Disclaimer: I do not own anything but the original characters, such as Evelin Brams and her family. If Hellboy were mine, we all know, the Prince would not have died at the end. Alas, poor me. It wasn't meant to be. That said, I hope you'll enjoy this first chapter.

Now Cracks a Noble Heart

Prologue: There are no facts, only interpretations

Once upon a time, when the world had few days behind it and man had yet to spring from the mind of the Creator, the earth was populated by many a race, each and ever one such race with its own powers and weaknesses. Fairest among them were the Elven kind. Tall and radiant a people, they cared for the other creations and for the earth itself, ensuring the days rolled on in harmony and prosperity found all the souls dwelling on their lands. Naught could fill their hearts better than the bringing of joy. And under their care the world thrived.

Remarkable civilisations were born in these lands. But by far the greatest was the Empire of the warrior elves of Bethmoora. Under Balor the One-Armed the greatest height had been reached. But in achieving what they had the Elves had placed themselves on equal ground with the Giver-of-life. Never did they outrightly challenge His authority, and yet some voices whispered of rebellion, they incited, they pushed for war. Others, milder ones, prayed for mercy. And God, in His supreme goodness, lent ear to them. For as a father could not bear to see harm come to one of his children, neither could He allow His children onto a path of darkness and destruction. Should they turn onto Him, He could but give them a clean death.

Thus God devised a fitting punishment for his children's arrogance. He called to him the King of the Elven realm and said onto him, "My son, My heart is torn at the sight of My people. Seen you how they peer through lowered lashes, cunning in thoughts and more and more unkind in manner? This needs be stopped."

Balor lowered his crowned head at the criticism. "I can but ask that you show mercy onto us," he said. Wise in his age, King Balor knew not to defy the Maker for his wrath would leave the land to suffer. "Give us lesson that we may never forget, give us hope after."

"Then I so say onto you, Balor of the Elvenkin, for you and yours there shall come a time when you will be tested beyond what you think possible. Whether you pass or not it is up to you. However, know this, should you fail then the entire of your race will fade with you." That decreed the lord onto the first of his followers. "May the stars serve faithful guides."

Upon hearing the will of God, Balor bowed to the one more powerful. "Your will be done," he said.

Not long was it until a new race emerged. Unlike the Firstborns, they had not a body made of starlight or meteor dust, nay, they were fashioned of clay and water, their blood thin and their insides empty, hungering for not even they knew what. But God, in all His wisdom, bestowed upon them His love. The Sons of the Earth could not understand what the Creator saw in these creatures too swiftly blown by a gust of wind. They were frail and weak of heart, they dreamt of bloodshed and lusted after power. They wanted what was not theirs to want. And to gain what they desired, they would stop at nothing.

"I give you Man," said God, placing his latest creation upon the ground. "Live in peace with your brethrens. Let My will be carried out."

And Balor, seeing his chance, took the younger being under his wing. For many a year they lived in peace. The Elves and not only saw that the humans were taught the ways of the land. And as Men grew in number and strength a chance crept upon them all. Soon, dissatisfied with their lot, the last of God's creatures grew resentful of their elders. They gathered together, their leaders joining hands in order to raise an army the likes of which had never been seen.

"On this day we are gathered to decide our fate." And decode they did. For hours on end they talked at lengths about their plan and the desired outcome. It seemed to them that as the finest creation of the Heaven's Father they should have been given more than they then possessed. "If they do not give freely then we must force them to hand over what is ours by virtue."

Unbeknownst to them in his halls the Almighty was preparing himself for what was to follow. He had given the choice to all the races. The power was in their hands. There came a moment when not even He could do anymore but watch. "What use in your freedom of choice if I make the choice for you?" The question was for one of the humans that had beseeched Him His council. "Forge your own path."

The Eleven King made aware of the plans of humans sought council from his Council. His son, young and brave, strong and fair to look upon, was in favour of war. "If it is a fight they seek, my Lord father, then we must oblige them. Or we shall fall to their swords." Nuada Silverlance would not see his people fallen under cruel hands. "Father, if this be our test, let us make ready." Well-meaning, alas impetuous, the young Prince held much sway over his father. The King gave consideration to the words of his son and saw their worth.

In answer to the swarm of men, the Sons of the Earth brought together their own armies. And so it was that blood flowed on once peaceful lands. Red of thick kind fell upon grass and sands alike, moans of pain and bellows of rage mixed under the scorching heat of the sun. To say how the battle was fought, how man brave warriors had greeted the shores of the afterlife in the wake of combat, how suffering had taken the light from so many eyes would not bring justice to the events. Loss was a thing to be felt, not understood. Becoming aware of the Lord's plan, King Balor put a stop to the fighting.

