The Dragon Star (Realms of Shadow and Grace: Volume 1) Read online

  THE DRAGON STAR

  Realms of Shadow and Grace

  Volume 1: Episodes 1-7

  An Epic Sword and Sorcery Opera

  G.L. Breedon

  BOOK DESCRIPTION

  (In case you forgot what this book on your digital shelf is all about.)

  AN EPIC SWORD AND SORCERY OPERA

  Dreams show us what we desire.

  Faith shows us what we believe.

  War shows us what we are capable of.

  THE DRAGON STAR

  Seven interrelated stories unfold across the Iron Realm as thousands share the same dream each night of a new star and new deity — A prophet leads a pilgrimage of believers, following the new star toward the Forbidden Realm — A prince turned priest assumes the throne as unseen enemies attempt to kill him — A special young girl is hunted by soldiers and protected by a man hiding from his dark past — A philosopher seeks to uncover the mysteries of an ancient artifact — A seer flees with an unreadable book from those who will kill to possess it — A carnival caught between two armies struggles to survive — And a man who cannot die awakens each morning in a new place to behold events he cannot fathom.

  Pilgrims and priests ― thieves and fugitives ― kings and generals ― all find their lives irrevocably altered as they ask the same question: Will the new goddess truly appear, and what will happen if she does?

  INTRODUCTORY NOTE

  WELCOME TO The Dragon Star, the first novel in the Realms of Shadow and Grace series. There is a lot going on in this novel, but there are a few aspects of the book that will hopefully make things easier for readers to follow the story.

  The novel is written in episodes — seven in each volume — and follows seven different story arenas, each with several view point character storylines. Every episode centers around a primary and a secondary story arena, and the other remaining story arenas all appear briefly. If at any point you find yourself confused about who is who, please refer to the Primary Cast List at the rear of the book (available through the table of contents). Additionally, for more information on places mentioned in the story, you can check out the maps and the Onaia Gazetteer at the rear of the book. The major entries of the gazetteer are hyperlinked from places where they are mentioned in the text.

  Also, throughout the novel certain words will be highlighted and linked to the Miscellany of Fragments and Artefacts at the rear of the book. The Miscellany contains various cultural documents related to words, ideas, events, and things in the story. Think of it as a glossary of cultural excerpts.

  Additionally, while I would recommend reading the novel in the order it is presented, each chapter (and interlude) has a set of links at the end which allow readers to follow the seven story arenas separately. There are also links that allow readers to follow individual character storylines through the novel. In this way you can read (or reread if you are so inclined) the novel in several different ways, choosing which story arena or character you wish to follow.

  To receive updates on the status of the next volume, free Realms of Shadow and Grace short stories, a free copy of my YA fantasy novel The Wizard of Time, and other interesting things, please sign up for my mailing list at Kosmosaicbooks.com.

  Lastly, word of mouth and recommendations are essential in helping an author’s work find new readers. If you enjoy The Dragon Star please consider writing a short review at Amazon US or Amazon UK. Even a few words would be very helpful.

  OVERTURE

  SUNSET SWALLOWS the sun as darkness devours the land, night chasing day chasing night in an eternal cycle forever racing across continents and oceans again and again and again. This endless war of light and dark rolls over realms of shadow and grace, lands separated by wide waters to distance their respective peoples.

  Onaia.

  A world of seven known realms. One sits bound in ice and inaccessible. The second is denied to all by powers unimaginable. Five more realms are each populated by vastly different peoples.

  The Iron Realm.

  A landmass of human dominions — nations at war and peace or plotting and praying for one or the other or more of the same.

  The Tanshen Dominion.

  At war with its northern sister nation for decades in dispute of theological and political practicalities, its capital of Tsee-Kaanlin sits in the southern region not far from the coast. The palace of Zhan Taujin Letan-Nin resides at the city’s center.

  In a room in a library in that palace sits a man of early years dressed in the black silk robes of a palace philosopher.

  Shadows and dust. Lamplight and camphor fumes.

  The man looks around the ill-kempt study and thinks: The old man never did learn to clean after himself. All those hours making it tidy, and now it is a grime-tomb of old books and loose paper.

  The man sees something in the lamplight. Something on the book-strewn desk.

  What is that?

  The man leans closer.

  Odd. No dust on this one.

  The man picks up a thin, leather-bound volume with a clean cover. He opens it and flips through a few pages.

  The man frowns. Licks his lips.

  What is this?

  The man turns the pages to the front of the notebook. Reads on. Scratches his head. Bites his tongue. Rubs his chin.

  This can’t be real. Can’t be true. But it’s in my uncle’s hand. Twenty years ago by the dates. Not these. These notes on the side are new. What do the heretics have to do with anything?

  The man sits in the musty cushions of the chair, head in hands, as he continues to read.

  What does it mean? Can it be real? Could my uncle have been right? Why didn’t he tell me of his suspicions before he died? He never trusted me.

  The man closes the book.

