Prologue

I don't know what you've heard before from Robert or Finn, but it's time for me to get this story straight. If you haven't heard it yet, then good—you'll be the first to know the truth. Not Robert's glorified version where he's the majestic hero, no, no, no. This is the real story.

The story of how a boy who came from nothing gained the world, and lost it just as fast.

It's quite the tale, really. One that will be told for centuries, whispered in taverns and sung in halls, written in books with grand titles like The Fall of an Age or The Boy Who Dared to Dream. But before all that, before the legends and the embellishments, it was just life. Hard, hungry, and cold.

And it all began in a little village by the name of Truntle in the far north corner of Barathrum.

Now, Barathrum was a strange place, much like its name—a land that seemed carved out of silence and shadow. That's not to say it was empty, oh no. There were mountains that clawed at the sky, rivers that ran silver in the moonlight, and forests so deep you could wander for weeks and never see the same tree twice. But back then, the land was quiet. As if it had forgotten how to live.

No animals roamed the hills, no satyrs danced by their fires, whispering sweet nothings to unimpressed nymphs. Even the stars seemed dimmer, as if holding their breath, waiting for something—or someone—to wake them.

That something, as it turned out, was me.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. If I'm going to tell this properly, I should start at the beginning. Not the beginning, mind you. This isn't a history lecture. Just far enough back to when I was fourteen—old enough to know the world was cruel, young enough to still hope otherwise.

We weren't well off, not by any standard, even our village's. We lived in a shack that could barely keep out the wind, let alone the cold. It was just my father, my younger brother Caleb, and me. My mother left years ago when Caleb was two and I was nine. Why? Well, there were plenty of reasons, and I suppose she picked one. I used to think she had left to find some kind nobleman who would adopt us, take us into his castle, and teach us to ride horses and read books by the fire.

I gave up on that fantasy two years ago.

Hope is a dangerous thing. It can lift you from the deepest pits, or it can drown you beneath the crashing waves of reality.

But that's not what you're here for, is it? You want the story. The real one.

So, without further ado, let's go back to that day. A day that seemed normal at first, except for one thing—it was the first time in a century that the light of the moon shone bright enough to wake the world.