Peace followed war. But peace did not bring happiness. The son of the King was not pleased with the tenuous reconciliation. By way of protest he chose to leave his father's side. "Only when my people will truly have need of me shall I return. And when I do, beware, for I shall not allow these wretches to continue ruling over what is ours," Nuada vowed. Without success did his sister try to dissuade him. Her words fell upon deaf ears. Yet Nuada loved well the sibling with whom he'd shared a mother's womb. "Nuala, my dear sister," he said upon feeling a wave of grief that was not his, "shed not your tears for me. I will return."

Wiser in some ways than her brother, Princess Nuala shook her head. "You will not return the same." And in the most secret corner of her heart the maiden feared he would come back to her a shell filled with rage and hatred, for she could see the heat in his glare, flames slowly licking at his soul, devouring the boy she'd loved so well. "Nuada, brother, stay." It was one last effort, one more attempt at keeping her twin within reach, to keep him protected.

"Nay," he denied her softly. The sight of her tears gave him pause. Nuada opened his arms to her. Nuala accepted the comfort of his hold. "I cannot stay. My very soul demands that I depart and seek salvation." But not even the breaking of his own heart would change his mind. "Forgive me this, sister. Forgive me the pain I cause you, my other half."

A sort of confusion stole over him when his eyes met those of his sister. Nuada slowly released her from his embrace. He could stay no longer, for if she asked him again to stay his wavering heart would cause him trouble. With one last good-bye to his twin, the Prince of the Elves took his leave. He did not hear his sister's heartbreaking sobs, nor her pleas. But he felt them as if they were his own. It was then that Nuada closed himself off to her. In time shed would no longer feel the absence of him quite so daunting. In time he would learn to breath without knowing she did the same only a few rooms away. He would not let his people down, he would not show weakness.

He faced many dangers in the world ahead of him. Fairy folk and humans alike saw in his self-imposed exile a chance to rid themselves on one who could become an incredible foe. Prince Nuada's lack of loyalties made him a danger for both former friends and current enemies. But, great warrior, tried before in battle, the Elven soldier fought them off one by one and gained allies of his own as time went on.

And if has not yet found peace in battle, if he has yet to be slain by an enemy, then Prince Nuada still walks the earth and lives among us.

Evelin Brams set her book down. Her TV had been one for quite some time, with the volume down so it would not disrupt her reading. However, the image of the red devil on the screen captured her attention. Hellboy. They called him Hellboy, and what a fitting name. He looked like a creature sprung from the eternal fires. And yet he did not act like one. Numerous times had he helped her kind and they continued to vilify him. The young woman supposed it was in the nature of humans, for which of her fellow humans could boast of not fearing the strange and unnatural? She thought not.

Children dreaded the dark. What it was to be young and scared of the creatures lurking under the bed, of the cold hands and strange eyes. Evelin remembered, for the dark scared her most. The unknown brought a chill up her spine; it made her hairs stand on end, and her heart thumped loudly. Jabberwokies, incorporeal Grendels, and creatures of the dark that shied from even the gentlest strokes of the moonbeams, they were by far more frightening than the man with red skin and horns atop his head. "How can they not see that he's only trying to help?" A sad state of affairs, she considered.

Grown men feared the light for it showed to them the true nature of things. Ah, the light, both a sign of love from God and a source of anguish, for it alone could uncover truths better left to be swallowed by darkness and forgotten. And yet all people craved it, they could not live in its absence. No matter how harsh the truth, no matter how vile, they would choose it over the uncertainty. Fear cut deeper than any other weapon. Hellboy, Evelin mused, was damned either way. Light or dark, humans feared him for what he was, without even knowing what he could be.

But the existence of this Hellboy in itself proved that God has a plan. Why else would he have allowed one such as he to live and thrive and protect them all? Had the Lord not wanted Hellboy to live he would not have. Evelin smiled as one of the reporters asked once again what the big red creature planned to do. It was as if they expected him declare war upon them. Humans got dimmer and dimmer, it seemed. Supposedly it was of their own doing. Evelin hardly doubted that. Many of their suffering were of their own making after all. It was something the woman had learned long ago.

Human had a way of destroying they touched. The world was fragile, more so than any of them could tell. And yet its strength they could not comprehend. How very much like them was their world. Evelin toyed with the idea of returning to her book but abandoned the thought. Her taste for courtly intrigue had vanished upon coming to the image of Hellboy and his companions. It was time to ponder upon those questions which left one with more inquires than answers. Such was the habit of deep philosophising.

