Here is the Prologue of Book III

The Boven Naturals: Echoes of Bhūshakt 

Prologue

Evan stepped into T'amery's opulent office, the scent of rich mahogany and aged parchment thick in the air. His parents sat at a polished table, sipping bitterstone tea and nibbling seaweed cakes beside T'amery.

The scene felt wrong—like a portrait painted by someone who had never seen human expression: all the colors accurate, but the composition unsettling.

"Evan, my boy!" T'amery's voice poured honey over poison as he gestured to an empty chair, positioned subtly lower than the others. "Come, join us."

"I'll stand." Earth magic stirred beneath Evan's skin, a slow rumble answering his anger.

"No need for hostility." T'amery's smile was too polished—gleaming and hollow. "We're all friends here." He traced a fingertip along his teacup in looping patterns. Evan recognized the subtle sigil—an enchantment, layered and sustained. "Please. Sit."

Voss and Poget Mundus sat too still. His father's sharp eyes were dull, unseeing. His mother's hands, usually expressive, now lay folded, inert. Their faces held the blank cheer of people too far gone to know they were smiling.

"I said I'll stand." Evan kept his tone level, but his heart pounded like a war drum. "What have you done to them?"

"Come now, Evan, why so angry? I said, we're all friends here." T'amery motioned again for Evan to sit, but was once more rebuffed. He leaned back, that gleaming smile tightening.

"They're merely enjoying my hospitality. The Hydropolian seaweed cakes are delightful, are they not? The bitterstone tea… a bit strong, perhaps, but effective."

T'amery let the implication settle like a dagger dropped tip-first into stone. "They'll forget this ever happened—if you cooperate."

Evan's gaze snapped to his parents again. Their movements were rote, mechanical. The kind of stillness that whispered of something deeper than sleep. Something taken.

"So, this is what you call friendly?" he hissed. "Drugging my parents and staging a hostage negotiation over tea?" He took a deep breath and added, "After the stunt you pulled at the rift yesterday, I'm to believe this is friendly?"

"I fear we've gotten off on the wrong foot," T'amery said mildly. "I know what happened at the rift seemed extreme. But it was necessary. Evland was out of control. The tales you've heard about me have been… exaggerated."

"Right," Evan said, bitter. "Because stealing our magic, torturing our families, drugging people and stealing ancient artifacts really clears up your image."

He shifted his stance subtly, taking stock: three exits, two visible guards, defensive wards faintly shimmering like heat above stone. His magic coiled, waiting.

"Oh, Evan. I believe my dear sister Evland has filled your head with stories. But I assure you, I am neither cruel nor power-hungry. You and your little friends have misunderstood me entirely."

"Really?" Evan's laugh rang sharp. "Then I suppose the Ankh of Zephyria just fell into your lap by divine accident?"

T'amery stood and walked to his desk.

The locked drawer opened with a whisper of magic. He withdrew the Ankh—still pulsing faintly with Sylph light—and turned it slowly in his fingers.

"You mean this relic?" he asked as he returned to the tea table. "This dangerous artifact I've secured to protect the world?"

"Yes. The one you stole." Evan's tone dropped. His father's hand twitched. Was there awareness under the fog?

"'Stolen' implies criminal intent," T'amery replied. "As Chief Supreme of the Boven Naturals High Consul, it is my duty to secure objects of catastrophic potential."

"Catastrophic if you hold them," Evan snapped. "Let's stop pretending."

He stepped forward. Floorboards creaked. With a calculated pause, he added, "Why am I here, really? What could a 'lowly Kobold' possibly offer the great Grant T'amery, Chief Supreme of the High Consul?"

His use of the full title was not courtesy. It was a blade.

The temperature in the room dropped.

T'amery's smile vanished.

"If you insist, we will dispense with pleasantries, Mr. Mundus."

The surname struck like a slap.

"Very well. You will find the Ankh of Bhūshakt. The Earth Ankh."

"And if I refuse?" But he already knew.

T'amery flicked his fingers.

The Caudate guards made intricate hand gestures—strange, unfamiliar, ritualistic.

Voss and Poget convulsed—brief, wrenching spasms—and then fell back into eerie stillness.

"These Bizonder guards are uniquely… persuasive. Aren't they beautiful?" The question was rhetorical, his tone silk on a blade. "Don't let their beauty fool you and do not test their limits. They have skills that would make even your leader, Paige Connatis, shudder."

Evan's attention locked on the guards—truly seeing them for the first time. Twisted Caudates, augmented by dark workings. Their eyes were voids. Obedience etched into bone.

"Stop." The word tore from him.

His mother's smile did not fade.

His father's breathing was too shallow.

Something cracked in Evan's chest. "What do you want?"

"Simple, you and your precious Cinquain Henten will retrieve the Earth Ankh," T'amery said, satisfaction rising with every syllable. "And you will deliver it to me—intact."

"You're joking." Evan met his stare, measured. "And what exactly do you plan to do with it?"

"It will be… secured," T'amery said, sipping his tea. "Locked away with the Zephyrian Ankh. Far from those who might misuse them."

The lie was flawless.

Too flawless.

Evan said nothing. He let the quiet stretch. Let the moment curdle.

He thought of the Rift. Of the way magic had begun to bend differently around him—like a compass needle searching for true north and finding only storm.

Suddenly, Ewie's words echoed in his mind: Sometimes the best way to change a prophecy is to fulfill it differently than expected.

Maybe this was that moment.

Maybe this was how it began.

The answer was not brute force. It never had been.

Evan's mind raced, scenarios tumbling one after another. None ended cleanly.

At last, he nodded. "Fine."

The word dropped like a stone.

T'amery's smile returned. "You see, Evan, that was easy?" He sipped his tea before adding, "And I always get what I want in the end. It is merely a matter of time—and cooperation."

But Evan saw it now.

The arrogance.

The flaw.

T'amery had already lost the moment he believed he could not.

With the realization, Evan's hands curled into fists. "What do you want me to do?"

He looked at his parents one last time—their absence, their stillness—and let the weight of the lie settle onto his shoulders like a crown forged in fire.

"Very good, Mr. Mundus. You have chosen the right side in this fight." T'amery gestured once more to the open seat.

This time, Evan took it.

He needed to know what came next.

He needed to hear the plan—if he was going to destroy it.

T'amery's serpent grin softened into something more human. "Good. Now let us discuss our next moves."

Even though Evan knew this was the only way, his friends would not understand.

They would call him traitor.

They would not see the chain he intended to break, link by link.

To pull this off, he would become what they needed him to be.

The villain in their story.

The fire that burned the lie to reveal the truth.

Not a hero.

Not a savior.

A weapon.

Wielded from within.