[center][h1]Prologue[/h1][h2]Two Weeks Ago[/h2][h3] In A Crevice Between Realms [/h3][/center]
	[i]The rumble of arcane words shook through the utter darkness. Power unlike any Salzen had felt for millennia stirred in his chest, arousing him from the agonizing, eternal slumber he had been banished to ages past. A long, deep groan broke the ear-splitting silence, the sound vibrating in his chest as the incantation grew louder. 
	Two glowing eyes, one entirely a deep red and the other a sky blue with a white spiral for a pupil, opened, both filled with a maliciously joyful spark. He blinked slowly, and the colors swapped eyes.
	Around him, the enchanted earth that had been his prison began to tremble as another voice joined the first, and then a third. They spoke together as one, the strength of the incantation intensifying. 
	With a series of cracks and the clatter of rocks falling and colliding with the narrow walls of the In-Between crevice, a sinuous line of light formed above him, tearing the darkness into two and shattering the maddening silence with the sound of the earth pulling apart. 
	“At last,” he whispered, his voice hoarse from lifetimes of lying dormant. A smile spread over his face as the chanting neared its end. 
	He inhaled through a long, slender nose, closed his eyes, and crossed his arms over his chest as his form began to rise toward the crack in a slow spiral.
	“Freedom.” He drew out the word as his body shot toward the light, toward those who had sealed him in this forsaken prison. Toward the world of Htrea.
	At long last, vengeance would be his to take, and he would see to it that the worlds would bow to him.[/i]

[center][h3]On Earth and In Htrea[/h3][/center]
	The very foundation of the worlds shook. Earthquakes stirred all around both worlds, the worst of it hitting Htrea with a vengeance and creating various tsunamis in even the most peaceful of waters. The occurrences baffled both Earth’s seismologists and Htrea’s Landwatchers as the earth quivered fearfully in parts of the worlds that had never before seen an earthquake.
	On Earth, people became frantic, even crazed, in the ensuing couple weeks as aftershocks still occasionally struck the planet worldwide, their intensity, thankfully, decreasing over time. Many blamed the government, boisterous rumors of various conspiracies forming around the unnatural events that no scientist could give a sound explanation for, while yet others proclaimed the end was neigh. Crime rates escalated. Everyone was on edge, as if a change had occurred not only within the depths of the earth, but in the very air they breathed.
	In Htrea, things were only that much worse. Not a day went by without multiple quakes being reported. Platoons of mysterious knights began sprouting up throughout every continent, bringing with them death and destruction. A fear settled over the land like a plague and hung heavily in the atmosphere. Crimes against humans grew to a record high. For those who could use it, even the ancient magic that flowed through the world felt slightly different, more testy than usual.
	But to two young people, one residing on Earth and the other in Htrea, the atmosphere was nauseating. Deep down, no matter how hard they tried to ignore it, something nagged at them, something that went deeper than the chaos ensuing around them. What, exactly, was neigh impossible to say. If they had not known of their abilities before, now it felt like they were going into overdrive, as if even their powers knew something was coming, something they themselves could not yet grasp. But one thing was certain: whatever the gut-wrenching feeling meant, it could only bode ill for them.

[center][h1]A Note to Start[/h1][h2]Present Day[/h2][h3]In A Small Htrean Town
Not Far From the Capital City Ekal Tlas[/h3][/center]
	The warm sunlight shown down on a small lake, glittering on the ripples as if nothing else in the world mattered, as if, in this small corner of the world, all was safe. A couple teenagers braved dipping their feet in the cold water, while others watched from the safety of the shore as they walked the lake.
	Despite the chill of late fall in the air, Zaris Hollowmire sat on a low-hanging branch, bare-chested. His platinum hair, which fell just below his ears, was as unruly as ever, and the daylight hit the four long scars running the length of his left arm just right to make them stand out against his fair skin. He had one foot with his knee bent on the branch, the other dangling below him, and his back against the rough trunk of the tree. He had his eyes closed, lost in thought. He basked in the peace of the place, and the security being with his friends brought him, keeping the foreboding feeling that had hung over him in a cloud as of late at bay.
	As the crinkle of the girl turning a page of her book reached him, Zaris looked down at the her, but she paid him no attention. He cocked his head, readjusted himself on the branch so both his legs dangled away from the lake, then swung his upper body downward, his knees bent over the branch.
	He grinned as he noticed the girl scowl.“Watchya reading, doll?”
	The black-haired girl slowly tore her gaze from her book to cast Zaris a glare.
	“I swear,” the girl growled, “if you call me [i]‘doll’[/i] one more time, I’ll put a hex on you to make your tongue fall off.”
