White Star Phase: Book One of the Ascendants Chronicle

by Scott Beckman

  Book Description

  A liar, a killer, and a lunatic.

  One seeks to elevate his own personal fame and fortune regardless of those who might be left floundering in his wake. Another will stop at nothing for vengeance. The last follows the will of totalitarian gods in pursuit of eternal glory.

  They’re not traditional heroes, but the future depends entirely on them.

  From different corners of the world, they will be drawn together by mysterious forces to determine the course of humanity. Each will be given incredible power; how they use it will determine whether mankind is doomed to extinction or offered eternal salvation.

  WHITE STAR PHASE

  Book One of the Ascendants Chronicle

  SCOTT BECKMAN

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Camarei I - Apex Return

  Skor-Adal I - The General

  Mourisiel I - Conspirators and Killers

  Camarei II - The Verdant Knight

  Skor-Adal II - Finding Purpose

  Mourisiel II - The Villain Rises

  Camarei III - A Party Forms

  Skor-Adal III - Plotting and Planning

  Mourisiel III - Seeking Out the Resistance

  Camarei IV - Brothers

  Skor-Adal IV - Training

  Mourisiel IV - Manipulating the Demon

  Camarei V - Vision or Dream

  Skor-Adal V - The Sigil

  Mourisiel V - Setting Out

  Camarei VI - Aioni

  Skor-Adal VI - The Praether

  Mourisiel VI - Viscera

  Camarei VII - Telling

  Skor-Adal VII - The Thrall

  Mourisiel VII - Survivor

  Camarei VIII - Qati

  Skor-Adal VIII - Realization

  Mourisiel VIII - Borderlands

  Camarei IX - Stories Worth Remembering

  Skor-Adal IX - The Power of Zor

  Mourisiel IX - Plotting and Planning

  Camarei X - Still Alive

  Skor-Adal X - The Trickster

  Mourisiel X - A Royal Family

  Camarei XI - The Village

  Skor-Adal XI - The Nightstorm

  Mourisiel XI - The Majordomo

  Copyright © 2018 Scott Beckman

  Originally published by Scott Beckman, 2018

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written permission of the copyright holder, except where permitted by law. This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.

  Cover Design by Maria Spada

  https://thebookcoverdesigner.com/designers/maria-spada/

  Published by

  Scott Beckman

  Digital Edition 2018

  Printed in the USA

  Camarei I

  Apex Return

  In the fields at White Star dawn, Hammon churned the soft red soil with his bare hands. Loose strands of hair tickled his face, dripping with globes of golden sweat. Small wooden tools with spikes and spades lay beside him, untouched. When he could, he preferred to get the dirt under his fingernails.

  An unusual sound caught his attention; a low growl, perhaps, or a ragged breath. Hammon paused in his work and held his breath to listen. Tall yellow grains on all sides waved in the breeze, whispering but betraying nothing. The distant chitter of an avus carried overhead and water trickled through the irrigation, singing a familiar song. It seemed every bit the familiar, peaceful world that he had known all his life.

  Thus, when the strange sound did not repeat, Hammon assumed he had imagined it and returned to his work. He whistled a folk tune, a hopeful and happy song about lovers who cheated death to stay together for eternity.

  Among the low buildings of wood and mud and clay, distant and stark against the horizon, the silhouettes of early risers prepared the wake-time meal. Some like Hammon preferred waking early to get their work done. Others, like Hammon's brother Mir, slept as late as the village leader allowed.

  The growl sounded again, closer than before. Hammon scanned the shadows between grain stalks while his hand crawled blindly toward the nearby tools. Still the grains waved as if innocent, though high and dense enough to disguise a beast moving low to the ground. Hammon considered calling out to see if some wild thing might start at the sound of his voice, but the world seemed so calm that he once again returned to his work, whistling louder.

  Hammon and his brother were young, a dozen Blue Star cycles. Though born in Verden, the commune’s nearest city, neither remembered it. Their father had moved them to the independent village as babes, hoping to give them an opportunity at a free life. The old man had passed cycles ago, stricken with a disease that had slowly shut his throat until he could no longer breath, one that some had said could have been cured in Verden. He had been buried near the quarry. Despite having no surviving family there, neither Hammon nor Mir had ever discussed leaving the village. Both accepted without question that it would be their home until they too passed and were buried by their father.

  Others had left the village over the cycles and made the trek back into Camarei, putting all the benefits of civilization ahead of the freedom to choose their occupation and their home. Some had gone out of fear that the village might not survive the Blue Star’s next passing without the advanced architecture of Camarein civilization; when the Blue Star took the sky, it heated some parts of the world to intolerable temperatures and drove all life underground. Others had grown tired of the simple commune life and the daily toil. Yet others believed their village, built at the edge of the known world, might be encroaching on the territory of legendary predators that, if the stories were true, had once driven mankind to the brink of extinction.

  Therill, they were called.

