Chapter One

First Prologue


In a place difficult for humans to find, a man, of sorts-it amused him to go by the name of Adam Black among mortals-approached a silk-canopied dais and knelt before his queen.

"My queen, The Compact is broken."

Aoibheal, queen of the Tuatha Dé Danaan, was silent for a longtime. When finally she turned to her consort, her voice dripped ice. "Summon the council."

Second Prolgue


Thousands of years before the birth of Christ, there settled in Ireland a race called the Tuatha Dé Danaan who, over time, became known as the True Race or the Fairy.

An advanced civilization from a faraway world, the Tuatha Dé Danaan educated some of the more promising humans they encountered in Druid ways. For a time, man and fairy shared the earth in peace, but sadly, bitter dissension arose between them, and the Tuatha Dé Danaan decided to move on. Legend claims they were driven "under the hills" into "fairy mounds." The truth is they never left our world, but hold their fantastic court in places difficult for humans to find.

After the Tuatha Dé Danaan left, the human Druids warred among themselves for power. Thirteen of their once faithful Druids turned to dark ways and-thanks to what the Tuatha Dé Danaan had taught them-nearly destroyed the earth.

The Tuatha Dé Danaan emerged from their hidden places and stopped the battle moments before the Druids succeeded in damaging the earth beyond repair. They stripped the Druids of their power, scattering them to the far corners of the earth. They punished the thirteen who'd turned dark by casting them into a place