disclaimer: I own nothing but the order the words are in

Prologue

It happened for the first time when Coran was very young. He was playing with his sister in the palace gardens. Hide and seek (or a variety of it. There was a lot of running and giggling). He hadn't even noticed that he had wandered into the maze at the center of the garden. It wasn't until the tall hedges, adorned with sweet-smelling blossoms of all shapes and sizes, surrounded him, twisted and turned around him with no end in sight that he realized he was lost. He wouldn't call for help. Not yet. He wanted to prove that he was more than a child. After all, he couldn't have come very far into the maze.

And so he kept walking. The flowers around him smiled, and pointed the way he should go. He thanked them, his moustache bobbing as he bowed and hurried on.

He'd never seen these flowers before. They were large-each petal bigger than his head and the whole blossom wider than he was tall. These flowers smiled at him, baring teeth longer than his fingers. He ducked his head and hurried past them. Beyond them the hedges opened, and he ran for the opening, despite the fact that the sun did not shine on the other side of the hedges.

The grey air stuck on his tongue and in his lungs. He looked up and they grey sky looked back down at him. He was no longer in the palace gardens, or he was in a part of them that he'd never seen. The grass, a rich green dulled by the thick atmosphere, stretched onward in all directions, broken only by a winding, cobblestone path. He turned around-if he could find his way back to the start of the maze maybe no one would notice that he had gone-but the maze was gone, and the garden (it had to be a garden of some sort) stretched on.

Coran swallowed the lump growing in his throat (he mustn't cry, he was nearly 50 decapheebs, after all), and began to run toward one of the grey, stone paths. Surely if he followed it for long enough, he would find someone who could help him.

He couldn't tell you for how long he ran. It could have been hours or seconds, he doesn't remember. The garden became cluttered with statues. Huge stone figures of men and women, when Coran glanced back they seemed to have moved. Some were staring at him. Others looked disappointed. He shuddered and kept running.

"It's happened again, hasn't it?"

"I am afraid so."

Voices began carrying across the open, rolling hills. Coran ran toward them.

"And here I thought that our brother had gone and messed something up again."

"Please do not speak about me like I'm not here."

"Whatever you say, dearest brother"

He crested a hill and saw them-7 figures sitting in and around a white, elaborately carved gazebo. Something in him was frightened by the sight of them, and he ducked behind a statue. Yet, for all his fear (some primitive instinct that he could not place) he could not stop watching and listening. He felt that he knew them on some level, whether consciously or not.

"Where are they? When are they?"

"Spread across a galaxy and thousands of years."

"I never like it when you talk in riddles." one of them-Coran could not tell if they were a boy or girl-threw their hands up and began walking away.

"Desire, wait."

"Only one is alive now. The next will come to us soon. The rest will not live for some ten thousand years."

The one who was walking away turned back to face the group, crossed their arms over their chest, and pouted. "Ten thousand years? Why call us now?"

"It was necessary."

"Necessary." Coran could hear the quirked eyebrow in the statement.

"Yes. I do not know all, I have not read ahead," the tallest one fingered the pages of a massive, golden book. The chains that bound him to it clanked together in a harsh, melodic way, "But mine is with us now. It was important that he see this meeting." He looked up and his hood fell back just enough that Coran could see the sightless eyes lock with his. He gasped, and stumbled backward, but could not look away.

"You allowed this?"

"It is necessary. He is mine, after all. Go on, Coran. Run back to your sister, she is waiting for you. We will come for you, in time."

Coran turned, though it took every ounce of energy that he possessed to look away, and ran. He did not know where he was running, only that he was running away. The landscape changed around him, and he did not notice. If he did, he payed it no mind. The ground under his feet turned from the soft grass to the packed dirt and stone of the palace gardens. The thick foliage and bright flowers of the maze flanked him. His sister stood in front of him, and he skidded to a stop, nearly running into her. She caught his arms as he doubled over, panting.

"Coran? Coran? What happened?" she asked, tiny hands framing his face and forcing him to look up into her large, effervescent eyes.

"I, there were people, I wasn't-" he looked around himself with wild eyes, yanking his head from his sister's hands. "I…" he shook his head. "I'm fine. I just got lost in the maze is all."

His sister looked worried, but the concern left her face soon enough. She lit up in a smile and grabbed his hand. "Come on! I found a bug that I wanted to show you. I want you to tell me what it is!" He allowed himself to be pulled away by her, away from the maze and the people and the strange garden and the words they had said. They still echoed after him like a dream, or music heard from a distant room as one lingers on the edge of sleep.

"What now, Destiny?"

"Now, we wait."