Pestilence by Laura Thalassa

Prologue

They came with the storm.

The sky surged, great plumes of clouds tumbling and roiling together. The desert air thickened, feeling damp and smelling unusually ripe.

Lightning flashed.

BOOM!

The world lit up like it was on fire, and there they were—four great beasts of men astride their terrible steeds.

The monstrous mounts reared back, pawing the air as their masters stared out at the world with foreign, fearsome eyes.

Pestilence, his crown perched upon his brow.

War, with his steel blade held high.

Famine, a scythe and scales at hand.

And Death, blighted Death, his dark wings folded at his back, a torch of bilious smoke tight in his grip.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, come to claim the earth and lay waste to the mortals that dwelled within it.

The sky darkened and the steeds charged, their hooves kicking up dust as they galloped.

North—

East—

South—

West—

The horsemen rode to the four corners of the world, and in their wake machines broke, fuses blew. The Internet crashed and computers died. Engines failed and planes fell from the sky.

Bit by bit, all the world’s great innovations ceased to be, and the globe slid into darkness.

And so it was, and so it shall be, for the Age of Man is over, and the Age of the Horseman has begun.

They came to earth, and they came to end us all.