  Hammon, like most in the village, didn’t believe in them. In his mind, the therill were creatures of story, invented by performers of an earlier age who had sought to add tension to their tales. Mir had begun to believe, but Hammon only teased him for it. To believe in the therill, Hammon had said, was akin to believing in the limitless strength of the Juulliiss or the gods of the faraway Skor-Adal.

  Yet that morning, when the therill launched itself through the stalks of grain with a feral snarl, Hammon's doubt at once became belief. All the stories fresh in his ears, told to him and all those of his village who would listen the night previous and the night before that and every night back for cycles, rang clear and true.

  Hammon scrambled away, leaving his tools, slipping in his haste. He shouted to the figures in the village but they were too far to hear him. Nobody knew he was out there, vulnerable and alone.

  The therill caught him when he slowed against the slope of a hill. Claws raked across his calves, splitting the muscles wide, and Hammon fell, pain flaring white and blinding. He turned on his back, some visceral part thinking he might push his attacker away, but the therill held his arms down and tore into him with its jaws until Hammon's strength was gone.

  When Hammon was still save for his shallow, ragged breathing, the therill rose on its hind legs, a broad-shouldered and spiny silhouette against the rising White Star. It waited, slavering, eyes on him. There was cunning in those eyes, an intelligence that rivaled Hammon’s own. They burned with an intensity beyond the thrill of the hunt or the adrenaline of the chase. There was hatred there, unmistakable behind the brown and red of the iris. Hatred that had been pent up, now
finally freed.

  Though the effort of speech racked his body with tremors, Hammon forced out a whine and a plea. The therill made no reply. Instead, it took him by the ankle and dragged him away from the village into the stalks of grain.

  ☆ ☆ ☆

  In the quiet of her hut, the noise of the village outside dim and muted, Erona worked on leathers with a knife. Lost in her thoughts, she didn't hear her mother enter until she let go a long sigh. In the flickering light of the small flame set before her, Erona saw her mother’s pale face and trembling lips, and set down her knife. “Another? Who?”

  Emeryn, Erona's mother, leaned back against the wall, eyes closed. She looked older than usual, as if her wrinkles had deepened since she and Erona had parted for rest-time. She rubbed her fingers together and flakes of dried blood feathered to the floor. “Hammon.”

  The name struck Erona breathless. At once, she recalled Hammon’s face and heard his voice. She had been seated beside him at the meal before rest-time. He had teased her about her knobby knees, made her laugh. “Did they find him?”

  “No. He’s just gone.”

  “Did anyone see him go?”

  Emeryn wiped her cheeks, leaving red trails. “Not this time. His brother found his tools.”

  “Maybe he’s gone hunting...”

  “There was blood. Too much.”

  Erona looked down at the animal skins in her lap without seeing them. Childhood memories of Hammon flashed before her eyes; she saw him playing in the children’s circle and running through the fields. She had known him for all her life, and had even imagined him as a potential father to her children, though his brother Mir had been her first choice.

  Emeryn knelt and touched Erona's shoulder, the exhaustion in her face replaced with concern. “Calcondre has gathered some of our strongest. They are searching now. They will find him.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” Erona returned to her task, trimming the skins for later curing. She ignored the tension forming in her jaw and shoulders, and focused on her work as if its importance overrode any feelings of loss for her longtime friend. Her mother’s hand remained on her shoulder a moment longer, then Emeryn stood and stepped back.

  “It will be made right. There will be justice for Hammon and the others. Calcondre will see to it.”

  “There won’t be,” Erona said. “Can’t you count? That’s the third one gone this cycle.”

  “Erona, I know…”

  “They won’t stop. They’ll keep coming, taking us away one by one until there’s nobody left.”

  Emeryn's voice shook. “Calcondre will find…”

  “He won’t.” Erona turned and glared. The pained look on her mother’s face failed to soften Erona’s heart. “He can’t find the fingers on his hands. He’s a fool for the way he’s handled things ever since Wret disappeared and you’re a fool for thinking otherwise.”

  Emeryn gasped as if struck. Erona tensed, readying for her mother’s anger, but it didn’t come. The gulf of silence between them widened, broken only by the song of an avus outside.

  Wiping away new tears, Emeryn straightened her back and set her shoulders. “You are not to speak to me like that. I know you’re frightened and sad. Don’t you think I am too? Don’t you think I worry that you might be the next to disappear?”

  “I know,” Erona said, softer than before. “If you’re worried about me, do something about it. Tell Calcondre it’s time to send for help. He’ll listen to you.”

  “They won’t help us.”

  “We don’t know that if we don’t ask. The people of Verden deserve to know what’s happening. All of Camarei should know. If it’s really the therill…”

  “Don’t,” Emeryn interrupted, eyes flashing. “They’re not real. Don’t start.”

  “Ricka saw the last one,” Erona said.

  “Ricka doesn’t know what she saw.”

