning muscles in his legs as he gasped for each breath. His dark, shoulder length hair streamed behind him as he sprinted through long grass that came up past his knees. The tree line ahead was rapidly approaching, and all of his attention was focused on reaching it before he was overtaken. He felt his strength flagging, but spurred himself onward for one last burst of speed before he crashed through the undergrowth and staggered to a halt. Turning to look behind him, Aiden grinned breathlessly at his pursuer, who had apparently been unable to keep up with him.
......."You owe me a copper, Pace!" the young man called out between breaths. "I told you turning thirteen makes all the difference!"
.......His friend, Pacian, merely waved dismissively at him, probably not wanting to waste his breath on yelling over the twenty yards that remained between them. It had been Pace's idea to skip their chores in favour of something more entertaining. Aiden had turned thirteen this very day, and although not overly fond of work, he didn't feel that running out on his family was entirely honourable. Pace had been very persuasive. A few months younger than Aiden, the two boys had been friends since they were little, a source of some concern to his parents as Pacian had a knack for getting into trouble and generally liked Aiden to be there when it happened.
.......Pacian slowly walked the final few yards to the tree line, taking the time to tidy up his short blond hair and absently brush non-existent dirt from his tunic. "I let you win, since it's your birthday," he explained. "If it was any other day I wouldn't have had a problem with beating you."
.......Aiden grinned, knowing that Pacian's pride wouldn't permit him to admit defeat. But he decided to play along with his little fiction, to spare his feelings. "Yeah you were beating me over the first fifty yards or so, but then you dropped back. I thought you might have gotten a stitch or something,"
......."All part of the plan!" Pace declared, grinning broadly. "Happy birthday!"
......."This is what you're getting me? Letting me win a race?"
......."A finer gift than what anyone else is going to get you - the feeling of victory."
.......Aiden laughed, dropping the subject. Pace was always good at making up plausible lies when pressed, something Aiden never could manage. The few times he had tried to cover up something when explaining to his parents had ended in disaster - and more work as punishment.
......."Anyway, I suppose we should get back now. If we stay away much longer I'm going to be missed, and I don't want to get in trouble today."
......."Okay," replied Pace, "But I wanted to show you something first. Come on, follow me." Pacian started walking into the forest, evaporating Aiden's light mood in an instant.
......."But that's the Cairnwood," he protested. "We're not supposed to go in there." Pace looked around innocently at the trees and shrugged.
......."I don't see anything dangerous about trees, do you?"
......."Somehow I think there's something in there besides trees that might be dangerous, Pace."
......."Such as?"
.......Aiden was at a loss. All his parents had ever told him was that Cairnwood was a dangerous place, and sometimes people who go in there never come out again. But he was never told anything specific, like if they were eaten by bears or ghosts.
......."Look, we're only going in a little way," Pace continued, "And I've never seen anything that you could call dangerous."
......."How often have you been in there?"
.......Pace shrugged absently. "A dozen times maybe. I don't really keep count. Hey, you're not scared are you?"
.......Despite knowing better, Aiden was thirteen now, practically a man, and would not stand for being called a coward. "Of course not. If you say there's nothing to be afraid of, then let's go."
.......Pace beamed, then turned and walked into the forest, with Aiden close behind him. For nearly twenty minutes they walked into the forest, their footsteps muffled by the fallen oak leaves of late autumn that lay scattered on the soft grass. For a place that was forbidden to them, Cairnwood seemed like a pleasant place indeed. The wind blew gently through the boughs, and the sounds of birds could be heard in the distance, all contributing to a sense of peace. Aiden was about to ask how much further they had to go when he suddenly felt the sensation of floating in the air, quickly followed by an explosion of pain on his chin that stunned him.
.......The next few seconds were a blur as he tumbled and crashed downwards, before finally coming to a stop on a hard rocky surface. Bewildered, Aiden struggled to clear his head to figure out what had just happened. The daylight had disappeared, except for a small shaft that came from above to pierce the darkness around him. Gasping from the pain in various places on his body, Aiden nonetheless recognised that he had fallen down a hole of some sort.