	“And here I thought they only taught you to use your magic for good.” He made a tisking noise and let his arms drape toward the browning grass. “Such bad examples those teachers of yours must be.”
	He looked up as a another girl with long, wavy blond locks approached, the bottom of her skirts darkened from dampness. She clutched part of her skirts in her hands, trying to keep them from brushing the ground and exposing her bare feet in the process. 
	“Araina!” Zaris spread his arms wide as she neared, the fingers of one hand tapping the leather binding of the book the black-haired girl held, and making her scowl. “[i]You[/i] won’t make my tongue fall out, will you?”
	Araina paused, her brows furrowing in confusion. “Why would I want to make your tongue fall out?”
	“Because he’s an obnoxious imp,” the black-haired girl muttered as she scooted away from Zaris.
	“Aww, I like you too, Kara.” Zaris tilted his head so Kara appeared right-side-up. “You’re so good to me.”
	“Shut up.” Kara bent closer to the pages of her book.
	“Oy!” a blond-haired boy who resembled Araina in many ways called from where the girl had left him by the lake, his pants rolled up to his knees and the sleeves of his shirt likewise bunched up around his elbows, showing off his tan skin. “Afraid of a little cold water, Zaris?”
	“How dare you insinuate such a thing, Sir!” He said ‘sir’ mockingly as he swung himself upright, turned to face the lake, and crouched on the branch, a hand on the trunk to steady himself. 
	“Look at you, all snug and completely dry on land. Too chicken to get even your feet wet!” The boy stepped back into the shallow part of the water, his hands in his armpits as he waved his elbows and made a few clucking sounds.
	Zaris laughed. “I think you just offended every chicken in a ten mile radius! But, if it’s wet you want...” A mischievous grin spread over his face as he readied to spring from the branch. His silvery eyes changed to a swirling opal as air gathered around him. He sprung, the element shooting him over the lake in a rush of air that made the pages of Kara’s book flutter violently.
	“GERONIMO!” Zaris shouted as he angled himself for a swan dive toward the water, the air around him building up as he fell. Just before he hit the frigid water, he heard the boy shout a quick, “Oh, crap!” as he turned to run from the lake. But it was too late.
	The moment Zaris and the gale surrounding him hit the water, the liquid spewed up around him, creating a miniature tidal wave that cascaded over the land and drenched everything within four yards of the shoreline. 
	When he was about half way down, the water sucked in around him, encompassing his bare-chested body in a shocking cold. The liquid swirled about around him in the bit of air that survived within the depths. Using his natural instincts when it came to using his abilities, he directed the air beneath him to help push him to the top of the lake.
	But then, the earth around the lake quaked, sending a violent ripple through the water. It knocked both him and his air aside, and a current sucked at his feet, pulling him further down as the earth rumbled.  
	He instinctively tried to gasp as he was jerked downward, and water burned in his lungs. Mustering all his strength, he held his hands out beside him, and called on the water, his eyes turning a murky shade of blue. For a terrifying second, nothing happened as he tried to kick his way toward the surface against the undulating waters. As his lungs burned furiously for air and adrenaline pumped through his body in a panicked frenzy, the undercurrents rushed around him and aided in working with him, instead of against him, carrying him toward the surface and the shallow portion of the lake. 
	Coughing and sputtering, he broke the surface quicker than he expected, his arms flailing slightly and hair flying back with a wet spray as he shot to his waste above the water, then bobbed back down. Zaris’ friends ran toward the lake to meet him, calling his name, all of them drenched from his little show. When he was capable of standing, Zaris trudged the rest of the way into the shallows, his legs shaky, then collapsed onto the rocky shore, the water filling his ears.
	“Zaris!” Kara reached him first, her eyes wide and her words muffled by the water in his ear canals. “Are you okay?”
	“Aww,” he said giving her a weak smile, his lungs still burning slightly from the water that had irked them. “You [i]do[/i] care!”
	Her worried expression turned to a scowl. “You owe me a new book, you beef-witted wart!” She gave him a gentle kick to the side as he propped himself up on his arms.
	The brown-haired boy and Araina had just reached him, and a couple others around his age hurried from the opposite side of the lake.
	“Was it just me,” Zaris paused to cough, “or was that quake worse than the last one?”
	“It was worse,” Araina said softly, wringing her hands together.
	“C’mon, dingbat.” Kara pulled at Zaris’ arm to help him to his feet. “We need to check the town.”
	“Damage assessments, here we come!” Zaris said in a sarcastically cheery voice. All the same, he took the lead as his group of friends raced toward town. Worry settled in him as he thought of his mother, and the ever persistent feeling that something was [i]wrong[/i], something he could not place no matter how ardently he tried, twisting at his gut and making an involuntary rush of wind stir up around him, egging him to run faster.