This was my first attempt at writing a novel 3 years ago. I've decided to share it to show how I've developed as a writer in order to encourage everyone who wants to try but are unsure of their skills.

The novel was supposed to be the first in a series, but I've not continued it beyond this first book. Maybe I will one day :)

Prologue

Io stood in silence, staring out over the world with hollow eyes. The storm wailed in his ears, shrieking with the sound of those who had lost their lives. Thick, black pillars of smoke rose from dying fires, reaching into the darkening sky.

He was too late; too late to save those who needed him the most.

Again.

She had said: One more try Io, only one. Now there was nothing left. Nothing for him to save, nothing to salvage.

The precipice was a mere step away, one step and he would be free. He closed his eyes and let go...

-----

They called him Io: he who returns. Centuries had passed since he abandoned the world he was destined to save. Centuries of time to restore and rebuild what was lost. Centuries to heal and forget.

Memories faded to faint whispers until the day the patched up wounds began to bleed. Once more, the world was falling apart at the seams. The very fabric of existence was withering, threads were running loose. Souls were wasting while shadows whispered. Hope was dwindling or non-existent.

Qumo sat in meditation, listening to the world around him. He did it out of habit, knowing that he wouldn't hear what he was searching for. All he heard was the soft rustle of leaves in the wind, cracking branches, and the soothing sound of water racing down the small creek. The Forces of Elements had been forgotten and neglected for long centuries, and now they were but a whisper of what they once were. Fire, Earth, Water, Air, all of them were silent.

He remembered a time when the force of the Earth had called out to him, urging him to let it live through him, within him. The emptiness created inside of him when Io silenced the forces was still there. The resentment was gone, but not the feeling of loss. He knew that Io had done what he thought was right. Everyone made mistakes.

"Qumo?”

“Boy, you know I don’t like to be disturbed while I meditate,” he huffed in disapproval. He could picture his young ward rolling his eyes at the tone, and he couldn't help the small smile that played briefly on his lips. This particular young man always eased his mind, and always brought him his tea with just the right amount of honey. However, he would never tell this insolent Human any of those things. At least not to his face.

He opened his eyes. “Now, what is it?” he asked, arching his brow. The stern look he shot seemed to have very little effect, as usual.

"They've returned," the young man whispered, his voice faint and sad.

Qumo looked into his ward's cloud-colored eyes, searching for answers to questions he didn't want to voice. Those eyes were most likely the reason he was here, far away from the superstitious parents that abandoned him as an infant. Here, among the N'aians, he was the boy or the Human, but never the freak, never feared out of superstition. Now those eyes glistened with repressed tears.

"How many?" Qumo asked, rising from the soft grass. He stretched his legs and tried to forget that his body had lived too long already. Next year he would begin his tenth century, but he wasn't ready to leave this world behind just yet.

"Five," his ward answered, disrupting his thoughts of old age and aching limbs. Only five, he thought. They had been a band of ten N'aians, ordered to stay out of fighting. They should have been ten upon their return, not five.

They strode in silence along the narrow path that led towards the settlement, dried leaves scrunching beneath their feet. The tall broadleaf trees around them seemed to stand in salute, expressing their sadness, as if they knew what had happened.

“Any of the five injured?” Qumo asked.

The young man glanced at him, his white eyes partially hidden behind his silvery blond hair. "Juno," the boy whispered. He knew Juno was special for his ward. She was the one who found him all those years ago, wrapped in a thin blanket far away from any Human village. She had acted like a big sister from that day on, always making sure that the boy was safe from harm. Losing her would be a great loss for the young man.

The settlement spread out before them, calm and serene, but you could tell directly that something was wrong. The tree-houses were abandoned, and the smithy was silent. It wasn’t until they faced the ancient central tree that they saw the first signs of life.

It was a grand tree, reaching further towards the sky than any other one, its blood red crown casting a large shadow on those below. Mothers and fathers hugged their sons and daughters, but many more stood rigid and quiet. Tears flowed from their eyes in slow trickles.

A few turned towards them as they came.

“Qumo..."

He nodded in acknowledgement to their collective greeting. He wanted nothing more than to comfort them all, but the words he wanted to say slipped his mind. The devastation in their eyes mirrored his own. How could he make them feel better when all he wanted was to go back in time and retract his order.

He had sent the N'aians to their deaths, unaware of the risks. The world had become a dangerous place, and he should have known. It was his responsibility, and now their lives would forever weigh on his conscience.

"This should not have happened. I grieve with you all from the depth of my heart. I will not ask for your forgiveness, nor your understanding. I am sorry to have sent you out on a mission without understanding the risks it would pose."

They were all watching him, listening to his words. He could see anger in the faces of those who had lost someone, but also defeat.

"The world is not what it used to be. We knew what we were heading into, we knew the risks, but we also knew that we had to gather as much information as possible. We were ambushed close to the border, just as we were heading into Scia. Their actions were not of your doing, Qumo. This is not your fault," someone spoke up. Qumo met the eyes of the speaker: Leiwen, one of their bravest fighters and informants. Her husband was not at her side as he should have been, but all Qumo saw was her bravery and determination, not her grief.

"You should visit Juno," she continued, waving for him to come with her.

He nodded to those he passed; he would speak with them later. First, he had to do what he could for the one that had returned, the one who still had a chance to survive.