......."Aiden! Aiden are you okay?" Pace called from above. Slowly, Aiden lifted himself onto his shaky legs, pleased to find that he hadn't broken any bones in his fall.
......."Uh, yeah I think so," he called back to his friend, whose face he could see hovering over the hole above him. Aiden judged it to be around twenty feet straight up. Tentatively, he touched the walls with his hands but was met with nothing but loose dirt and rocks for hand holds on the wall. "I don't think I can climb back out Pace. Go and get help!"
.......Pacian hesitated. "You sure? You want to give it a try?"
......."Yes! Go get help!"
.......Again Pace hesitated. "How about I go and get some rope?"
.......Aiden found his friend's seeming reluctance baffling, until it dawned on him that they had ditched their chores and entered Cairnwood - and Pace was responsible. Knowing his friend, he wasn't about to own up to any wrongdoing, unless Aiden was in real danger. Apparently falling down a hole and injuring himself didn't qualify.
......."Okay go and get some rope then, but hurry!"
.......Pacian sprung into action. "I'll be back before you know it. Wait here!"
.......Aiden groaned inwardly at the poor attempt at humour, but at least help was on the way now. The young man resigned himself to spending nearly an hour down in the hole. Aside from the light streaming in from above, there was only blackness before him. Now that he was thinking a little more clearly, he could feel that he was leaning up against one side of the hole, but that he wasn't trapped up against the other side.
Stretching out his arm, he felt nothing.
.......What he had thought was a hole had in fact turned out to be some sort of cave. He slowly crouched down, still leaning against the wall behind him and tried not to think of the things that could be lurking out there in the darkness. His aches and pains were gradually subsiding, and for nearly half an hour he sat there, shaking slightly from the cold and the fear. The sun was well past it's peak now, and the angle of the light streaming down to him was changing, and it was becoming darker. Aiden fought rising panic as each second of waiting seemed to last forever.
.......In the deepening gloom before him, Aiden thought he saw something. His breath caught in his throat, and he peered ahead, trying to see better. As his head moved, the young man noticed it again - a glowing light somewhere in front of him. It wasn't really moving, and didn't seem to look like anything threatening. Aiden had heard of fungus that glowed in the dark, and he figured that's what it was. Leaning forward, he judged that it was only a few yards away. Crawling forward to feel the ground in front of him, he slowly inched his way towards the faint light.
.......There was a lot of loose dirt and small rocks on the ground, but underneath that, a smooth, solid surface could be felt. His curiosity overcoming his fears for the moment, the young man could only assume this was an old mine shaft, but had never heard of mines anywhere near Coldstream, his home town that lay no more than two miles away.
.......Avoiding the worst of the sharp rocks, Aiden reached the source of the dim blue light. It was coming from the floor before him, and was no bigger than his fist. It seemed to be emanating from something metallic, but it was hard to tell in the darkness. Slowly, he moved his right hand close to the light, and felt around to try and figure out what the object was. He dusted away some loose dirt, and reached over with his other hand to grasp the object. The instant his fingers closed upon it, his world changed.
.......The darkness of the cave was replaced with the near-blinding light of midday. Squinting against the sudden brightness, he gaped in astonishment at the sudden change. The young man crouched on a snowy plateau, looking upon a scene from his worst nightmares.
.......He stood amongst a great battle, with armoured men wearing the tabard of the Kingdom clashing against hooded and robed warriors, with signs of steel armour hidden underneath their garb - though they looked like some sort of priestly army, they were heavily armed and armoured. Bodies from both sides of the battle littered the landscape, and the ringing of steel and the cries of the combatants threatened to overwhelm Aiden's shocked senses.
.......His mind struggled to comprehend what had happened to him when one of the Kingdom soldiers suddenly ran through him, appearing our of his chest as though he were insubstantial. Gasping with surprise, Aiden looked down at his body, wondering if he had perhaps died and become a ghost, when he noticed that the ground he was standing on was quite clearly that of the cave he had been in. His mind raced, trying to comprehend whatever this strange magic was, but the events unfolding around him appeared too real to ignore.
