Two years after Mao’s father dies, the necklace of bright green emeralds that he gave her when she was seven glows a brilliant, dazzling violet. Chinks of pink and shelfs of concealed indigo sparkle brilliantly, catching the eyes of only her. The room is pitch black but for the glowing jewel.

The lumpy orphanage’s bed she occupies, finds itself empty as the girl leapt from its thin covers. In a swish of thin white cloth, the gently pulsating jewel is coddled in her near-frozen hands, warming them – almost. Mao sweeps out of the darkened room, desperately trying to cover the jewel, fearing the light as a giveaway.

Mao rushes from the brick building, a grey shawl wrapped around her thin frame. There is no time for shock. A dirt road extends from the double doors of the orphanage, reaching like an arm and turning sharply at the hypothetical elbow. There the tree stands. Nobody knows who planted it, or when, or why. It was said to be one of the Old Ones, turned to nature by the merciless battle between their kind and the Dark Knight himself, three thousand years past. But nobody talks of the evil that reigns over the poor land of Numaya to this day.

As the girl flees into the night, a crow, black as the sky above, swoops silently through the branches of the Illuia tree. He cannot understand the importance of the glowing jewel embedded in the fleeing human’s hands, though his instinct tells him to follow her. He does not know that the jewel may be the change that the next century is waiting for, the one that leads to the end of the world, or the one that leads to the new beginning. But follow her he will.

A million miles from this place, a black hand extends from the ground, comprising of shadows, yet still bearing substance. The hand is not the size of a normal human’s; it is the size of the Illuia tree and is most certainly not normal. Or at least, this is what the man standing before the extended hand is thinking. Gresh’ra looks on at the scene before him with growing trepidation. For three full minutes he stands there, thinking the same thing. He catches himself upon the gonging of a bell signalling a new hour, ringing from an unknown place yet penetrating the still, dead forest surrounding him.

Then, quite suddenly, a voice colder than ice and telling of a thousand evils darker than the passing of night and deeper than the Gorge of Hunro is heard. It is untold, but we know that the language was before the time of the Old Ones, more complicated than anything ever heard before and harder to write than the story playing here. Gresh’ra stands there dumbstruck at hearing such a horrid language, the words intolerable for human ears and something he never wants to hear again.

Abruptly, the sounds change, instead of seemingly coming from nowhere, the words turn into formed Common and come from the translucent hand. Not only do the words make sense, but they are coming from the image of a face, bare of detailed features unsexed.

“You have been chosen,” it says imperiously. The face’s undefined mouth does not move. Nothing more is said, the mysterious face-hand feels that it has said enough and, as though nothing has passed, it loses form and plunges unexpectedly into the still-dumbstruck human before it. Gresh’ra’s body convulses in a vulgar manner then becomes quite still, falling like a stiff board to the ground.

Sources do not know what happened next, they know only this: that it is unknown what happened to Gresh’ra, he still exists somewhere inside his body, but his soul is locked inside a cell bare of bars yet more confining than the room without windows and doors.

Back to the next day, the black crow is sitting perched on a tree stump. As suddenly as the hand’s voice spoke, the crow understood. The crow had a name, and he knows that now. He also had a brain, and he knows how to use it now.

The girl is within the hollowed tree, sleeping quietly, her soft golden hair rising and falling with each breath. This is not the Illuia tree; they are far from the orphanage. Mao’s eyes flutter open slowly. She does not know why she fled the horrid building nor is she concerned with leaving it behind her.

The first thing she realises upon surfacing to consciousness is that there is a voice, other than her own, talking inside her head. It talks utter nonsense. Mao shakes her head, futilely trying to clear it. The voice does not disappear.

Meanwhile, crow is desperately trying to pronounce his name, Lucius. Lucius finds speaking only in the harsh “caws” of his language frustrating. He realises that “caws” are useless if he intends to say his name, yet barks the loud sound into the still air around them.

Mao looks at the crow before her, only just discovering it was there. She clutched the necklace, which is wrapped tightly around her hand, so hard that the chain digs into her skin somewhat painfully. The still-glowing jewel flares momentarily as Lucius says his name, inside his head at the same time as crying it aloud in crow, and Mao hears him, both of his cries.

Now is the time for shock, or surprise, or both. Mao has lived for sixteen years and never has the necklace glowed. Nor has she ever experienced communication between herself and other animals. Nor has she come across a bird that understands words, language and thought processes. She sighs deeply and thinks to herself, I guess this is just a day and half filled with discovery.

You and me both, dearie, the bird replies.

XX. Mackenzie