by Tyler Brotherton

Created on: June 09, 2009

Chapter 1

I

As the black clouds swirled overhead, Thaal realized a storm, the likes of which he had never seen, was about to lay waste to his homeland. He turned slowly towards his house, not able to pull his eyes away from the huge cancer-like clouds that told him, in an un-spoken language, that the imminent event would be more than just an inconvenience on an otherwise perfect day. He finally mustered enough strength to finish turning all the way around, and started towards the house faster than he was aware he could move.

He reached the house in what seemed like an instant only to find the door barred from the inside. Taking another swift glance at the doom overhead, he moved to the door at the rear of the home...Barred... His last hope was the storm cellar. Although only a few feet from his current position, it seemed all too far away. A few steps, and what seemed like an eternity later, he felt the cool rounded steel of the handle, and gave a firm tug to find his efforts were completely in vain. As he tried to gather his thoughts enough to make sense of what was happening, he heard voices nearby.

He soon recognized them as his sons Jynn and Rhett. They were arguing over something quite intensely, and from what Thaal could tell, it was over a stone.

"My house betrays me as death rears its head, and they quarrel over a rock." Thaal said to himself. Not entirely surprised at the concept, yet more than slightly angry at the stupidity of their timing, he ran to see them on the other side of the house.

Beginning to feel out of breath, he finally reached the side of the house his sons were on to see them pushing and pulling, trying to wrestle free a shiny black stone from each other's grasp.

Before he could summon the words necessary to end the conflict, Rhett, the oldest of the two who had nearly 18 years, stumbled backwards a couple steps with the stone in hand. Feeling relieved that the conflict was over Thaal noticed a glint out of the corner of his eye. Time seemed to all but halt as he watched the following events unfold.

The glimmer he had seen was his youngest, Jynn, unsheathing a sword. All in one fluid slow motion Thaal watched the sword slide out of it's resting place as Jynn spun one full turn, slicing his brother diagonally across the chest, and grabbing the stone from Rhett's hand as his body slowly fell towards the earth.

Thaal was so devastated that he completely forgot the storm overhead, and found himself unable to breathe.

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