Every Fae knew the story of how their world came into existence.  It was long and complex, filled with cunning, betrayal and all the things that the courts were know known for, but it started quite simply.<br/><br/>The Creator fashioned Prime, the original world.  The Fae were the first to emerge from the primordial chaos, natural beings, not created directly.  The first to come forth was known as the Queen, who heard the last echoes of the Song of Creation, the only sentient being except the Creator to know it.  Followed behind her was the King - the first fae.  Their "children" soon followed - seven Princes and seven Princesses.  They were the most powerful, each having the most frightening of abilities.  They walked through creation.  More would follow, but once the universe began to settle, the fae's numbers stopped growing except when the Queen would sing another into existence.  They stagnated and the Creator was disappointed.<br/><br/>To show them what they were lacking, humans were created.  At first the Fae viewed them with a tad bit of... interest, but quickly that faded.  The Fae went into their corner of the world and left the humans to their own.  No one knows how many years passed - Fae are notorious for not keeping count - but when they ventured out, humanity had spread far and wide.  Some Fae took it upon themselves to reverse it and learned a key thing in the process - humans were fun to toy with.<br/><br/>This realization spread through the Fae and, before long, the two races were at war.  A human could not stand toe to toe with a fae.  Dozens were still outclassed, but soon a special trait emerged in humans - a few could detect fae approaching and their touch could wreak havoc on them.  Some were born with the trait, others developed them suddenly.  The war was starting to turn.<br/><br/>In an effort to save both races, Faerie was created - a world for the Fae to retreat into and seal behind them.  Humans could have their world, the Fae would have their own.<br/><br/>If only things could stay that way.  No one could dare stand against the Queen... except the King.  Safe in Faerie, they bickered, thousands of years of animosity coming to a boil.  She had always refused to share the Song of Creation and now the King was deprived of one of his favorite pasttimes.  He decided to take things into his own hands and led a revolt against the Queen.  He even tried to fake the song and created nightmares made flesh.  The war burned Faerie for what seemed hundreds of years, but in the end, the sides and settled.  The King and Queen were missing.  The Unseelie, as the King's people were called, were cast into the coldest, darkest corners of Faerie.  But they found a secret there - the Queen's song was not perfect and small holes in Faerie allowed for travel to another place.<br/><br/>A place between worlds.  It was infinite, beyond imagination.  But getting from there to Prime was much more difficult.  The world between worlds was filled with infinite possibilities, echoing everything from Faerie and Prime.  Only through reflections could one cross from the Shade into Prime - and humans kept adding more and more.  Their own mirrors.<br/><br/>The fact that the Unseelie were disappearing didn't escape notice.  Hunts began and the third world was found as well.  The War between the Fae was spreading to Shade and, now, Prime.<br/><br/>-----<br/><br/>Faerie, to him, was a land of the boring.  It was perfect and he was powerful enough to change the reality of Faerie around him.  V'Lane wanted a challenge - a hard thing for a Prince to find.  But he had been following this Unseelie... for a long time.  His feet fell silent as he approached, hoping for an ambush.<br/><br/>As a Prince, V'Lane was nearly the perfection of nature.  He was tall, lean and muscular, beautiful beyond belief.  His skin was a faint blue-green, his eyes gold and hair white.  Not that it mattered, he could change it at will - in reality while in Faerie, by glamour in Prime.  He was a master of an array of powers, some of which were shared with his prey, an Unseelie female.  She was what they called a Dutchess - one step below the Prince and Princesses, but dangerous enough for now.  He'd tracked her to this area many times, now he wanted to know why.