After a time, his eyes moved on to a constellation just becoming visible on the southern horizon, settling on a bright point he knew to be Sirius. Before today, it had been just one tiny speck in an ocean of possibilities and he marveled at how extraordinarily mercurial life could be. Turning his head, he found Kirian staring at the same point in the sky. The man’s emotions were unreadable, but Magnus had the sorrowful feeling that the Makhás master would always grieve when he looked back at home. He could only hope that in time, Kirian and the other refugees would heal along with him and the rest of the fleet under the radiant light of Alcyone and that the long reach of the Drahkian Empire stayed far away from all of them.
Author’s Note
Descent of the Maw is the backstory of Magnus Talrésian and Kirian Vall along with numerous other characters who appear in the epic science fantasy series beginning with Blood of the Prime, T’nari Renegades—Pleiadian Cycle, Book I (see the excerpt “The Elder’s Offering” included below).
“T’nari” refers to a family of consciousness who shares a common purpose.
The amazing music from Naruto Shippūden kept me company throughout the writing of this work, most notably “Madara / Madara vs. Naruto / The Mask” during the battles in Merope, the haunting choral passages of “Girei” (Pain’s Theme), and the heart-breakingly beautiful strains of “Sen’ya” (Itachi’s Theme).
—Erin
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Other Publications by This Author
T’NARI RENEGADES—PLEIADIAN CYCLE
To Steal a Moon (Prequel Novella)
Descent of the Maw (Prequel)
Flare Shifter (Prequel Novella)
T’nari Blood Claim (Short Story)
Blood of the Prime (Book I)
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Excerpt from
Blood of the Prime
T’nari Renegades—Pleiadian Cycle, Book I
Excerpt from Chapter 13
“The Elder’s Offering”
Magnus stood with the three Schedaran elders in the shadows outside the flickering stone circle, watching silently until his grandson Rhys and the beautiful young Schedaran dreamwalker, Karra Jas Khurias, were well out of sight, heading for the wedding fires in the hills up above Tirim Nah. For years he had watched his gregarious grandson keep serious relationships at bay, holding himself back, waiting for that special someone. Recognizing the young man’s inner hunger, Magnus had despaired that Rhys would ever find whatever he was looking for in the perfect mate. Little did he dream that the answer would come from the reclusive sect of Schedaran refugees who had emerged two days ago from the far-off caverns of 1st shade to attend the system-wide meeting at the Great Hall. He was still reeling from the shocking sight of desert robes coming toward him down the aisle in the massive hall as he was about to launch the proceedings.
The sensation of eyes boring into him crept over Magnus’s skin and he looked down to find the small blond elder peering up at him with a look that could cut through steel. He waited for the Schedaran leader to speak, patiently weathering the intense scrutiny, but when the ancient man kept his silence, Magnus took the initiative. “It’s time we had a talk, Hano Emmon Dahl,” he said quietly.
Hano nodded slowly. Beside him, the other two elders took their cue and took off through the fire-lit sites to do some exploring before they retired for the night.
Magnus motioned toward the sound of the gurgling spring next to the empty circle of green standing stones and fell into stride with the small white-robed man. Hano seated himself quietly in the grass beside the small pool facing the glowing stones while Magnus lowered his large frame to sit next to him.
Hano’s dark eyes glanced once at the Andaran high councilor and shifted pointedly off in the direction where Rhys and Karra had disappeared. “I’m leaving you my greatest gift, Magnus Talrésian.”
“Your granddaughter?”
Without moving, Hano’s sharp eyes turned back to Magnus and narrowed. “My great-grandniece. You’re a very perceptive man. I’ve told no one—not even her.”
“May I ask why?”
Hano let out a long sigh and dropped his head. “Karra was about four years old when her parents and five others failed to return from a scouting expedition into the desert. I would have taken her in then, but I had a vision in which I saw ... your grandson, an outsider, someone unknown to us, holding her in a protective embrace. I had the strongest feeling that she’d need to leave us one day and I didn’t want her to be tied down ... to me. She’s very tenderhearted.”
“Must be the bloodline.”
Hano snorted without looking up.
“Rhys loves her deeply,” Magnus assured him softly. “He’s a very dedicated man. When he gives himself, he gives everything.”
“Must be the bloodline.”
Magnus laughed deep in his throat. “You could say that. Hano, why does there have to be such a radical separation?”
The Schedaran shrugged. “We live in different worlds. I don’t want her to drag herself across that blasted desert plateau all the time just for me. I’ll see her in the Dreamcore.”
“So why don’t you come here to Krii? We have a big family and you’re welcome to visit as often as you wish. I have a feeling that I’m going to need you quite a bit myself.” When Hano remained silent with his head bent, Magnus sweetened the pot. “I can teach you how to get here in seconds.”
The dreamwalker’s head shot up and his dark eyes pierced the Andaran councilor with brooding speculation. Magnus pointed toward the standing stones a few feet away where he had witnessed the Schedaran elders raise a column of energy up from Tarsus in a quiet but powerful blood rite just a few short moments ago. “From what my internal senses picked up during your ceremony, you are more than capable of learning a simple transport matrix, Hano.”
