PROLOGUE
Death has been stalking young Dex since the day of his birth. No, not in the sense that the clock is ticking as soon as you’re born, marching through time towards your inevitable death but the actual malevolent presence known to many as the Grim Reaper. Or Sir Grim as young Dex will soon refer to him as. Though Dex has never actually seen his stalker, he could always feel its presence, as if someone or something always kept a watchful eye over him. He never felt alone. He knows it something that wants to take him away… away from the pain and away from the shocking existence of this terrifying world. The afterlife? He doesn’t know. The question Dex will soon ask himself is if Sir Grim wanted to save him, why wait until after he experiences the horrors of his world? To be cruel? A lesson?
Dex’s story takes place just before his 13th birthday in the fall of 1351. The leaves were in the midst of change as well as Dex’s own self awareness. Especially, the awareness of the changing landscapes and population that surrounded him during one of the greatest pandemics in recorded human history: The Great Plague. This devastating plague serves as the unfortunate backdrop to Dex’s story. There was no help as the disease ravaged the country over the course of only a few years and in the fall of 1351, death was at its peak. There were no medications to stall the spread. No medication to ease the profound reality that had thrust itself upon the community. No medicated smiles or comfort in knowing that you could be safe. No one was safe. And with this grim reality, Dex was forced to face whatever was thrown at him head on whether it be diseased rats, psychopaths, or religious fanatics. Ultimately in the end, Dex has to make the most difficult and significant decision in his short life. A decision where as a normal human being, would easily choose the sweet relief of darkness and nothingness. A decision only someone as unique as Dex could make.
As raw and difficult life was in the end, Dex eventually finds the ultimate distinction that separate us from the wolves: hope. But did it come too late? As unrequited the love was or as false was the sense of security was, hope was undeniably a valuable commodity during this reality and hope is what undeniably saves him in the end. Even after his demise.
Have you ever seen a dead body? No, not your grandmother laying in the casket after her long and tedious battle with cancer. May she rest in peace. But a body, half decomposed, stiff, ravaged by wild dogs? Wild dogs dragging the rotting corpse into the woods to feast on? How about bodies? In the very plural sense of the word: bodies. No? Well, Dex is about to take you on to his sad and terrifying journey through the medieval age to explain to you what he saw when he encounters the horrors associated with the Black Death. The countless bodies. The overwhelming noise of the rats terrifying villages and cities. The cries of loved ones kneeling over their deceased. The darkness of the forest that surrounds the short life of young Dex.
Faint of the heart, beware...
