Daughter of the Red Dawn (The Lost Kingdom of Fallada)

Daughter of the Red Dawn

Copyright 2012 by Alicia Michaels

Published by Anchor Group

Edited by Melissa Ringsted (There For You Book Editing)

Cover Design by Larry Stephens (Imagine Images Photograph & Graphic Design)

All rights reserved.
Published by Anchor Group.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher.
Please respect the work of this author by not copying or reproducing their work.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, places, or people living or dead is coincidental.

The author acknowledges the trademark status and trademark of products or people used in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication use of these trademarks is not associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

Dedicated To:

Mary Ann Stephens, for introducing me to the wonderful world of fantasy fiction by sending me a box set of The Chronicles of Narnia when I was a pre-teen.
Because of your encouragement regarding reading and education, I became a lover of books and the written word. When most aunts gave their nieces toys as gifts, you always gave me books and I will always remember you for that.

R.I.P.

Special Thanks to:

Karen Luellen for your awesome encouragement and critiques
.

Prologue

These are dark times in t
he land of Fallada
and I fear that they will only continue to grow darker. When we erected the wall between
our realm
and the world of man, we could never have foreseen this. Had I know
n
, I would have destroy
ed the evil that is Eranna when
I had the chance. But alas
,
dear friend, she has grown too powerful and now only the return of those we have lost will even
the
score.

Forgive
me for allowing my
thoughts
to run away with me when we’ve only just met. My name
is Adrah and I am Queen of the
Fae
folk of Fallada. I have lived for thousands of years, and during that time I watched our world fall into utter ruin.

We lived in harmony
with man once;
it was such a wonderful and peaceful time. Endroth, our great king, was the perfect ruler. Born of a human man and
Faerie
woman, he understood both worlds well.
All he ever really wanted was f
or both lands to exist together
in peace,
and for a time they did. This could not last, as the world of men began to change and evolve. Their greed and violent nature turned them into our enemies instead of our friends and we soon found
ourselves
in the midst of an unwanted war.

King Endroth’s heart was heavy at the thought of obliterating the world of men. While it was certainly within the power of the people of Goldun, the northern
region of Fallada where
Faeries
dwell
, we were in agreement with Endroth that it went against our morals to do such a
thing. We
are
a peaceful people, and wanted nothing to do with the destructive and corrupted legacy of man.

And so, it was with a heavy heart that King Endroth
charged me with a most monumental task. Instead of going to war with man, we settled on separating
ourselves
from them forever. For months we stood on the border between our world and theirs, our arms outstretched as we used our magic to create the enchanted wall that now bars them from entering
,
or even seeing
,
Falla
da
.
As if that had not been hard enough, we were forced to strike our history from their memory, ensuring that contact between
us and
them
could never again be achieved.
This occurred in the year of 1868.

My friend, I would love to tell you that this is the end of my story. I would love to tell you that Fallada continued on in peace and that our troubles were no more, but it is no
t
so.
Soon
after the wall was erected, the stirrings of evil echoed through the West. Queen Eranna of the
icy region of Mollac
was its cause.

Eranna has
always
been
discontent with her lot in life. Being queen
of Mollac
was never enough for her, and she fancied herself above those who ruled the other three corners of Fallada, including myself.

She is, I’ll admit, the most beautiful woman in all of Fallada, and well she knows it.
Her vanity and discontent are,
I believe,
what
drove her to an interest in black magic. It began innocently enough I suppose, for she only wanted to learn how to keep her youth and beauty. While the royals of Fallada are not immortal
—unlike the Fae who have everlasting life--
they have long
li
ves
reaching at least
five to six
hundred years
. This was not enough for Eranna, and so began a life of
covetousness. Once youth and beauty were attained
,
Eranna began da
bbling in spells and witchcraft
.
She also
spent years learning to manipulate and bring others under her will.

She was not yet strong enough to overcome the mind of King Endroth, who she had always wished would take her for a wife
after her own husband died of suspicious causes
. The great
K
ing had always mourned the loss of his
first
wife and had vowed not to take another. In her conceit, Eranna thought that her beauty would be enough to turn the
K
ing’s head, but alas it was not. By then Eranna’s goal was clear; she wanted ultimate power and control. She wanted to be queen of all Fallada.

