Prologue

It was a cold May night, two years after  the birth of the two small children sleeping peacefully in her arms. She walked hurriedly through the burning town that was once their home, leaving everything behind. Occasionally tripping on loose stones and smouldering timber, she broke into a run, trying not to wake her precious babies. Her long brown hair, darker than the night itself billowed behind her in the wind as tears streamed silently down her cheeks.
Finally, after what seemed like years, she reached the forest on the outskirts of the town. But she could not stop, not yet. Not until they reached safety.
Onwards she staggered until the first light of the next day reached her eyes. Miles away from home, she was in a new forest. A scary new place with twisted trees and winding paths. She collapsed into a shivering heap, the children falling from her arms.
She tries to drag herself towards them, her precious baies, the only reason for her to live. Her arm reaches out to hold them when a large black boot came crashing down on her arm, forcing her to stop. A sharp pain shoots through her harm and she looks up to see a rough looking man smiling menacingly down at her.
He reaches down to the two small crying bundles of flesh still lying down on the cold forest ground. He picks them up and cradles them in his arms.
Writhing in pain she screams for him to stop, to put them down. But he just laughs, a cruel, heartless laugh. He slowley releases her arm from under his foot and turns to leave.
As he walks into the distance he can hear the woman's screaming and crying for him to stop, for him to give back her babies. He looks back one more time and smiles. Thinking to himself, 'I just ruined her life'.
He'd just stolen the twins who were born into the darkness.