Extract from Book One

John Erickson
Illustration & Graphic Design
johnraptor@aol.com
www.geocities.com/johnraptor_socal

“It was said,” she (Mayrila) told me, “that if a son was ever born to my line he would be the last of the line and a seer, and his prophecies would guide the future to a place of darkness, where the kingdoms have fallen. You are the one and only son ever born to my line, Candale, and, as I have no sisters, or cousins, you are also the last of my line. You are that prophet.”

“No,” I said. “No, I’m not.” I got to my feet. This had gone on far enough. I had sat there and listened to her describe my birth in a matter of fact way, making me out to be nothing more than the product of a transaction, something she had done for money, and that had been hard enough to listen to. Now she wanted to justify why she had told me all this, and ruined my life, by blaming it all on some foolish belief she had about what she thought I was. I wasn’t going to waste anymore time listening to her. She was insane, or a liar, or both! But Mayrila caught my hands.

“Look in the books, Candale,” she said. “This,” and she tapped the page of one of the books, “is the Shadow Seer. You.” She released one of my hands so that she could hold up the book for me to look at. “Look at the picture, Candale.”

“Mayrila-.”

“Just look!” There was something so forceful in her voice that I let my eyes drop to the open page and the image of a boy with dark curling hair and large eyes. He was a tall, slim boy, as I was, but it wasn’t that which caused my heart to skip a beat inside my chest. No, it was that the boy looked just liked me. It was like looking into a paper mirror. It was my face staring back at me from a yellowing page in a leather bound book. My face! “And not just in this book,” she said. “In these two here, and in several others that I didn’t bring with me, there is a boy who looks just like you. Look at it, Candale. It is your face. There is no colour in these pictures, but the description alongside says clearly that your eyes will be violet, your hair will be black and your skin will be pale. People have dreamed of your birth for so long, other prophets and seers have seen you coming. They drew these pictures of how you would look and wrote these descriptions. They said that you would come from an ancient line of witches, my line, Candale, and now here you are, exactly as foretold!”