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Prologue

When the sun dipped low in the sky, dripping the last of its fire, the children huddled together to hear the next part of the tale For the old ht into the rooun on a rainy afternoon would continue now, as twilight settled over the land

The fire crackled in the grate, the only sound as he sipped his wine, as he searched his ht words

“You kno a beginning, of Hoyt the Sorcerer and the witch from beyond his time You kno the vampire came to be, and how the scholar and the shifter of shapes froh the Dance of the Gods, into the land of Ireland You kno a friend and brother was lost, and how the warrior came to join them”

“They gathered together,” one of the wide-eyed children said, “to fight, to save all the worlds”

“This is truth, and this happened These six, this circle of courage and hope were charged by the gods, through the ht the army of vampires led by their ambitious queen, Lilith”

“They defeated the va ones said, and the oldsword and stake to destroy evil

“This, too, is truth, and this happened On the night the sorcerer and the witch were handfasted, the night they pledged the love they’d found in this terrible time, the circle of six beat back the demons Their valor could not be questioned But this was only one battle, in the first iven to save worlds”

“How many worlds are there?”

“They can’t be counted,” he told them “Any more than the stars in the sky can be counted And all of these worlds were threatened For if these six were defeated, those worlds would be changed, just as a ed into demon”

“But what happened next?”

He s shadows on a face scored by the years “Well now, I’ll tell you Dawn caht of the battle, as daill A soft and misty dawn this was, a quiet after the storm The rain had washed away the blood, huround was scorched where fire swords had fla In that limmered

“It was for this,” he told theht For lory”

He sipped his wine, then set it aside “So they had gathered to preserve these things And so, now gathered, did they begin their journey”

Chapter 1