[MyPrologue]

A predetermined life; an entire existence arranged by the strings of fate. That is hardly a life at all, not knowing what will happen, but still knowing that whatever happens was predestined. But … what if we could know what the Divine Will had foreordained? What if we could take every step knowing exactly where to place the next footfall? What if we could know what would begin the unraveling of our very lives? Would that be a life worth living?

For some, this was the ideal way of life, the so-called righteous path to boundless dictatorship. I am, of course, speaking of the malicious race of Zaithyca. They were known for their fraudulent tendencies, destructive behavior beyond my own comprehension. Of the many terrible stories I have heard over the years, I am quite ashamed to say that I share the blood of these vile creatures. Be assured, however, I am not one of them, not truly. I am not of a foolish mind, and would never allow such a simple autocracy to rule over me. If the tales be told true, the zaithean race could not be held in brilliant stature. I must be thankful I was not raised in their time.

I suppose it would be prudent of me to explain why, exactly, I count myself lucky enough that I am only half as psychotic as the stories I have heard.

Every one hundred years or so an oracle was chosen anew; the most talented sorceress who perfected her magic, and who was the first to obtain the title of cleric, was usually the superlative candidate. Her advanced magical aptitude was desirable for perfecting their unremitting spurious illusions of fate. This was her primary, and most important, substantial responsibility. There were, however, numerous other, less significant obligations to occupy the oracle’s endless hours of confinement.

As it is told, becoming the oracle of Zaithyca was a great honor, and many aspiring clerics dreamed that they would be privileged enough to even be considered. They were, of course, all ignorant to the true meaning of destiny. Their practice of fortune telling was nothing short of cunning manipulation. Ingenious, really, a clever ruse to the undying devotion the king demanded.

I do not believe there are predestinations in life, but I was not raised to conceive such sentiment, unlike my kin. As they were taught, everything they were preached was to be taken in all seriousness, no matter how absurd the notion. It was their “how–to” control the chaos.

But they are all gone now. The race of Zaithyca died. All that I would have called kin, slaughtered – although many still desire to refer to it as their extermination day, as if they had rid the world of some sort of vermin. By no account, after all I have been told, do I disagree that the elves did us a tremendous kindness on that day, but I do hold a certain connection to the memory of Zaithyca. I only wish the many races of Scira could hold to their title, of being one-thousand times better than my kin, and hold even a minute amount of respect for a province they had once called a neighbor.

There was only one who survived, but he had uncovered the deception of their untruths many years before the devastation. My father, Czar, chose exile over the comforting web of lies the people of his church had provided. Unfortunately, he was the only one who saw clearly enough to untangle his soul before it became too entwined within the madness.

Czar lived for many decades, in the shadows, lost inside his own mind. He tried so hard to discern his rightful path, but forty years of solitude was enough to destroy any person’s amount of sanity. Finally, he had decided that death was his true destiny, the preferable choice to so many more decades of loneliness. He was ready for death’s embrace … but then, he saw her for the first time.

After fifteen years of life documenting scrolls, Czar’s journals became nothing more than words of delirium. But the day he first laid eyes on her, after twenty-five years of meaningless scrawl, my father’s scrolls became … profound.

There was so much excitement, and love for this woman he had never known, whom he’d only observed from a distance. But there was more than passion behind his words, there was obsession. For five years his entries continued on about this – his – “Dhe’aiYurau us Aim’hew”; his Angel of Beauty.

Then his entries ceased.

I am only to guess what happened. My mother never told me much of my father, only that he was killed by the hand of one of Anik’s Guardsmen.

I was nearly of my thirtieth year, still a child by the standards of Zaithyca, when my mother passed away, and wise enough to piece together what she had been leaving out.

My father was so infatuated with her he could not see reason. He forced himself on her, and for that he was granted release from his tormented life. I do not blame him, for what he did. He could not hide from her what he was, but he only knew that he needed to have her. I know that need, the lust to feel close to someone when all you know is … neglect.