Leiwen led him to their care-house. He hated the place since the time he spent while caring for his late wife. He steeled himself to go inside, already scrunching his nose to the strong scents of herbs and vinegar that called upon his memories. It was a small cottage, different from the other houses with its muddy brown walls and steep roof. It belonged more inside a Human village than in a N'aian one, but the thick walls helped to keep an even temperature inside.

He was greeted by their doctor and Juno's family. They stood ready, ready to take their leave of her, forming a circle around her where she lay. She was completely motionless, her eyes closed. Her long light-green hair rested like a halo around her beautiful face. She looked at peace but it did nothing to alleviate the sorrow that hung in the air around them.

The narrow bed was covered in flowers, petals, leaves, twigs, soil, and smooth stones: everything to signify the Earth. He held back his tears, but couldn’t quiet the rage inside. She wasn’t supposed to leave this soon. She was too young, far too young. None of them should have died.

"It's too late," Juno's mother said, her eyes red from shed tears.

He approached the unconscious female and took hold of her rigid hand. He felt nothing; she wasn’t there. “Juno, your time has not yet arrived. He cannot take you unless you are willing. Come back!" he urged. His voice remained steady, but emotions were crawling at the edges, ready to take charge if he let them. It all became so real: seeing her before him, a sacrifice for the information he had requested.

Someone patted his shoulder: his ward, and this time Qumo almost lost his patience. This wasn’t the time to interrupt.

"She handed me this when they arrived. She told me to give it to you," the young man whispered and handed him a slip of paper.

In a shroud of night

As the shadows lengthen

As warriors cry in mind

Their children die

white upon white to See

black upon black

Night is Light, Fire and Earth, Water and Air

Behold the World of Io

Qumo recognized the hymn. It was from the Willow Scrolls. He sighed. The hymn had been spoken so many times, to no avail. The secrets once held within those words had died along with their hope of a better world. Io seemed to have visited the world for the last time, leaving them to fend for themselves. He looked into his ward’s eyes again, ready to scream out his frustration. However, the boy didn’t look away. Those eyes... White upon white.

“Find him!”

Qumo startled as he heard his own voice. It was not he who had spoken, yet it was. Their eyes met, and once again he was surprised to see such deep understanding in those cloud-colored eyes. His ward only nodded and left, leaving him alone with a family in grief.

He still held Juno’s hand, and for a brief moment he thought that he felt her presence. He studied her lifeless expression, her beautiful face.

“Hold on Juno. Please...”

She didn’t, and a lone tear fell from his eyes.

-----

The young man, or Vito as the other young ones called him, sprinted from the care-house. Tears burned behind his eyes. She was gone, Juno was gone. He forced down the tears; he wouldn't soil her memory by showing his weakness. He would show her that he was strong, that he was brave. He would make her proud. However, that thought was hard to maintain as the world screamed around him, and not only from the pain of losing the only true friend he had. Those screams were ever-present, his constant companions for as long as he could remember. He never heard the silence that Qumo talked of, instead he heard the voices of thousands upon thousands of Human souls that left this world by the hands of each other.

Countless wars had raged outside their forests for centuries. The latest between Scia and Easthold was just one among countless. They fought for land, they fought for their beliefs; they fought for their honor. They even fought for freedom, but they died, died with losses, died with victories: they died in vain. To him it seemed pointless, but he had lived too long with the N'aians to know what it was to be a Human, what it was to be one of them. Yet, he still heard their haunting cries that pierced his soul and left him hollow. He shared their pain.

He climbed up the steps carved into the thick bark of his tree, and rushed into his small tree-house. He began to fill a small rucksack with clothes and items he thought he would need. He had never been outside the settlement alone, but this wasn't the time to ask for someone to hold his hand and help him out. Everyone had their own problems, and they were all far greater than his own ones. He knew he should pack light, but still enough to last him a few days.

He had a vague idea of where he should go. Qumo didn't know about the voices in his head, nor did he know about the dreams Vito dreamed at night. Dreams that called him to the west, filled with emotions of anticipation, regret, abandonment. They were everything and nothing, and now he understood. Those hills he had walked at night: that was where he was going.

He thought of the note Juno gave him. These coincidences didn't happen, they were patterns of a truth, a destiny. Now he was following his. He didn’t dare to hope that his destiny would take him to Io, but somehow he knew it would.

-----

“I’ve got a new assignment for you.”

Milo stared at the brown envelope in his boss' hand. He took it and nodded, not meeting his boss' eyes. He never liked the man, but that wasn't important.

“Good hunting!”

The traditional words echoed inside of him. He knew what to do, and he knew how to do it. It was just a despicable way of using his talents for secrecy and stealth. But he was beyond regretting the choices he had made. This was his life, and he was good at it.

He opened the envelope after his boss left the murky room and closed the door behind him. There was a name: Qumo. Milo shut his eyes to conjure the image of the man. Nothing appeared. This was not a man then. He tried to search for a woman, but found nothing. He would have to do this the old fashion way: by investigation. Then Qumo would meet his end.

He burned the envelope together with its content in the small hearth and grabbed his things. Night was approaching, his time, his domain, and now was the time to travel.

Such was his conviction that he didn’t look over his shoulder when he left his safe house for the quiet street, arrogant enough to miss the figure that began to trace his steps.