"Esylana!"

It was a deep night, dark and cold, save for the sparkling stars that splashed across the heavens in a glittering array. The moon was hiding her face, as she did monthly, and it suited the young auburn-haired magess as she made her way through the forest towards the great Tree of Life.

Former great Tree of Life. For Yggdrasil, as they so called it, had been touched and tainted by the goddess of corruption herself, but the magess was desperate for there to remain some magic within its roots, to carry her from here, this dying world.

She heard her name echo through the woods as she ran, and she hastened her pace, though the way was made all the more burdensome by the weight within her belly. She was with child, but she could not let this child be born here. Too much had already happened to this world, to her beloved friends, and she would not abide the prophecy coming true. If anyone could stop it, it was her. And it was now.

"Esylana, wait!"

She reached the great Tree, and with a fierce effort, wove her way through the tangled overgrowths of dead vines, prickly bushes, and the ever-growing roots that were so big the earth could not contain them fully. She was out of breath by the time she'd reached the heart of the Tree, within the trunk itself.

"Esylana, please, don't go, we can help you!"

The voices were getting louder. Somehow, they had known she would fly like this. Perhaps she had been more transparent than she'd imagined. It had taken every ounce of strength not to go and bid them farewell. She did not think she'd see them again. Somehow, deep in her heart, she knew this was a one-way trip. A one-way trip to...she did not know.

She worked fast. Pulled out the components for her spell, laid them in their proper positions, and then held the spell itself on the crumbling parchment. It was an old spell, she'd combed the libraries for it, and finally, after nearly giving up in despair, a single obscure thread had led her to this tiny tapestry of hope.

"Om nemneth, su goli es liath," she began, speaking the words with strength. The wind, where there had been none, began to whisper in a breeze, tugging at her robe hem. The cries of her friends, still in the forest looking for her, died as her focus drew into the spell.

"En latha, sol riath. Su goli es timneth," her voice dropped to a whisper, as the wind began to overtake her voice. She did not need to shout the spell. The magic was there, the Tree was starting to respond. A bitter-sweet feeling of success and loss filled her. This was it.

"Om nemneth, su riath, su goli sa lorae."

It was done. The wind instantly died, the silence deafening, as the air shimmered invisibly before her. It was a portal, good for one use. She would step through, it would close, and this world, her friends and family, would be safe from the coming Third Child.

She stepped into the portal, just as a pair of mages, the ones who had been calling her name, finally found their way through the roots to the heart.

"Es-"

Silence. And darkness.

~~~

(20 Years Later)

~~~

Somewhere, high in some unknown line of peaks, lies a library that is settled into the side of one of these mountains. It is not very well known, for whomever had built it, lost in the memories of time, had a mind towards privacy, and heart towards learning. But in spite of its lack of fame, the whispers and rumors of its existence still manage to circulate beyond the mountains and into the ether, carried to one distant land, or another, until seekers of knowledge, provers of fate, find themselves making the trip to find such a library.

After all, the most fascinating knowledge is the forbidden kind.