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Be warned. This work is fiction only in the loosest possible sense of the word; to be fiction is to lie, and this work is quite possibly a very grand lie. But like all stories, it holds within it a kernel of truth, for those of the discerning eye to discover and crack open like a hard nut, to feast upon the flesh within. Be warned that this is fiction only because it is impossible for you to prove that it is real. That you may believe the people and places within these pages are merely ink on a page, pixels on a screen. That they begin and end in the confines of a chapter.

This is folly of the highest order. Oftentimes this is a necessity; it is too difficult to believe that there are things lurking just out of the peripheral, that monsters walk among the wilder places and masquerade, occasionally, as men. Folklore and myth and legend and children's rhymes, all tossed aside and labeled as fiction. We forget ourselves as mere mortals, forget that this place we exist in is older than us, that there were things that came before us, that will still live long after us, those things that inspired dreams and nightmares and all those strange little myths and legends and children's rhymes.

Be warned. If you think, even for a moment, that perhaps even a portion of this tale rings true, or if it dredges up a long-repressed memory of something unexplainable, something deeply, intrinsically wrong: do not dare deny yourself that doubt you feel. That perhaps it was not something easily explained away. That perhaps what you experienced is real. Is tangible. Is waiting for you to seek it out, and find it, and regret that you did.

Be warned, thrice, and finally this time, that we mere men like to think the world has been conquered. As cities sprawl and trees fall and mountains turn to mines, we enjoy the delusion that with fire came civilization, and with civilization comes safety. This is not mere folly. This is dangerous. The wild places have not been tamed or conquered or even quiet. You would not claim the doe safe from a wolf simply because it does not howl its presence. Indeed, just because you cannot see it, lurking in the underbrush, still and waiting for you to forget your place, does not mean that you were ever any semblance of safe.

The story begins soon enough, now. It has been waiting, patiently, hungry in the brush. Let me lure you deeper into this place, deeper into this world not so dissimilar to your own. Let my siren's song leave you complacent enough for that story to leave that safety of patience. Let my words caress you, weave a tapestry of wonder and terror and humanity. Let them be the burial shroud your innocence is wrapped in when you find yourself at the mercy of a realization far too deep and heavy for you to carry back to the safety of a shore.