Prologue

The Planet New Atlantis...

The Zabourovax Constellation...

Date & Time unknown...




Even for a boy with Magic, dreams almost never held meaning and so it was not unusual that twelve-year-old Lester Kincaid didn't often recall his dreams. Except once. He could never forget that once.

It started with the stomach-turning sensation of falling down a long tunnel.

Usually, this feeling would be coupled with a sharp awakening, and Lester was ready for it. But the sharp jerk didn't come. Nor did the abrupt return to consciousness, like it always did. Lester didn't wake up, even as he felt his body slow to a stop, hovering in an abyssal darkness.

It was almost as though he was awake...but then he wasn't.

It took Lester but a moment for him to realize - he was conscious, almost fully so. There was a certain dreamy haze to his surroundings, but Lester could hear the silence - that certain absence of sound that is somehow deathly quiet yet louder than a thousand Banshees, all screaming at once.


As he hung, suspended in the blackness, his senses began to take hold. Lester could suddenly smell...ocean water. That significant smell of sea air.   And...yes! Those were definitely the sound of crashing waves coming closer and closer to his ears.

Lester felt the pleasant sea breeze cool upon his bare arms. He looked down and saw his body coming into focus before his eyes. And then the world began dissolving into a collage of color. Almost as though someone were sketching the world in around him.

Mere moments later, Lester was standing on a beach. No, not just any beach, it was Cassyvankus Bay. Lester would never forget this place, as long as he lived. He'd never forget where his mother's funeral had taken place.

The very waves that had swept her ashes out to the shores of the afterlife.

Booming waves lapped up onto the shore and the breeze, becoming stronger and stronger now, whipped through Lester's dark brown hair. The sky was as overcast and grey as the day that Lester had last been, and, as Lester looked out to the Northern Odysseun Ocean, something deep in his subconscious told him that there was nothing out there.

For a twelve-year-old, Lester was smart,

"It's not real," Lester's voice sounded for the first time. "This entire beach...it's all a dream."



"Interesting deduction," said a smooth voice. "But not quite accurate I'm afraid."

Lester didn't know where to look. The voice had come from all around him, from the very sand beneath his feet and the sky above him. The ocean had radiated with the voice, which was strong and definitely feminine.


Suddenly, Lester's senses were on alert. In front of his very eyes, about ten yards away, wind began to swirl. It whirled and revolved at high speed, and when the currents finally settled, a second person had appeared on the beach.


This woman was at least five foot ten, with gorgeously shiny black hair that whipped in the breeze. Her robes were emerald green with a low V-neck and covered in elaborate golden swirls. The woman's complexion was light brown with sculpted cheekbones and a prominent chin.

Her eyes were a deep brown, but something within them radiated pure power.


Lester immediately recognized the woman. He doubted he could forget beauty like hers, and his memory zeroed in on one of the many pictures in one of his school textbooks. His jaw dropped. "I...I know you!" Lester spluttered.

"Of course you do," the woman gave a smile showing perfectly-sized teeth, all pearly white. "As I know you."


Suddenly, it came to him. "But...it can't be you!" Lester said. "You're just a legend."
"And yet, here I stand," the woman said. "As real as you."


"You're a legend of Old Atlantis," Lester recalled, more for his benefit than hers. "You're one of the three Disciples of the Light. You're...you're Medea. Sometimes referred to as the Goddess of Beauty."

"You're too kind," Medea smiled. "But I'm no Goddess. Just a sorceress gifted with great power. And along with it, power's ever-present sister...responsibility."

"How can you be real?" Lester asked. "How can you be here?"



"This isn't a dream," Medea said casually. "A state of accelerated consciousness, hidden away at the heart of your very soul. A connection between our spirits, if you will."


"And you've come all this way just to speak to me?" Lester asked, baffled.


Medea chuckled. "You've yet to understand your importance. If you only knew, Mr Kincaid. If you only knew of the instrumental role you would play in the days to come."


"What do you mean?"


"I've come to seek your help, Lester," said the woman, very seriously. "And trust me when I say that the future of our entire world hangs in the balance."
Lester gulped. His mouth was dry and he felt as if there was a lump in his throat.

All his life he'd been the third wheel. The one nobody really needed, or paid attention to. In school, he didn't have many friends, he just kept his head down and did his studies. Now, here was a legendary, super-powerful sorceress who had crossed the borders of reality and broken down dimensions...to ask for his help.

Lester looked her in the eye, a newfound confidence being born in his heart and a new fire roaring to life in his eye. "Go on."