PROLOGUE
I sit here alone now, with little future and a past that is becoming rapidly irrelevant. I have little need—and less desire—to lie. My tale is the truth, no matter how greatly it differs from the histories that others have offered. Few others have observed the passage of time from my vantage, and of those few, none has chosen to set down his observations for others to read. When the truth of our past is lost, we are all diminished. I would build a levee against the flood of lies and errors that threatens to overwhelm all truth.
I write of time and change, of gods and demons, of good and evil—all inevitably connected. I write of glory and shame—always intimately related. I write of life and death—for neither is complete without the other. I write not to offend but to enlighten. Perhaps I write only to satisfy some need in my own soul—if I have such a creature—but I hope, I believe, that my words will satisfy others, on some level. That may be the one vanity remaining to me.
The hot breath of summer blows lightly across me. It is fitting. For I start my narrative on a hot summer day such as this, in England, in the Year of Our Lord 1238. And there was great evil on the wind.