In the distant past of Earth, there were great wars which no one remembers. Where the inhabitants of the material, normal world fought against those of an alternate magical world, for who would have influence. Going on for years, eventually a sect of gnostics called “Druids”, seeking to stop the constant struggle, enacted a powerful magic over the world, an effect now called “Shroud”.
Shroud was a field covering the entire planet which largely separated the two worlds. Most humans couldn’t perceive it at all, and over time memories of the Other faded. As for the magical, they were unable to bypass it, never the twain shall meet. Once set up, magic on the material world became much more difficult, costing the Druids much of their power, and Shroud sustained itself via the influx of sunlight.
While some powerful entities could occasionally bypass Shroud for a time, they were largely limited by it. It wasn’t perfect; occasionally magic could still seep into the Material world, usually manifesting in an individual with small powers. Particularly common were the “Wildtouched”, descendants of former fae servitors who could turn into a single alternate non-domestic vertebrate animal.
However, as time passed, all memory on the material world of this time was forgotten, and people who were infused with magic either failed to learn their own truth, or kept it secret. In the magic world, the forces that sought control were slower to forget, but found all their attempts to destroy Shroud to fail.
However, eventually a enterprising fae lord realized the problem. Shroud existed in both realms, and attacking it from only the magical realm would always fail because it needed to be attacked on both fronts, both magical and real. Only the Wildtouched, existing with a foot in both realms, could be used for this. Studying for centuries, he developed a plan where he would use latent energies, channeled through an individual Wildtouched, to attack and destroy the Shroud.
Initially his attempts failed, but over decades he narrowed his focus. He first realized that he would have to attack Shroud during a total solar eclipse, the time when it would be getting the least sunlight and thus weakest. But those are rare, and channeling the energies needed would be difficult and risky. Resolving to use a latent nexus of power, he charted the stars and found one that would see an eclipse.
During the Salem Witch Scares of the 1690s, he manipulated a number of Wildtouched to start a small encampment on the edge of Threemile Pond in what is now Maine. This settlement, eventually known as Augusta Falls, was founded by those fearful of being found out for their alternate nature and executed. Threemile Pond itself was such a nexus of ley energies, and was to see a total solar eclipse pass over in June of 2016.
With two problems solved, he started working on getting a channel. These efforts met with failure; the backlash of channeling that through any individual mortal was simply too much strain on their bodies. For the next several hundred years, events were manipulated to try and allow them to handle this influx of power better, allowing some Wildtouched lines under his guidance to develop a level of powerful healing.
This healing, however, would prove its own difficulty; the most promising lineages started to suffer increasing numbers of premature births. Frustrated but undaunted, in the early 1900s the fae started funding significant amounts of medical research, particularly in neonatal intensive care, knowing his time was starting to run out.
But it worked. Eventually everything came together, and individuals started to be born who were able to handle close to the necessary power…and on April 7th, 1986, Richard Peter Gallian was born in Minnesota, weak and early, but pulling through with intervention. Seeing that he finally had the individual he needed, the fae manipulated events to get Richard’s family over to Maine, he kept an eye on the child as he grew and his spark awakened at 15. A final challenge appeared in 2007, when the boy went on the run after being spooked by an attempt to root out more about the Wildtouched by an organization known as Lapis Lazuli. Moving across the continent using his shapeshifting into a red-tailed hawk to aid him.
Initially the fae moved on to other candidates, as there had been others born, but due to a series of unfortunate events, by 2015, all of the others had proven to be nonviable in one fashion or another. With the clock rapidly ticking down, much effort was spent to track down the missing bird, and eventually he managed to be brought in with only days to spare.
Using his friends and concern for others against him, the fae broke Richard’s will to fight by offering to stop torturing the people in his care, which he did. From there, the fae used his pawn as the channel through which to destroy Shroud. And on the afternoon of June 20th, 2016, during the total eclipse, Shroud was finally destroyed, and long-denied magic flooded back into the world like a tidal wave from a broken dam. The world will never be the same…the world of the Sundered Shroud.