Thief of Dreams

by Adrian Cole

Overview

Vicious aliens, human gladiators, and elemental gods populate the realms of the Star Requiem series in the second novel following Mother of Storms.

Adrian Cole’s acclaimed Star Requiem series welcomes readers to Innasmorn, a planet where the elements are worshipped as gods . . . and where mankind is considered the enemy.

In the impenetrable West of Innasmorn lies the forbidden city of Shung Hang—a mystical place shrouded in legend . . . and guarded by the winged warriors of the last goddess, the Aviatrix. Pursued by the relentless death machine of the corrupt prime consul Zellorian, the last remnants of an exterminated mortal race make their way across a perilous, devastated land. For only by harnessing an ancient power secreted in the Deathless City can the intrepid human survivors hope to hold the enemy at bay—and forestall the bloodthirsty alien Csendook’s planned genocide of humankind.

Don’t miss the entire Star Requiem quartet: Mother of Storms, Thief of Dreams, Warlord of Heaven, and Labyrinth of Worlds.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781497621794
Publisher:	Open Road Media
Publication date:	04/01/2014
Series:	Star Requiem , #2
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	366
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Adrian Cole was born in Plymouth, Devonshire, in 1949. Recently the director of college resources in a large secondary school in Bideford, he makes his home there with his wife, Judy, son, Sam, and daughter, Katia. The books of the Dream Lords trilogy (Zebra books 1975–1976) were his first to be published. Cole has had numerous short stories published in genres ranging from science fiction and fantasy to horror. His works have also been translated into many languages including German, Dutch, Belgian, and Italian. Apart from the Star Requiem and Omaran Saga quartets being reprinted, some of his most recent works include the Voidal Trilogy (Wildside Press) and Storm Over Atlantis (Cosmos Press).

Read an Excerpt

Thief Of Dreams

Star Requiem: Book Two

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By Adrian Cole

OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA

Copyright © 1989 Adrian Cole
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4976-2179-4

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CHAPTER 1

EANNOR

The tunnel stretched ahead into the distance, its walls seeming to contract and expand in the wavering lights held by the frontrunners of the company, an illusion of instability and change. Vorenzar, the new Keeper of Eannor, rode at the head of the company, two hundred strong, and not once on the long march did he look back or to the side, his eyes filled with visions of the future and the world he was about to take control of. Eannor, a world of mystery, shunned by the Csendook, abandoned because of the catastrophic events that were said to have taken place there, events that had resulted in the near annihilation of the world, the death of the renegades, the servants of the Imperator Elect, last of Mankind.

Beside Vorenzar, on a smaller beast, rode Ipsellin, his Opener, a being who was half the size of the huge Csendook, partly of the warrior race, and partly something else, a hybrid whose origins were lost in the far past of the Warhive's creation. The Openers were strangely rotund, neckless and with wattles of fat hanging under their chins, their eyes milky, their hair like a wiry down across their skull and upper backs. Ipsellin was no exception, his broad face creased in an almost permanent frown. He wore a voluminous tunic, emblazoned across its chest the twin scarlet rings that were the emblem of Auganzar, Supreme Sanguinary of the Csendook, whom Vorenzar served.

Vorenzar was dressed in dark war-mail; at his side he carried the twin swords of a commander going forward to battle, though he was on a peaceful mission. Strapped to his back was a long rectangular shield, embossed with the scarlet twin rings, the 'eyes of Auganzar' as they had been dubbed by his troops, his selected Thousand. Beyond Vorenzar were a score of his own picked Csendook, the finest fighting beings he could find, and behind them were two hundred of the new warriors, the moillum, the gladiators: these were Men, trained by Csendook, Men who began as slaves, captured in the last of the wars, who had elected to become what they were rather than die in some pit, slaughtered by beasts for the amusement of their conquerors. They had accepted a new role, knowing that if they fulfilled it well, they could expect more from life than any defeated army should ever hope for.

Ipsellin held aloft a light, nudging his charger closer to the beast ridden by his master. It was a xillatraal, a quadruped that resembled a huge horse, but which also had reptilian features, a scaly hide, an elongated head and a forked tongue; it was carnivorous, prone to temper, and took firm handling, though the Csendook had formed as unique a relationship with the fierce creatures as Man had with the horse. Vorenzar's beast, though large and terrifying, accepted its burden without complaint, as though it shared the power of his position.

Vorenzar glanced down at the bulbous figure riding uneasily beside him. 'This Pathway seems to me to be unduly long. I seem to recall a shorter one.' He was referring to the fact that the Opener had brought him to Eannor before, on a spying mission for Auganzar. It had been a different trip then, with only the two of them, garbed in secrecy and stealth.

Ispellin's eyes rolled. 'The journey always changes,' he said in a hoarse whisper, as though his voice would offend the walls. His mouth was a scarlet orifice: the Openers had no teeth, they ate no solids. 'It is to do with conjunctions, Zaru. But the Path I have opened for you is nearing its end. Eannor is not far.'

