Deep within the lonely mountains lay a dusty cavern, that hadn't been stepped in well over forty thousand years. Had someone been close enough to hear, they would have heard the sound of drums beating to a rhythm long lost to the world.
No one, however was close enough to hear the sound, except a figure inside an enclosed tomb. The sound wound it's way through the woman's very veins, breathing life back into her. Mere minutes later, a heart that had long since stopped beating, began to rise and fall in her chest again in time with the drums. Slowly the woman opened her eyes, and lay still for a minute, terror seizing her as she realized she was in a tight closed place.
She took a calming breath, berating herself for her moment of terror before cautiously listening to her surroundings. After determine that she was alone she lifted her arms up and shoved the top of the cold marble off flinging it halfway across the room.
She rose up easily to her feet and belatedly realized she had lain in a tomb. Her bare feet made no noise as she moved around the cavern, and she felt the walls before coming across a torch. A moment later she had it lit, and looked around.
Shelves lined the stone walls, and hundreds of potions and ingredients lay upon it. She put the torch down, noticing it illuminated the small cavern bathing it in light. She placed the marble cover back onto the tomb, and walked over to a shelf a sudden burst of wind from outside the small chamber, chilling her and making her realize she had no clothes on.
Her amber eyes, scanned the chamber until she came across a pile of cloth. She walked over and picked them up. Quickly she pulled on the black leggings, black dragon skin bodice, and black dragon skin boots. Another quick scan revealed her sword, a long straight sword, the handle white dragon skin with green emeralds embedded in the hilt.
She ran a slender finger over it, frowning when she came across words engraved perfectly in it.
Nigrum Lacrimae Cadunt.
Black tears fall? Images flew through her mind faster than she could keep up with, leaving her with more questions than answers. Where was she, and why was she in a tomb? She didn't remember being put there.
One question she could answer, and as she walked out the chamber and through the tunnels, she decided she was in the lonely mountains. Slowly she reached out a hand and touched the stone, closing her eyes to listen to it.
The stone spoke of ages come and gone, new people of different races that were born during her slumber. They spoke of battles, of good and evil. They told her she slept for a forty thousand years.
Sahara wasn't used to feeling uneasy, she had trained for hundred of years, and was the daughter of a Queen and King. She had never had any reason to feel uneasy, but as she walked through the tunnels she had explored with her cousins as a child she felt an iciness she had never known creep into her bones.
She almost didn't want to leave the safety of Kaunes, but she needed answers, that she simply wouldn't find here in the lonely mountains. She tamped back her anxiety and decided that she would just have to go on, and deal with whatever came when it got there.
Mere miles away, in the small town of Idenberg a young woman, walked along a path the moonlight guiding her way home. She was coming home from a forbidden trysts with her childhood friend.
Her sigh was filled with sorrow, known only by a woman who was being forced to marry a man she didn't love, and forsake the man she did. Her sigh seemed to echo against the trees of the forest path, and the trees she had often climbed in childhood suddenly seemed dark and foreboding. Amelia shook her head, to clear it. Her mother had always told her she had to much of an imagination but couldn't stop the shiver that raced dow her spine chilling her.
She picked up her pace walking faster, suddenly in a hurry to get home when a man stepped in front of the path. He was pale, almost transparent in the moonlight and was formed more perfectly than the elf she had seen in Dale years ago.
Still as she looked into eyes as black as night, she felt paralyzed by fear. They were cold, lifeless and as he leapt forward her scream was cut off before she could even open her mouth.
Struggling vainly she felt her life slowly draining from her, as something painfully sharp pierced her neck.
Durvin smiled blood dripping onto his chin as he let the girl fall to the ground. It was good to be free. Now, he just had to find Evalinde.