Prologue

 

Deep in the infernal glow of Hell’s belly, the Old Ones began to stir. Called forth out of a dreamless slumber by a growing sense of tension, where they had remained undisturbed for millennia, they awakened. Languidly they spread their scarred, battered wings and stretched their crooked limbs as their ancient eyes began to open. A growing sense of tension and unease began as a subtle stirring in the air and rose until it permeated Hell, down to the chambers in which they had slept undisturbed for millennia. Anger at being disturbed rose like bile in their throats. Ancient mouths filled with rows of hooked fangs yawned and snarled. Yet the Wise Ones knew, it had been no creature of Hell that had summoned them, no foolish mortal in the land of the Above that had recited age old incantations of beckoning. Things in the land of the Above were changing, shifting the balance of Good and Evil towards the powers of the Light. Narrowing newly opened eyes, the daemons concentrated and followed the signature of energy to its source in the world of mortals. The hideous ones smelled this change with flared nostrils, letting it fill their rotten lungs until it burst forth into their minds with a certain knowing.

A woman, innocent and naive, young and beautiful, unaware of the part she would play in the war to come. She would be easy enough prey, as the pure ones always were. There was no true need to worry; what match would she be for beings such as they?

She was enough of a threat to have awakened them, the oldest beings of diabolical renown, granted reprieve from the sufferings and tedious happenings of Hell. How this could be was unknown, and caused a commotion of growls as the Old Ones ascended from their sulfurous tombs. With growing blood lust, the need to destroy and devour filled them with powerful, hateful energy, filling their bones and sinews with the raw need to spill blood and ravage souls.

Having been newly born from the encrusted pits of Hell, they rose to their full heights, and shook off the filth in which they had slept for millennia. The sense of urgency washed over them, filling them with the need to act now before the powers of Good became absolute.

A figure stood among them, guiding them in the awakening. His long red hair spilled past his shoulders in a wave of crimson, flowing out around him as though it were dancing in some unseen tide of water. His wings were huge and mighty, far larger and more magnificent than any of the beings which stood before him.

“Rise my children,” He spoke, his eyes on fire, his voice both beautiful and terrible. “Your time to awaken has come. In the land of the Above, she grows in her powers, she can no longer be ignored. Destroy her and the one who will protect her, in any manner which you deem fit. For if you do not, the powers of the Darkness will lose its foothold on the mortal world, perhaps irrevocably. Arise and go forth, unleash your fury!”

With war cries, screams and growls they answered him, heads thrown back on terrible necks, great, clawed hands beating on scaled and rotted chests. One by one they opened the great expanses of their leathery wings, ready to burst forth from Hell and contaminate the world of the Above.

Smiling, the figure stood proudly in the chamber of Hell which had held the oldest, most monstrous of his children.

It was time for war.