Before she could lose herself in these thoughts, her phone started ringing. The shrill sound made her wince. Evelin's lips pulled down at the corners but she reached for the device anyway. If one could not escape, one might as well face whatever danger they encountered. "Hello! This is Evelin Brams speaking."

"Hello, Evelin!" a male voice replied. It was, of course, the only male to call her residence. "It's Daniel. I was wondering if Mira and I could bring Nate over for a few days, a week at most."

Daniel Brams was Evelin's older brother, and only brother at that. There were seven years between them, but they got along fairly well. Mira was his wife of six years, and Nathan, or Nate as he was affectionately called, was their son. Every now and again they would leave him at Evelin's place. The younger sister hadn't minded caring for her nephew in the past, nor would she start at this point. "Sure, Daniel, bring him over."

Normally a closed person by nature, Evelin was not much for company. But her young nephew had grown up around her, and she'd come to love the little guy to bits. It was really lucky that she could take him in to work. Nate was a good child, easy to get along with and not given to making trouble. Should Evelin give him something to do, he would do that quietly. In that he was much like his aunt.

"Thank you, Evelin!" Daniel proceeded to express his gratitude, ignoring Evelin's attempts to stay then flood. "You ought to come with us the next time we visit England. Marge says that she'll drag you herself if you don't visit this Christmas."

Originally of Isle of Wight, England, Evelin had come to the USA when she was in her teens. Her parents and brother and her, the whole family moved when their father was relocated. But that had been years ago, and her father had stopped working for that company. Then he died of a heart attack, and her mother had remarried since and gone to Florida. Daniel met Mira when Evelin was still in University, and they now lived in Queens, while Evelin had remained in Manhattan.

Contact had been kept with relatives and some friends, but Marge was by far the most insistent. Her mother's sister used every opportunity she got to try convincing her niece and nephew to come back. But Evelin had long since settled in her life and she was happy with the way things were. "You can tell her that I'll do my best, but I don't think I'll be able to make it. Work, you know." In consequence, Evelin used the excuse of work to avoid going there. Aunt Marge had a way of prying out of anyone information they would rather not give. "Give my regards to Sylvie when you see her. And tell me when to expect you."

"I'll drop him off at your place tomorrow afternoon," her brother announced. "I swear to God, Evelin, you have to stop filling his head with those fairytales of yours. The boy refuses to sleep if one of us does not read something to him."

How else was a child supposed to fall asleep? Evelin did not comment, she merely chuckled good-naturedly. "I'll see you tomorrow then, Daniel. Have a good evening!"

Their parents had read to her when she was little, and she was certain that to Daniel too. But her brother and his wife, they were busy people. Evelin could understand how they saw reading tales as a waste of their precious time, yet they ignored the importance of such works. Literature was not merely entertainment; it had never been such and those to consider it simply a means of amusement were denigrators of a sacred temple to her. It was beyond the young woman's capacity of understanding how others could label the written as rubbish and throw it away without a thought. That might have been the poet's soul in her, rather than her more rational part.

An enthused young woman, Evelin had been a good pupil, both in school and in university. That achievement was tied with her love for knowledge. Since young, Evelin had preferred reading to other activities. When one read a book, another could be found just around the corner, then another and another. And with every chapter, every page and every word new world came to life within her mind. Whole universes had found themselves devoured by her eyes at one point or another. How could she live without knowing? To know was to have power and to have power was to decide. It was a gift, and those who squandered it were poorer for it. Why settle for mediocrity when greatness waited? Why settle for less when one could have more? That was what her brother refused to understand.

However, Evelin had seen in her nephew a reflection of herself. And as such she had vowed to share her knowledge with him. And the child drank it all. Fairytales were the simplest of what she planned to read to the boy. If she could bring up in him a taste for learning, she could paint his world in other colours than black and white. How could a person not what to see all the shades and hues? How could they choose to keep to their blacks and whites and live without reds, blues, greens, and so many other colours? Nate apparently could not, and Evelin was determined to teach him as many colours as she knew. Together they would pain the world.

Ignorance was a disease. Evelin came by it every day. It invaded the mind and twisted the truths around until they were unrecognisable. It bred monsters, perverse fiends feeding on the intellect, on the very understanding of the world. No human could escape his own limits. But nothing stood in the way of knowledge if one truly wished to earn it. Whether it took them more or less years, that was without relevance, for never once did man stop learning. Conscious or not, information found its way in the mind, unless blocked. Man was both great and weak.