  What do I do with this? Who can I show it to that will believe me? The high priest is mentioned in the notes. I could take it to him if he were not missing. He and that little tahneff and her lovely tutor. There must be someone I can show it to who won’t try to kill me for its contents.

  The man leans back in the chair and stares up through the small window at the sister moons.

  There is one person I can show it to who won’t kill me. Who will even reward me. Yes. That is what I will do.

  The man smiles and holds the notebook tightly in his hands.

  To continue reading the storyline of the Interludes follow this link.

  EPISODE ONE

  THE FUGITIVES

  LEE-NIN

  NIGHT SKY. Stars blazing in coal-black emptiness. Celestial magnificence.

  The heavenly firmament dimmed by an unexpected light. Brilliance and beauty. A new star. Brighter than all others.

  Sunrise and footsteps. Boots and bare feet treading the dust of a winding road. Thousands of eyes cast toward the horizon, following a beacon of boundless radiance.

  Saltwater waves lapping against barnacled hulls.

  Sand and forest and ice-clear skies melting in rain. Rainbows rising over weathered stone, splintered with time, yet retaining shape and form and function.

  Clouds painting the sky in a sinuous spiral.

  A woman standing atop a temple dais. Below, thousands kneeling.

  A voice resounding with otherworldly power — speaking in every attendant ear.

  “I am the new goddess come to release you.”

  Lee-Nin woke from the dream, heart thundering within her chest. She clasped her free hand to her mouth to silence her quickening breath.

  The dream. The dream had filled her sleep. Moments of unconsciousness she could ill afford.

  She glanced around, eyes straining in the c
loud-covered blackness of the night. She listened intently — tree branches clattered in the mild breeze, crickets sang their simple song, and somewhere nearby, the gurgle of moving water echoed through the forest.

  Bark biting into her back, she sighed as she relaxed against the trunk of the sheltering tree. Her arm still clutched the slumbering girl to her chest, the child’s gentle exhalations wafting against the back of her wrist.

  Sao-Tauna slept, momentarily oblivious to the danger enveloping her life. Does she dream? Lee-Nin wondered. Did the sleeping girl also behold visions of the new god? She brushed a stray hair from the girl’s face as she pondered the dream.

  Why had it come to her now? Now, after so long without any dreams. A dream that came unbidden to many others for months. The palace staff had whispered recitations of the dream even under threat of punishment. From all accounts, carried through the iron gates by tradesmen and traders and local townsfolk, the visions came nightly to thousands throughout the dominion. Rumors circulated that the dream also haunted the sleep of those in neighboring dominions.

  Forbidding discussion of the dream only ensured more spoke of it — in secret. The zhan of the Tanshen Dominion held considerable power over the lives of his subjects, but his will could not extend to their dormant minds. People feared what they could not understand, and no royal explanation accounted for the phenomenon of a single dream inhabiting thousands and thousands of people’s sleep simultaneously each night. How could people not speak of a dream they shared with others? How could they not wonder at its source? How could they not dread its import? How could they not suspect that the god who spoke to them in the dream might be real?

  Even the threat, and the occasional example, of beheading could not still their tongues. The zhan and the priests might have declared the dream a blasphemy, but too many dreamers walked the land to make enforcing a ban on discussion a possibility. And despite protestations to the contrary, no one believed the palace councilors and the temple hierarchy to be immune from a dream that afflicted peasants and farmers and tanners and brew-wives in equal measure.

  Not equivalent in the sense that the dream came to all people, but that it came to persons of all stations. Not everyone’s nights beheld visions of a sacrilegious new god. Only three in ten saw the dream when they closed their eyes for the night. But that number had grown from one in a hundred, and all expected it to climb with each passing evening. Lee-Nin should have suspected the dream would come, but as her god, the true god of her heart, seemed so far from her, she had not anticipated any other god to attempt a lodging there.

  Might the dream be a sign? What could it mean? Why did it come now when she faced such danger, when the child in her arms depended upon her for protection? The wardens had said they would kill her — murder a child thought too threatening to allow to live. How might a seven-year-old girl threaten the Tanshen Dominion?

  Lee-Nin stroked Sao-Tauna’s cheek. The girl wrinkled her nose and shifted in her sleep. Lee-Nin took a deep breath, emotion welling up to choke her throat and involuntarily clench the fingers of her free hand.

  It didn’t matter why the tahn wanted Sao-Tauna dead. It didn’t matter how far they had to go to outrun the wardens sent to slay the girl. Lee-Nin would protect Sao-Tauna regardless of the requirements or the costs. It seemed improbable, but she had accomplished other impossible tasks. She would realize this responsibility, irrespective of the risks.

  Lee-Nin turned her head to the sound of a snapping twig, carried on the wind. The dull ring of muffled metal followed, the familiar slap of leathered steel against men’s thighs. The soft snuffling of dogs with their noses close to the ground reached her ears as well.

  She shook the girl gently, placing her fingers across the child’s lips to stifle any possible utterance of alarm. Sao-Tauna opened her eyes, wide and instantly awake, so unlike the normal groggy rousing of a child. Sao-Tauna rarely behaved like other children. Lee-Nin never concerned herself with the reasons — she only cared for the girl.

