Prologue
"It was a dream. The outcasted knight awoke cold and alone. The images flickered at the edge of his memory: lux et erebus, the suffocating darkness, the swirling amethyst spiral above the dancing shapes. He was alone, as always, with the echoes of the nightmare clinging to him. He sat up, the roughspun blanket scratching against his bare skin, and glanced around the small, stone chamber. Dawn was just breaking, a sliver of pale light filtering through the narrow window. It offered little comfort. The dream, with its unsettling imagery, had stirred a familiar unease within him. Lux et erebus… the words whispered through his mind, ancient and ominous. He didn't understand their precise meaning, but he felt them in his bones, a primal dread that resonated with his current plight. He was an outcast, stripped of his title, his lands, and his honor. The dream, he feared, was a sign.