Herein laid the greatest tragedy of the humans. Caught between two poles, two pitiless opposites, tearing at him, man could but resign himself to the impassability of nature and his own incontestable doom. Now, one could embrace the fate, walk towards this end without a fight. Walk blind through life save for those small needs that brought a fleeting joy. Or one could fight. Not with weapons such as sharp words and cutting knives. No, sharp minds and tongues made for better weapons, words could make a giant as easily as they could bring down a giant. And what was man if not one such giant built upon words and thoughts, a fissure in that carefully wrought armour could topple the mountain. Evelin had long since decided she would fight, and her weapons she needed as much as she needed air.

Throughout her considerations Evelin had neglected the Tales of Old that had been neatly laid on the counter. The young woman sat back down and took the book with her, putting it on her lap. A week with her favourite nephew – and her only nephew if she were to be sincere – made her mood brighter. Nathan could not speak with her of the great mysteries of life, but there was a certain animal comfort in knowing another soul close to hers. And Evelin was not above such needs be they of baser ilk. Closed-off and withdrawn she might have been, but even she had need of company. Children fed both her desire for conversation and her hunger for knowledge, as they were, as they were ever curious. Besides they, much like her, could peer through the veils that separated worlds. They could see beyond the flesh and bones, they could see the soul. If that were some kind of madness, Evelin confessed to being mad and being better for it. For only the fool could tell what really was. The sane would shy away and see there what was nor or they would not see what there was.

Shaking her head, Evelin returned to reading. Yet her mind would not cooperate at the moment. It seemed that she had neglected another important aspect of her daily care. Glancing to the clock, she was surprised to find that the hour was late, later than she would have thought. Evelin made her way to the kitchen. It did not take long for her to reheat yesterday's meal. "Evelin, at some point or another you'll have to go grocery shopping," she said upon noticing her somewhat empty refrigerator. Perhaps she would do it after Daniel dropped his son off. Little Nate would be happy to help.

Notes:

Title – "Now cracks a noble heart. Good-night, sweet prince; And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest. " This is the full quote which has inspired the work's title. It is what Horatio says upon Hamlet's death in Shakespeare's "Hamlet".

Chapter title - "There are no facts, only interpretations." This quote comes from Nietzsche whose work I find pleasing. It is a reference to the fact that every person perceives differently the world. I think this needs no further clarification.

Evelin – The name bares the meanings of life and, possibly, desired. I just like the sound of this name.

Brams – Johannes Brahms, although to be fair Evelin is of English origin, with Romanian roots. Brams has been loosely inspired by Castle Bran which ties in with the well-known Dracula, although the person that inspired the image of the vampire, Vlad III, voivode of Wallachia, had little to do with the castle itself.

Hybris – Also known as "hubris", this concept is used to point out the over-reaching exhibited by a person or an entire culture. In my story the hybris is represented by the Elves' attempt to become the equals of the Creator. In the ancient Greek tragedies the hybris often led to a painful and violent end for the perpetrator of an offence.

Morality – I shall attempt to make use of the brilliant example of the ancient Greek in this. In their plays (the tragedies) there was no real villain. What drove the plot further was a conflict of moral imperatives. There are many examples to be found, and I won't include them here. But know that I will try to conduct my characters after this standard. That is to say, there will be no fully good or fully evil characters. All actions will have some motivation, whether they are justified or not, I leave up to my readers.

Blaise Pascal – "Man's grandeur is that he knows himself to be miserable." For Pascal the human being is both damned and brilliant. A bit of his philosophical attitude has already been shown in Evelin's soliloquy. He is an interesting author to read.

Plato – The following quotes have served as inspiration: "Ignorance, the root and stem of every evil." and "We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light." One of the classics, never should it be said that Plato did not have some truth is his words.

Jabberwocky – Carroll Lewis was very fond of inventing words, as such he coined a series of portmanteaux terms among which is Jabberwocky also. In fact the whole poem dedicated to this creature is made up of such words. The interesting fact is that even without understand the actual meaning of the words one can conjure an image of the Jabberwocky, rendered scarier still by the incertitude.

Beowulf – Grendel is one of the antagonists Beowulf has to face in the eponymous heroic poem. Now, in the Old English variant Grendel is not described beyond his origin, descendent of Cain, so called "shadugenga" (walker of the darkness) and also it is said about him that he has the power of thirty men. That said, Grendel hunts in the dark and the warriors cannot see him most of the time, which produces a palpable tension.

The Fool – At the King's court the Fool was the only person who could speak the bleak truth without repercussions, precisely because he was not sane. What was perceived as a joke by the courtiers was often the truth they would not dare voice.

Colours – Here they denote ways of thinking; to appreciate the value of one's system of ordaining the world, one must first understand said system. This is actually a reference made by a professor of mine. It shall not be expanded on.