  “The wardens are coming again.” Lee-Nin held up Sao-Tauna to whisper in her ear, and the girl threw her slender arms around Lee-Nin’s neck.

  Sao-Tauna said nothing, nodding her head in mute acceptance. She seldom spoke, but it did not escape Lee-Nin’s notice that in the days since their flight began, the girl had not uttered a single word. Lee-Nin stood silently and held the girl in one arm as she clutched the folds of her dress with her free hand, holding them up to avoid dragging the ground and leaving even more of a trail for her adversaries to follow.

  She turned away from the sounds of the approaching men, stealthily picking a path through low-hanging branches toward another noise, one she hoped might provide the means of eluding their pursuers, if only temporarily. She ducked the knotted arm of a tree and followed the sound of flowing water.

  To continue reading the Fugitives story arena follow this link.

  To continue reading Lee-Nin’s storyline follow this link.

  THE FUGITIVES

  SHA-KUTAN

  STONE-SHARPENED STEEL bit into oak, the log halves falling from the tree stump as the sound of the splitting rolled across the gently swaying, dew-stained stalks of barley. The cloud-draped night sky provided little light to illuminate the small farmhouse by the field and the man who stood chopping wood in the darkness.

  Sha-Kutan placed another log on the weathered stump and hefted the well-worn ax handle above his shoulder. He did not need light to see the timber. He sensed the placement of the firewood without benefit of sight. He knew the ax blade would slide deep into its fibrous flesh with the same certainty he perceived his breath gliding in and out of his lungs while silently reciting the mantra of Kana Joshi, bestower of peaceful minds.

  “My mind is a clear sky — a brilliant sun blazing — illuminating All.”

  The ash wood handle of the ax slid through the crook of his palm, guiding the edge of the metal head effortlessly through the air, the blade singing softly on its way toward its inevitable destination — a terminus it did not meet.

  The ax blade hovered a fraction of a finger’s width above the rough-cut edge of the log, its descent arrested in a moment by the powerful arms of the man wielding it. Sha-Kutan slowly lowered the ax to the damp grass surrounding his feet.

  He turned and looked into the blackness of the night, perceiving the imperceptible with senses extending beyond the fivefold physical conduits of human apprehension. Someone walked in the woods bordering the fields. More than one person. One closer than the others. No, two. A woman and a child. A girl. And many behind them. Men. In pursuit.

  They come this way.

  They cannot come here.

  They come this way, nonetheless.

  What will we do?

  We could hide.

  Yes. Hide until they pass.

  But why do they pursue the woman?

  We cannot become entangled.

  No. No, we must not become entangled.

  We should hide.

  Yes. Conceal ourselves and let them pass.

  And if they find us?

  Then we should pray.

  Yes, we should pray. Pray that we will not need to kill them.

  Sha-Kutan flipped the ax handle up to fall against the tightly wound muscles of his shoulder, looking once more toward the interlopers rapidly approaching his home — his sanctuary against the past. Where might he hide that no one would find him? Years and years had passed as he attempted to answer that question, and there he stood, waiting for strangers to infect his solitude.

  He walked away from the small farmhouse and its adjacent barn, carrying the ax with him, hoping against all hope that he would not find need of it that night.

  To continue reading the Fugitives story arena follow this link.

  To continue reading Sha-Kutan’s storyline follow this link.

  THE FUGITIVES

  LEE-NIN

  TATTERED CLOTH rippled across the surface of the water, slow cross currents twisting it to sink and
rise and descend again. Lee-Nin held Sao-Tauna above the thigh-high river, letting the folds of her dress billow out behind her, hoping the fabric would help dampen the sound of their passing through the gently flowing water.

  She walked as quickly as possible, reaching her feet out cautiously with each step to avoid rocks and other obstacles along the river bottom. To her great relief, the slender forest tributary meandered between the trees in sharp and unpredictable turns, making it harder for her pursuers to see her when they inevitably followed her trail to the water’s edge. She wanted to put as much distance between where she entered the river and her exit as possible. As she pushed through the bone-chilling waters, she considered her options.

  She had not always been good at seeing possibilities and quickly planning how to utilize circumstances to her advantage, but she had honed those skills through repeated use since reaching adulthood. After a certain age, she had found that she could always think her way out of a problematic situation, often while events arose around her. She would do the same with this series of particular predicaments. She would reason out a path to safety for herself and Sao-Tauna. And, if necessary, for the girl alone.

  Coming around a curve in the river, she saw what she needed. The riverbank had so far been either too steep or too rocky to leave the water safely. Climbing the pitched earth of the angled river’s edge required grasping branches that would no doubt break and announce her passage to her pursuers. Likewise, stepping from the water to the bare stone would leave behind a puddle clearly visible even in the dim light of the cloudy night. A moss-covered outcropping of rock, like the one she steered toward, would sop up the water as she departed the river and conceal her new direction of flight.