A look of startled hope flashed across the elder’s face before his sharp features twisted with pain. The ancient man closed his eyes and fell backward onto the spongy grass with a mournful groan. “By the Blood, Magnus, why couldn’t my damned prophetic vision have shown me that possibility? I’ve wasted a lot of years holding her at arm’s length for nothing!”
“I don’t know, Hano. Sometimes we show a remarkable talent for hurting ourselves when we don’t need to. Just tell her who you are and let things go from there.”
Hano covered his face with his hands and lay still. Magnus sat quietly watching the fire flicker within the stone circle, giving the other man a little space to work through his thoughts. The faint sounds of distant drumming and laughter mingled with the chirping of crickets and frogs on the cool night air.
Stretching his long legs out in the grass in front of him, Magnus leaned back on his hands, his black hair falling loosely between his shoulder blades. When the dreamwalker remained silent for some time, he broached the subject that had been consuming his curiosity for the past two days.
“What brought you out of the desert, Hano?”
The elder uncovered his face and stared up at the stars.
“Was it Karra coming to join Rhys?” Magnus ventured.
“Partly. But she would have come without me.” Slowly Hano pulled himself back up into a sitting position, crossing his legs in front o
f him and twisting his mouth to the side as he carefully considered his words. “The Tarsian people gave a desperate, rag-tag group of strangers a home, a second chance at life. When the Cih shipfolk brought us here, your gracious forebears offered us the option of settling in the cities, making our own colony in the Andaran countryside, or inhabiting the desolate caverns in 1st shade. The fear of annihilation was still fresh in the people I came with, so they—we—said a quick ‘thank you very much’ to the Tarsian councilors and chose the most remote possibility available.”
“You were one of the original settlers?” Magnus exclaimed. “Just how old are you, Hano?”
The small man laughed softly. “I really have no idea. I was well over three hundred Ushuan years when we fled the Schedaran system. I stopped counting after we arrived—the years are so much shorter here on Tarsus.”
“Hano, that was over four hundred Tarsian years back.”
The Schedaran shrugged casually. “We know a few tricks. How about you? I sense a natural health in all of your people, too.”
Magnus smiled and nodded. “I’m a hundred seventy-seven. This,” he said, waving an arm in the direction of the solstice fires and celebrations, “has a lot to do with holding onto our vitality—and staying as far away from the Drahks as possible. So? Why now, Hano? Do you need us? Is there something I can do to help you?”
Hano sat staring at the dark-haired man, taking his measure before nodding. “My instincts were right. Here you are offering help when you know nothing about us. That element was there in the people who offered us refuge in the first place, but the terrified Schedarans who got here were not in any shape to trust easily.” Letting out a long sigh, Hano began picking at the grass in front of him. “Unfortunately, our fears just got worse the longer we survived on our own out in the desert. But I listened to all of the news relays which were sent to us from the Tarsian high council and knew something important had happened here when the Pacifist Agreement came through.”
“You answered that message, didn’t you?”
“Um-hm. And you were a part of its making, weren’t you, Magnus?”
“Yep. I was a rather vocal young captain at the time and had seen too much of the Meropean War with the Drahks. The day we were driven out of Merope, we made contact with a remarkable group of psychic masters from Sirius who agreed to teach us if we made a widespread commitment to non-violence. We spent a lot of years under their guidance building our skills and designing new ships and defenses to meet the Drahkian problem in a new way. We may only be pissing in the wind, but it’s the best we’ve come up with to hold them off. We don’t have the network of allies we used to.”
“We do,” Hano replied softly. “The Schedaran dreamwalkers who escaped and survived kept in contact with each other in the Dreamcore. Our current network includes Schedarans of eight clans spread over fourteen worlds, and we’re still finding lost clans. The sad thing is, most clans are just as paranoid as the Ushuan, some of them with just cause. I doubt my contacts will contribute much to the struggle here in the Pleiades, but I came to Krii to offer my skills as a dreamwalker if it’ll help make any new bridges you can use. Karra is well-trained and extremely talented, so you’ll have two of us to put to work—that is, if you need us.”
Magnus raised his dark brows in surprise. “That’s quite a generous offer. Can you teach other people to do this?”
“Sometimes. Like anything else, it depends on a person’s inherent inclinations and abilities.”
“Then I’ll be your first student.”
Hano’s head whipped around, his initial astonishment changing quickly into a twisted smirk. “I’m a hard taskmaster, Councilor. Do you have the time to dedicate to such a venture?”
“I’ll make time. I’ve always been one to jump into new things with both feet, especially if they contribute to protecting Alcyone. It’s past time I started delegating a bigger share of my work to my more-than-capable staff as I was recently reminded by a friend of mine.”
Hano nodded slowly before his eyes clouded and he turned his face away. Realizing he had torn up a good section of the grass in front of him, the elder carefully patted the bare spot in silent apology, but his expression still held traces of agitation.
“What is it, Hano?” Magnus prodded.
