NexLord: Dark Prophecies

Dark Prophecies is the first novel of a three-book Epic Fantasy series. A mysterious old woman named Mara comes to teach four children who have been foretold in two dire prophecies. The kids have wild adventures while forming strong bonds. Mara teaches them to fight, and much more, for the mysterious old woman knows what the future holds for these children, and their coming will shake the world.

The NexLord series is a traditional fantasy. The focus of this epic fantasy story are these four young people who are caught up in a deadly struggle started long ago. The magic system is based on emotion and deals with the power of group beliefs and self-fulfilling prophecy. The setting of the story is a unique planet where all normal human emotional tendencies are magnified. Humans are not alone there; four other intelligent races inhabit the lands. Prejudice runs rampant and wars based on racial hatred have plagued the lands for hundreds of years.

The emotions of hate and fear have coalesced into one place and continuously inhabit the body of a human, known as the Dreadmaster. This being continuously gathers and wields these evil powers. The ever-growing power exists independently of the human vessel it inhabits and when the body is destroyed it is only a matter of time until the power inhabits a new vessel.

To combat the Dreadmaster's power all free humans gathered to create Knights of the Realm, known as NexLords. The NexLords and their Bondsmen are the one counter to the Dreadmaster's power. But with the ending of the Final War, the last of the NexLords disappeared into the east after warning that the Dreadmaster's power was still out there. However, no one listened or believed.

For three hundred years now there has not been a new Dreadmaster and no one in the Human Realm has followed the difficult path to become a NexLord. However, there is a Prophecy spreading across the land, a prophecy that tells of the coming of a new NexLord who will bring a golden age. Yet what it predicts is about to go terribly wrong... for there is another prophecy, a Dark Prophecy.