CHAPTER ONE

Aaron Corbet was having the dream again.

Yet it was so much more than that.

Since they began, over three months before, the visions of sleep had grown more and more intense—more vivid. Almost real.

He is making his way through the primitive city, an ancient place constructed of brown brick, mud, and hay. The people here are in a panic, for something attacks their homes. They run about frenzied, their frightened cries echoing throughout the cool night. Sounds of violence fill the air, blades clanging together in battle, the moans of the wounded—and something else...