  “It doesn’t matter. There’s something terrible out there. We’ve had no luck finding it or stopping it or preventing it from taking us away. We need help. Think of Landen's tales of the nightstalkers. When they came to Querble, it was a long night and nobody could see them. The citizens were only saved because Heto got back to the watchfires and brought torches." She searched her mother’s face for understanding. "We have to send someone to Verden. They have soldiers. They can protect us. It has to be now, before someone else is taken. It could be me next time. It could be you.”

  “No,” Emeryn said. “Calcondre will find a way to protect the village. Don’t ever speak to me like that again.” She pushed through the fur and was gone.

  Erona struck the ground with her fist. She briefly considered going after her mother but she knew from experience that there would be no changing her mind. She felt a burning desire to do something, to act in some way that might protect her village and those she cared about, but the only thing that came to mind was taking news of the attacks to Verden herself, and that meant facing the vulnerability of the road. Given the predator's tendency to attack when its prey was alone and separated from the village, the idea was too dangerous to seriously consider without help. Erona tried to return her focus to her task but when she couldn't, she set down the knife and went to look for Mir.

  She found him in the field, working with his head down. Though she had to stand on her tiptoes to see over the yellow stalks of grain that filled the valley, they only came up to his elbows. Sweat glistened on his naked shoulders, and his face was hidden behind long tresses of jet black hair.

  Erona stopped nearby, considering how to broach the subject of Hammon’s disappearance. It had gotten no easier since the disappearances had begun.

  Mir paused to wipe his brow and spotted her. They regarded each other a moment, sharing an unspoken grief, and then he returned to his work.

  Erona watched him till the earth until her feet began to ache from standing. “I’m sorry, Mir.”

  He neither paused nor looked up. “Me too.”

  “You know it wasn’t your fault.”

  “I should have been with him.” The words came soft, as if he spoke to himself. “I told him to wait. He didn’t listen. He never did. I should have gone.”

  “It wasn’t your fault.”

  “It has to be somebody’s fault, and I could have been there.”

  “We don’t know what happened.”

  Mir shot Erona a look. They had discussed the disappearances before and agreed on the dangers that others, like Erona’s mother, refused to accept. Those who had disappeared hadn’t fled the village, they had been taken against their wills.

  “Someone should go to Verden,” Erona said to break the silence. “Someone should get help.”

  “Don’t you go. Don’t you leave here too.”

  “I don’t mean me. Just somebody.”

  “We should hunt it,” Mir said, an edge creeping into his voice. “Trap it. Kill it.” His hands clenched the long-handled hoe like he meant to break it.

  “We don’t have the weapons,” Erona said. “We need soldiers. If it’s the therill…”

  “I don’t care what it is. I just want it dead.”

  Distant shouting caught their attention. Erona covered her eyes against the White Star’s light and squinted; a group of villagers approaching from the west carried someone between them and called for help from others in the village square.

  Mir raced through the fields towards the village. Erona followed in his wake, ignoring the whips and smacks of grain that she took to the face. Her heart pounded and her lungs ached but she did not slow, thinking only of Hammon. None of the disappeared had been found before. Hammon might know what it was that had taken him. Maybe the others had survived and he knew how to save them.

  By the time Erona reached the village center, the other villagers had formed a small circle. She hopped up to try to see past them, then looked to Mir. His face showed no glimmer of hope, only disappointment and concern. Erona's heart fell.

  Calcondre’s high voice shouted from the
center of the group. “Back! Back! Give her some room! Let Emeryn do her work.”

  “Mama!” Erona exclaimed, and the villagers all looked back at her.

  Mir took Erona’s hand and pushed through the throng with her in tow. At the center, Emeryn knelt beside Lasa, one of the older women in the village. Lasa lay on her back, eyes closed, lips moving in fevered whisper. A dozen long, black spines stuck out from her abdomen and thigh, the skin around them mottled in greens and yellows. Blood from the wounds had already formed a small pool on the ground. A bitter and unfamiliar stink rose up from it, worse than death.

  Brow furrowed, Emeryn studied Lasa's wounds. She pulled on one of the spines but it stuck fast and Lasa whimpered in pain. Calcondre, red-faced and sweating, looked over Emeryn's shoulder. “They won’t come out?”

  Emeryn shook her head. “They’re barbed. It’ll tear a chunk out if I pull any harder.”

  “Can we push them through?”

  “Through her stomach and organs? Her leg?”

  “Then we’ll cut them.” Calcondre tapped Erona’s shoulder. “You. Go get the knife from my hut. Hurry!”

  Erona started to go but stopped when her mother said, “It doesn’t matter.”

  Lasa exhaled a last shaking breath and stiffened. She had been a teacher, admired for her wisdom and determination, one of the first to organize the original trip from Verden and among those who had decided where they would settle their village. Though Erona hadn't known her well, witnessing Lasa's death broke the floodgates inside her and she wept all the tears she had defiantly held back since learning of Hammon’s disappearance.

  “What was it?” Erona’s mother asked Calcondre. “What happened?”

  “We found him. Hammon.”

  “And?”

  Erona stifled her sobs to hear Calcondre’s response. “It’s them. The therill. They’re back.”

  Skor-Adal I

  The General