The place where the thirteen High Judges met was not a place at all, in the strictest sense. That the table seemed to be circular and wooden, and that the floor appeared as though ancient dark slate tiles had been laid there centuries before was mere illusion.

The high-backed chairs in which the old men sat were nothing more than constructs within the mind of the Summoner, and the pure darkness that surrounded everything had the eerie sense of being somehow more real than everything else, the floor, the table, or the chairs.

If any of the High Judges, the rulers of the Ministratum, thought of this place as frightening or even strange, they did not show it. That even the proudest of commoners would stare agape at the very thought of the place around them concerned them not. They were absorbed within their own thoughts, and had no time to spare wondering at the remarkable; to men such as the High Judges, Magicks of the Power no longer held any wonder.

© Robert Goforth, 2012, no part of this may be duplicated without permission. All rights reserved  

… though I’m still uncertain whether or not it even needs a prologue, whether writing of these things in this way somehow diminishes their impact, or in some way sullies the start of the actual chapter one.

I’m also debating whether to have a section within the prologue that shows some of the main characters at peace, in order to make the rug-pulling moment seem more potent; part of me thinks that doing so would only come across as contrived as… well, as it is.