The Herald of Autumn

September 23, 2002 
The Maine Wilderness 

There are things unseen in the world of men, strange things that live in the secret cracks between places.

Fortunately for the children of men, there is one who protects us from the darkness that we cannot see. 

Every year, with the death of summer, Tommy Maple, the Herald of Autumn, awakens to again wander the land. Wherever he goes, red and golden leaves follow him, and he hunts the twisted creatures in the darkness. 

This Autumn, however, is different from those in the past.

Tommy awakens to the taunting of a mysterious and elusive worker-of-wonders. Soon, a sinister tale unfolds- a story made from the whispering of forgotten legends that ends with a dark revelation. 

A story that Tommy has always been part of, even though he didn't know it. 

Far from the eyes of men is an ancient abomination, hidden from even from the Facility. As ever, Tommy pokes where he should not, and soon the hunter is the one that is hunted, chased through a misbegotten wood by a creature who seems to be little more than darkness and feckless hunger. 

The behemoth is pure horror, and can unmake everything Tommy is. 

As the Herald faces a foe unlike any other, will he fall to the darkness that haunts our world? Will the shadows of a lost age devour him, causing him to be reborn as one of the world's sorrows? Or can he trust the wonder-worker, a creature spun from little more than trickery, malevolence and deceit?