.......The black-robed assailants, as if hearing some sort of order, disengaged from the fight and pulled back down the road to Aiden's left. They quickly disappeared below the horizon, apparently down the side of this mountainous terrain to regroup. Some of the defenders gave a weak cheers, but most of them appeared to be steeling themselves for something else. Something... worse. For the first time, Aiden noticed a large fort to his right, with stone walls fifteen feet high that stretched across the field behind the defenders. These walls were lined with archers, and some kind of siege machines that were loaded with massive bolts of wood and steel.
....... One man in particular stood out among the others, dressed in shining armour, and appeared to be in command of the Kingdom forces. He pointed across the field to where the attackers had fled, and as if on queue, the ground started to shake as if from heavy footsteps. Aiden felt all this as if he were standing right there amongst it all, but the soldiers around him didn't appear to be able to see him.
.......The shaking of the ground grew more intense until the head of some armoured creature appeared, revealing more of it's body the closer it came. It was easily over twelve feet in height, with shoulders eight feet across and encased completely in ornate armour. It gleamed with the appearance of burnished steel, and was fearsome to behold. The face on the front of the helmet was forged into an expression of haughty superiority – as if those it was about to crush were beneath it's notice.
.......It was joined by another, and another of the massive creatures, and a cry of despair arose from the defending soldiers. A shouted order came from the walls, and the siege engines unleased their fearsome bolts, which struck the first huge armoured being square in the chest. A dent appeared in the fine armour, but it did not stop it's relentless march to the walls.
.......The defenders held their swords and pikes nervously, and it appeared that their morale was about to break, when a rallying cry came from one of their number - a huge man dressed in black armour, with a great horned helm leaped to the front, wielding a massive two-handed axe that glowed with power. The mighty warrior swung his weapon at first the armoured opponent that loomed over him, and sheared one of it's legs cleanly, the deafening sound of tortured metal echoing over the field. The great armoured foe, unsupported, crashed to the ground, where the mighty axe wielding warrior swept it's head off in one stroke. Aiden recoiled, expecting to see blood gushing forth from the terrible injury, but was shocked to see none.
.......With the fall of the first of these behemoths, the rest of the defenders roared their battle cries and charged into the fray. The black-armoured warrior was the only one that was truly effective against these opponents, however, and the other men could only delay the massive armoured creatures with their lives.
After a few minutes of untold bloodshed, only the black warrior remained to defend the castle, and he faced off against the last of the armoured creatures alone. This one was different to the others though – shorter by several feet and wielding a great glowing sword in one of it's hands.
....... A small mountain of bodies surrounded them, and neither warrior could gain an advantage over the other. Aiden, clutching the glowing orb, could not look away from the fight as the two titanic figures clashed. The metal creature seemed to be fighting differently to the others that had fallen, and the black warrior was hard-pressed to keep the monster at bay.
.......A shadow grew over the battlefield as something obscured the sun. Aiden squinted against the light to see what was happening, and was stunned by what he saw. An immense silver dragon was descending onto the battlefield, it's wingspan easily over a hundred feet across. Talons the size of a man dug into the ground as it crashed to the surface behind the black warrior. Both combatants ceased their fighting as the dragon reared up on it's hind legs, dominating the scene before them.
.......Then, unexpectedly, the dragon turned it's great head to look directly at Aiden. The young man, bewildered by the shocking events he had witnessed, froze, his eyes locked with that of the dragon. The moment passed, and the great beast turned it's attention to the combatants before it. Suddenly, there was a white flash, and a blast of wind sucked Aiden off his feet, causing him to fall forward. Reflexively, he reached out his hands to stop his fall, and dropped the glowing orb, shattering it upon the ground of the cave. In the ensuing darkness, Aiden could see nothing, and heard only the desperate beating of his heart.

(C) 2008 Stephen Louis Nowland

More to come in the near future!