Prologue

Prologue

The woods were the last place where three children ought to have been at that ungodly time of the night. Branches loomed like skeletal fingers, threatening to snag their clothes with each hurried step.

The woods, better known to locals as The Warren, seemed to come alive around them, as frightening whispers of unseen creatures echoed through the darkness. The two boys took the lead, their breaths ragged with fear.

Christian, who was at the tender age of ten, turned around to check whether Lyra was following. Her usually bright blue eyes seemed to glow in the dark like two celestial bodies lighting their way in the chaos that had ensnared them all. Her flowing hair fluttered in the evening breeze, as if every specter who had ever wandered through these woods wanted to caress her gently and reach its fingers out to her.

"Do you see her?" Lyra whispered, her breath hitching as only the breath of a frightened eight-year-old girl could. Twigs snapped underfoot, adding to the sense of impending danger.

"No," Christian shook his head, looking in front of him as his brother led the way. He had no idea where they were going. He only knew that they could not stop. Lyra needed them, and that was more important than any fear that threatened to eat him up alive.

"Come on!" Arden, the eldest of the three, urged them, as his voice trembled with urgency. Christian wondered if Arden was afraid. He had to be. He simply wasn't showing it.

"Thea!" Lyra's father, Karl Stockton, Baron Crestwood, shouted into the night.

"Lady Stockton!" Several other voices joined in.

Christian swallowed heavily. Lady Stockton's illness did not make her violent. However, it made her oblivious to the danger that she posed to herself, and that was where their true fears lay.

"Lyra?" Arden called out from way ahead of them. His brother, though only two years older, had always taken the lead in everything.

Both Christian and Lyra looked in that direction, his own heart beating like a drum in his throat. He could see his brother's silhouette in the dark. Arden stood motionless; his gaze seemingly fixed on something ahead of him.

Christina grabbed Lyra's hand. They quickly reached Arden, now all three of them focused on the sight before them.

"She's there," Arden managed to murmur, his voice down to a whisper, his finger pointing ahead. "She's… just… dancing in the moonlight…"

Instinctively, Christian moved closer to Lyra, as if in an effort to protect her from the sight she would never be able to unsee. The same would be said of him. He could not tear his eyes away from the ill woman swaying in a haunting dance in a small clearing.

The moonlight illuminated her as if she were on a private little stage. Her figure, bathed in the soft silvery light, shimmered with otherworldly radiance, her nightgown seemingly woven out of stardust. Her arms rose and fell in sweeping arcs, following the sound of the music only she could hear. Her fingertips would occasionally graze the tips of surrounding trees as if she were endeavoring to reach for something just out of her grasp.

The children all stared at her, both in awe and petrified at the sight that was unraveling before them. At that moment, she halted mid-step, her movements faltering, as if she had just recognized something in the shadows. She turned to them, her words slicing through the stillness of the night like a chilling whisper from beyond.

"Do not fear the shadows, my darlings," she murmured, smiling, but there was an unmistakable sense of dread in her tone of voice. "For, without darkness, there can be no light…"

Christian squeezed Lyra's hand, but he knew that he could do little to reassure his friend when his own heart was pounding with primal fear. Just then, they could hear the oncoming of footsteps, and moments later, Lyra's father appeared with a few more servants.

"Thea!" Lord Karl Stockton exclaimed loudly and desperately, with sudden relief lacing through his voice. They found her this time as well, like so many times before. The man rushed over to his wife, wrapping his strong arms around her willowy frame. "Come, let's get you back to the house before you catch your death out here."

His wife had suddenly lost all of her energy and seemed to slump into his arms like a puppet without any strings to hold it up.

"Karl?" Lady Stockton whispered in a melodious voice that Christian remembered. Moments of her complete lucidity were rare. "Where am I?"

"You are alright, my love," her husband replied, pressing his lips to her slightly sweaty forehead. He held her tightly, almost as if she were made of mist and she might dissolve at any moment, never to return. "You just wandered out of the house, that's all."

Lady Stockton's eyes met the eyes of her daughter. "Lyra?"

Christian turned to his friend, whose hand rested limply in his own. But Lyra didn't get a chance to respond.