Forgive me, I am running away from the point once again aren’t I? We
Fae
tend to take our time with things, as we are immortal and have all the time in the world to spare. But you have not, have you? You wish to know what
this
darkness
is that
I spoke of in the great land I call home. Very well, I shall tell you.

Eranna wanted the high throne, and she wanted the adoration and worship of every man, woman, and child in Fallada as well as the human world. Her mind became more and more deluded for every year that she spent practi
cing the dark arts, until eventually she was flung completely into madness. She would not rest until Fallada
, and Earth, were
hers.

When Endroth gathered the kings and queens of every re
gion
of Fallada
to his council
, Eranna was the most vocal against the building of the enchanted wall.

“We need only to demonstrate our superiority over them!” she’d exclaimed. “We are strong enough to rule them, to make
them our
eternal slaves!”

King Endroth would hear none of it, though, and the wall was erected.

Eranna retreated into the West quietly but seemingly defeated. I am ashamed to say that I did not see her next move coming. All of my strength and power were
so
focused upon building the wall
,
that I did not keep a watchful eye on her corner of the kingdom, which is one of my many jobs as the
Fae
queen. What I did not see was that Eranna had taken
Witches
and
Sorcerers
unto
her and was gathering power. The vain woman wanted no barrier be
tween herself and her ambitions
; she
would not tolerate any perceived threat to her greatness.

Not long after the wall had been constructed, Eranna gathered all of Fallada’s princesses—there are seven in all—and sent them away into the wo
rld of men. Two there were from her own home of
Mollac,
one of them birthed from her own womb
. Two more each were taken from the
southern desert region
,
Damu
, and the Eastern underwater kingdom of Zenun. The se
venth was the only daughter of K
ing Endroth and heir to the throne of Fallada. Not only were these
children a threat to Eranna because of their
beauty; they were a threat to her coveted power as well.

Never has such a tragedy befallen Fallada; seven young girls, princesses, lost to us forever. King Endroth fell into a state of morning so severe that I fear he will never come out of it. The four regions have become distrustful of one another, each blaming the other for the loss of the royal daughters. Endroth could put an end to all if he would only
make the effort, but you must understand, my friend, that his sadness is great. It has fallen to me to see to the welfare of Fallada, as Goldun is the only region of Fallada not at war with the others. They turn
to me for guidance and counsel
;
alas
,
there is only so much I can do.

It is because of this that I have had to turn to the scribes known as the Brothers Grimm. Perhaps you’ve heard of them and their fantastic tales? Of course I am acquainted with them; why wouldn’t I be? Before the walls were built, they spent
almost all of their time in Fallada, scribbling down tales of their encounters within our borders. It was their choice to remain in our land when the walls were built. King Endroth allowed this because he had quite a soft spot in his heart for the brothers and knew that their souls truly did thrive within the boundaries of our great kingdom.

What have they to do with what’s happening now you ask? Well, I am just getting to that. When the princesses went missing and the Eastern, Western, and Southern corners of Fallada fell into chaos, I took it upon myself to bring Jacob and Willhelm to Goldun. Within the realm of the
Fae
ries, they were each given a drink of the Elixir of Life, bestowing upon them immortality until such time as I supply them with the antidote. The men were old and feeble and I needed them alive and fresh. They alone hold the knowledge that is
key
to finding the girls.

You see, when we created the wall, we also created a time gap that ensured even more separation between us and the human world. While the girls were taken from Fallada in the year 1868, I have estimated th
at they
arrived
in the world of men
sometime in the 1990s. The girls,
who had been
between newborn and three years in age
when
taken, range anywhere in age from
sixteen
to twenty
-one
by now and will be hard to find.

The Brothers Grimm
are
as dedicated to this cause as I am. They love Fallada as I do, and will not rest until it is returned to its former glory. For this to happen, they know
,
as well as I, the seven lost princesses must be found
,
returned to their homes
,
and Eranna must be destroyed.