Tahr - The Days of Ash and Fury, Volume One [sample]

Prologue

Lucan stood beside the Elf on the ridge overlooking The Praër of Thornwood, once more bearing silent witness to the terrible scene. Before him, a vast expanse of grassy slopes yawned for a radius of miles around the Trine Crossing, and in that field lay an army of felled and falling elven warriors. To the right, the Pinestroke ran from the near eastern foothills to the western forest and beyond, parallel to the Trine. The 'Stroke was a once endless procession of ancient emerald trees, marking the entrance to the homeland of the elven people. It now stood lifeless, branches barren of needles, blanketed in ash. A few days' ride beyond the Pinestroke to the north lay the once tranquil and ageless city of Thornwood, though Lucan knew that it, like all lands of Greater Tahr, was no longer serene, no longer at peace. Thornwood was the beloved home of the Elf, he knew, but how he knew these things, he could not say.

A thousand-pace stretch lay between the tree line and the river to the south, to Lucan's left. There, the poisoned grey-yellow waters of the Trine thickened with the blood of elves and the ichor of the unnamable beasts they battled. The mighty river had once been a pristine and shining sibling of The Morline; now, the toxic vein of pestilence and blight no longer gave life to the land of Tahr, but stole it away greedily. Lucan had never before been to the Trine, yet he somehow knew what it had once been. He could visualize it in his mind clearly, unspoiled, not as an imagination, but as a memory. Further south beyond the river, the relentless surge of blackened, hairless, shrill and evil creatures again flooded the ashen Praër. Many days' ride in that direction, Lucan's own city had once stood, the Kingdom of Mor, the home of Men. He knew it stood no longer, yet still, he could not say how he knew.

The scene before Lucan reminded him of stories he had heard as a child, legends of horrors millennia past. He recalled tales of when Fang had first emerged, the great volcano that towered at the muzzle of the Maw. In that all but forgotten age, it was said, Fang had not sprung from the world in a violent birth, but had gradually risen, lava pouring from its mouth, cooling, then spilling again over the course of many cycles, ultimately resulting in a soaring black thorn that protruded from the center of Greater Tahr. The land had been covered in ash, it was told, as it was in the scene before him. Indescribable beasts from the deep fiery pits of Fury had clawed their way from their eternal prison to make war upon the living, their aim to claim the world as their own. Lucan had once believed the stories were little more than a way to ensure the behavior of children; if the boys and girls of Tahr were not good, adults warned, their mischiefs would call the evil up to the world of the living again. The worst children would serve as the first meals of the devils.

Lucan watched the battle play out before him, as he had a hundred times, and knew that the tales were not merely the conjuring of aggravated parents, but an accurate portrayal of a menace that Tahr had once faced, and was facing again. Heroic tales of men, dwarves, and elves of the days of Fang were enshrined in ballads that Lucan had performed countless times to earn a meal in a tavern. He recalled his favorite, The Ballad of Mulgar, a hearty drinking song about a dwarven king that had fought the minions of Disorder and rallied the peoples of Tahr to final victory.

In the setting before him, no such heroics were to be found. Only death, and a single source of hope and light that stood beside him, the beautiful Elf, the ubiquitous and mysterious woman that had accompanied him to this hillside dream too many times to count. Yet Lucan was terrified to turn and look upon her, for he knew that when he did, she would vanish like smoke, and the nightmare would begin anew.

Lucan knew he was not here. The knowledge comforted him, for truly being here would mean that the things he saw were real, and they could not be. No, in no world he wished to live would these dreads come to pass. Yet neither did he wish to awaken and return to his own world, a life in which he had no purpose beyond hustling his next meal, a life where he had run north, escaping the wrath of men he offended. His true life was one wherein his body most certainly lay dying, somewhere. Lucan allowed his hand to rest on the pommel of the sword at his waist, a sword with a name he could not recall, a sword he did not own, yet did. As his fingers gripped the weapon, he sensed again that here, in this life, he had a purpose. Here, his life had meaning, value, worth. Yet the cost of this reality was more than he could bear, for he knew his merit was inextricably tied to the monstrous horrors before him.

In contrasting the values of his own reality and this one, Lucan had decided that the only thing he truly wanted from either was to continue to share the presence of the Elf. In this world, if only for fleeting moments, he could stand beside her. In the other, in his true life, he did not know her. Lucan decided then that, if he should ever awaken from this nightmare, he would seek out the beautiful Elf; he would find her if it took a lifetime.

Lucan turned to look upon her, and again she faded like mist.