Prologue

She is Coming

I am Tersa the Weaver, Tersa the Liar, Tersa the Fool. When the Blood-Jeweled Lords and Ladies hold a banquet, I'm the entertainment that comes after the musicians have played and the lithesome girls and boys have danced and the Lords have drunk too much wine and demand to have their fortunes told. "Tell us a story, Weaver," they yell as their hands pass over the serving girls' rumps and their Ladies eye the young men and decide who will have the painful pleasure of serving in the bed that night.

I was one of them once, Blood as they are Blood.

No, that's not true. I wasn't Blood as they are Blood.

That's why I was broken on a Warlord's spear and became shattered glass that only reflects what might have been.

It's hard to break a Blood-Jeweled male, but a witch's life hangs by the hymenal thread, and what happens on her Virgin Night determines whether she is whole to practice the Craft or becomes a broken vessel, forever always remains, enough for day-to-day living and parlor tricks, but not the Craft, not the lifeblood of our kind.

But the Craft can be reclaimed—if one is willing to pay the price.

When I was younger, I fought against that final slide into the Twisted Kingdom. Better to be broken and sane than broken and mad. Better to see the world and know a tree for a tree, a flower for a flower rather than to look through gauze at gray and ghostly shapes and see clearly only the shards of one's self.

So I thought then.

As I shuffle to the low stool, I struggle to stay at the edge of the Twisted Kingdom and see the physical world clearly one last time. I carefully place the wooden frame that holds my tangled web, the web of dreams and visions, on the small table near the stool.

The Lords and Ladies expect me to tell their fortunes, and I always have, not by magic but by keeping my eyes and ears open and then telling them what they want to hear.

Simple. No magic to it.

But not tonight.

For days now I have heard a strange kind of thunder, a distant calling. Last night I surrendered to madness in order to reclaim my Craft as a Black Widow, a witch of the Hourglass covens. Last night I wove a tangled web to see the dreams and visions. I must be sure that those who must hear it are in the room before I speak.

I wait. They don't notice. Glasses are filled and refilled as I fight to stay on the edge of the Twisted Kingdom.

Just as another had fought tooth and nail to rise above the pool of lust he'd drowned in; to bring himself back from that edge I forever wonder.

He wakens now.

Little does he know he also has a part to play.

But he will learn soon. They all will.

Ah, there he is. Daemon Sadi, from the Territory called Hayll. He's beautiful, bitter, cruel. He has a seducer's smile and a body women want to touch and be caressed by, but he's filled with a cold, unquenchable rage.

When the Ladies talk about his bedroom skills, the words they whisper are "excruciating pleasure." I don't doubt he's enough of a sadist to mix pain and pleasure in equal portions, but he's always been kind to me, and it's a small bone of hope that I throw out to him tonight. Still, it's more than anyone else has given him.

And there's another pleasure slave within those halls; the foreigner whose background no one knew where he truly came from. If Daemon Sadi was the magnificence of darkness then this pale stranger was the splendor of light; pale as moonlight with odd sightless green eyes, raven hair spilling down his neck and shoulders in a fall most women dream of having with a Blood Jewel as red as blood dangling from his neck.

And just like me he walks the edge of the Twisted Realm.

Julian Daemon calls him.

The boy seemed to answer to anything and anyone, uncaring of the outside world, lost within his own fantasies.

Broken. But unlike I, the pale beauty was hacked at for decades before slipping away.

How a creature not of Hayll long lived lines could remain unchanged for over two decades is anyone's guess.

But I care not. Julian is Julian.

The Lords and Ladies grow restless.I usually don't take this long to begin my pronouncements. Agitation and annoyance build, but I wait. After tonight, it will make no difference.

There's the other one, in the opposite corner of the room. Lucivar Yaslana, the Eyrien half-breed from the Territory called Askavi.

Hayll has no love for Askavi, nor Askavi for Hayll, but Daemon and Lucivar are drawn to one another without understanding why, so wound into each other's lives they cannot separate. Uneasy friends, they have fought legendary battles, have destroyed so many courts the Blood are afraid to have them together for any length of time.

I raise my hands, let them fall into my lap. Daemon watches me. Nothing about him has changed, but I know he's waiting, listening. And because he's listening, Lucivar listens too.

"She is coming."

"She is coming."

Julian stirred from beside a woman's breast, sweat soaked body shivering as he once again danced from the Other.

The woman's words woke something within him, something different than the ebb and flow of sex and pleasure he'd been locked in for hours.

"Stupid bitch," someone yells. "Tell me who I'll love tonight."

Not me. Something whispered. Like the touch of a foolish Blood male could be called 'love'

I sat up further from the cocoon of sleeping flesh, idly rubbing the hair from my face, licking at my lips.

They tasted sweet.

"What does it matter?" the woman answered frankly, and I could tell the outspoken fool was abashed by her tone of voice. "She is coming. The Realm of Terreille will be torn apart by its own foolish greed. Those who survive will serve, but few will survive."

Her words rang with the fatality of a prophecy.

Tilting my head to the side, I slipped my robe back onto bare shoulders and stood, making my way towards the wild black haired woman, a hand making sure the robe was closed, hiding my flesh from view.

I may be a whore and a sex slave, but that didn't mean I'm willing to let everything hang out.

Finally, the voice clicked in my memory as I caught sight of a familiar face.

Ah. Tersa.

Another one who roamed the Warped World and still could see this plane for what it was. Tersa knew of me just as I knew of her, having crossed past her foot prints many a time on blood crusted sand.

Daemon Sadi had knelt before the woman as she spoke, holding her hands as golden eyes locked with golden.

Such beautiful eyes, golden eyes. I wonder if a Hayllan would let me keep theirs?

"The Blood in Terreille whore the old ways and make a mockery of everything we are." Tersa waved a hand wildly in the air. "They twist things to suit themselves. They dress up and pretend. They wear Blood Jewels but don't understand what it means to be Blood. They talk of honoring the Darkness, but it's a lie. They honor nothing but their own ambitions. The Blood were created to be the caretakers of the Realms. That's why we were given our power. That's why we come from, yet are apart from, the people in every Territory. The perversion of what we are can't go on. The day is coming when the debt will be called in, and the Blood will have to answer for what they've become."

How ominous. And so perfect for this lazy no good race. They deserve to be purged of their filth.

"They're the Blood who rule, Tersa," Daemon says sadly. "Who is left to call in this debt? Bastard slaves like me?"

Bastard slaves. Unwilling fodder for those who rule.

I shuddered, coming to a stop by the Eyrian Lucivar Yaslana.

"Welcome back." He muttered gruffly, never taking golden eyes off of Daemon and Tersa even as he greeted me.

My relationship with the winged man was odd, to say the least.

One day he'd hate me.

The next he was treating me like a brother, training me.

Others, he'd ignore me completely.

I saw Daemon shoot Lucivar a look then; golden eyes disdainful before they went wide at the woman's whispered words.

"You can hear them?" I asked softly, and Lucivar grunted.

"Could. Bastard put up a sound barrier."

I laughed softly, walking away from him.

I had learned all I needed to. Something great was coming once more. Maybe it'd take weeks, years, decades, but this world would change.

Oh how I wish I'll be there to see it.

As you can see massive parts of this chapter are taken directly from the book's pages. Momo no own them, duh.