The dreamwalker made a disgusted face. “I’m supposed to barter with you for my knowledge, but I can’t do it. You have my help, whether you can assist us with ... a certain problem we have or not.”
“There’s no need to barter,” Magnus stated calmly. “You’re family, if you want to be. We help the Maians, they help us. Now what is it?”
“We have a clan who is being harassed on Caldera in the Ksora system, but we have no way to get them out.”
“How many?”
“About three thousand. We can make room in our seven cavern sites for about two thousand of them and we’re out looking for a new site to house the rest. We’ve even stepped up food production to begin preparing for them in the event we can find a way to bring them here. Magnus, we’ve lost two clans completely to genocide since our escape from Schedar.”
“Well, there’s no need to lose any more. We’ve got eleven starships on Tarsus alone. A single ship can carry at least five hundred extra people, twice that in an emergency. As long as we get no interference from a Calderan fleet of any sort, we could pull those people off in a couple of hours.”
“I, uh, I’m sure the cost ... would be prohibitive, though. We don’t—”
Magnus reached over and put his hands around Hano’s neck, growling and shaking him gently. “There’s no cost! A little of our time! Now will you stop that and just let us help you? Or will I have to strangle you first?”
Hano laughed and swatted the big man away. “Alright. I’m just not used to receiving. None of us are.”
“Well, get used to it or I’ll get downright nasty. Got that, little guy?”
Hano nodded and grinned. “I guess I’ve met my match in bullies. You win.”
“Good. Now, do you think the Calderan government is approachable by our starship leaders once they arrive over their airspace?”
“I somehow think they’ll be relieved to be rid of the Bataani clan, but I’ll check with my dreamwalker contacts there later tonight to get their opinions.”
“Alright. In the meantime, your new fleet pilot grand-nephew-in-law could help out with the search for another cavern site. I’ll have him take the Gypsum out scouting over your territory to scan the mountains—oh, hell, here I go again, planning someone else’s life without his consent. I guess if I want to live much longer, I’d better leave him alone for a few days with his lovely Schedaran princess. I’d send someone else out to your colony, but I think he’d do the best job at smoothing things over with your, shall we say, ‘shy’ people?”
Hano rolled his eyes heavenward and gave a short laugh. “Yes, Rhys would be the perfect choice for making a bridge with my head-in-the-sand clan. Quite the diplomat, aren’t you, Magnus?”
“Of course,” the councilor replied smugly, giving his black mane a cocky shake. “How do you think I got to be such a high and mighty big stud in the first place? I save my forked tongue for the people I really like.”
“So that’s the secret,” Hano cackled. “I’m not that selective. I just piss everybody off. It’s about my only entertainment anymore.”
“Hano, if you’re not busy enough, I think I can scare up plenty of mischief to occupy you. You said you’re ready to be drafted.”
The elder’s face became suddenly serious. “You may become busier than you’ve ever dreamed in the very near future, Magnus Talrésian. What do you know about the T’nari League?”
The high councilor sobered instantly, his dark blue eyes studying the ancient man beside him before he answered. “An old friend of mine once told me he’d heard rumors about a group banded together fighting the Empire. He was a trader and got caught on the wrong side of the Meropean invasion. After he died, I never kn
ew where to look for more answers since no one else in our dwindling network knew anything about it. What do you know, Hano?”
“Not much more than you, I’m afraid. But whoever they are—I believe they’ve found Karra.”
Magnus sucked in a breath and was about to speak when Hano stopped him short with a raised hand. “Not only that, I think Rhys is the key to reaching them.”
“By the Prime, Hano.”
The elder nodded, his dark eyes shimmering in the firelight. “Rhys is a very special man, but he’s been asleep.” Without releasing Magnus’s gaze, he pointed in the direction of the hills. “After tonight, you won’t recognize your grandson.”
Hano’s words had been soft and spoken with a prophetic edge. A chill raced up Magnus’s spine, but he held himself still to allow the Schedaran man to continue.
“We have secrets that the Drahks want destroyed, Magnus. We should have told you long ago what a threat we are to you. The Empire wants us exterminated. I don’t have many answers to give you, but I’m the only one left in this clan who remembers anything from Schedar.” Hano’s eyes burned as he watched the man beside him. “The Drahks never broke through our portals, Magnus.”
Caught completely off-guard, the Tarsian councilor was momentarily speechless. “But what ... how— ?”
Hano smiled and pointed to the stone circle flickering with light. “Blood.”
Magnus blinked several times before he recovered his voice. “Kept your portals intact?” he spluttered.
Hano nodded, then gave a quick shrug. “That was a big part of it, the part I understand. The second piece of our old defense system is beyond my expertise.”
“But do you know what it was?”
Shrugging again as if the information was useless, the Schedaran answered flatly, “Gold.”
For several moments, Magnus couldn’t breathe. The uncanny synchronicities he experienced decades ago as well as over the past few days fell rapidly into clear and astounding place, smacking of an ocean of intelligence he could barely comprehend. Falling back onto the turf, his deep laughter boomed into the night air and rolled out across the plain. Hano stared blankly, waiting for the Tarsian to explain his ebullient reaction.
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