Vorenzar grunted. He understood a little about timing. Only an Opener could bridge the worlds of the great Cycle with a gate, a Path, and without proper timing the Path could snap like a stretched thread, a ruptured artery. It was an uncomfortable thought, for if it happened, travellers would be flicked into instant oblivion. Vorenzar had visited numerous worlds of the new Csendook empire, but he never relished the journeys between them. And this one seemed to be taking far too long: there was a smell of blood in the air.

However, the tunnel began to open out, light streaming into it from a source ahead. A short while later the company came to the end of the Path. Like a cave into a hillside, it widened, revealing the terrain and vegetation of a world. Eannor. The almost forgotten world, the place where Man had made his last stand, and where his Imperator Elect and all the leaders had perished.

Vorenzar grinned as he surveyed the peaceful scene below in the deep valley. Trees grew thickly, a river gleamed beyond them, and hills rose up, verdant and fertile, beyond them high mountains dressed in a lace of snow. The sky was a blue vault, smudges of clouds in the distance. There was no hint of desolation, no trace of destruction, no gaping world-wound, no ruins. Eannor looked almost a virgin world. Did the Garazenda who controlled the Csendook really think this place was Man's tomb? Auganzar had never believed it. Which was why he had first sent Vorenzar here. To search. To find the means by which Man's Imperator Elect had eluded the Csendook, and to track him down to whatever world he now hid upon.

Movement on the slopes caught Vorenzar's eye, and he dropped his visor. In a moment a small figure rode towards him from the low trees, behind it two others, though they were more cautious than the first figure. Vorenzar grunted: they were Csendook warriors, Zemoks, and therefore born cautious.

The first rider, mounted on a young, temperamental xillatraal, came upon him swiftly. The being was not unlike Ipsellin, though not as rotund. An Opener, its face coated in sweat from the unprecedented exertion, its eyes filled with agitation. Its beast bucked and turned, reflecting the anxiety of its rider.

'I was expecting you,' said the Opener. 'I am Etrascu. But, Zaru, I was to fetch you – to meet you beyond the Path at –'

'I have an Opener of my own,' said Vorenzar impatiently, dismissing Etrascu's protestations with a brief wave.

Etrascu glared open-mouthed at Ipsellin, his eyes coming to rest on the renowned twin circles of the latter's tunic. 'It was not necessary, Zaru –'

'You seem offended,' said Ipsellin, his voice thickening with scorn.

Etrascu's xillatraal turned and he struggled to bring it under control. It had sensed the beast that Vorenzar rode, the mass of creatures arrayed behind it, emerging from the Path. 'Not at all,' stammered Etrascu. 'Merely surprised. As you know, Eannor is a restricted world –'

'Indeed,' cut in Vorenzar. 'I intend to keep it so. Everything I do here will be in absolute secrecy. The Garazenda are most specific.'

'I should have been told,' muttered Etrascu. 'No one should open a Way to Eannor without –'

'Where is your master?' snapped Vorenzar, ignoring the complaints.

Etrascu was looking in horror at the moillum who had formed ranks on the hill slope. They were Men! How many of them were there? And they were all armed! Was there to be a battle here? But why? Surely the Supreme Sanguinary had not sent them here to do battle with the Csendook guardians, the watchdogs of Eannor, his own people? But Etrascu knew it would be dangerous to ask more questions. Instead he began to ride back. As he did so, the two Csendook that had followed him came up, their faces set.

'You are the Zaru, Vorenzar?' said one of them stiffly.

Vorenzar nodded, acknowledging the commandership.

'You are welcome, Zaru.' The Csendook looked back at the company, the large number of moillum. Behind them the hillside was as closed as it had been before Ipsellin's working. 'I am Ulbok, serving under the Zolutar, Cmizen. I am to take you to him.'

'Have arrangements been made to accommodate my Zemoks?' said Vorenzar, gesturing to his Csendook.

'They have, Zaru,' nodded Ulbok. 'And there is an area set aside for the others, as was ordered.' He made no attempt to hide his distaste for the Men.

'Then lead on,' said Vorenzar, ignoring it.

Etrascu heard this exchange with mounting dread. What did it mean? Why had he not been told? Why should Vorenzar have been allowed to open his own Way here? Etrascu looked at Ipsellin, but the Opener ignored him, his gaze deliberately fixed elsewhere as the entire company began to move down the mountain, led by the two Csendook of Eannor.

The ride took two hours and brought them down into the cool trees of the valley and to a place where it widened out. On a precipitous hill overlooking the river, a castle had been carved out of the native rock, its black windows gaping down with interest on the newcomers. Ulbok and his companion picked their way up the single, winding path that led to the base of the castle, and one by one the company followed, entering the shadows of another tunnel that took them out to the sunlight of the inner castle court. Walls towered over them ominously, dwarfing them.

Vorenzar, however, did not feel in the least humbled. He was too elated to be on Eannor again. His previous trip here had been furtive, dangerous. This time it would be very different. The taste of power had given him an appetite. He looked about the sombre court, wondering if its captain, Cmizen, would show himself. He evidently preferred to try to hold on to his dignity; he would be waiting in the castle, in his hall of office. Vorenzar grinned inside his helm. He dismounted slowly.

'See that the moillum are properly housed,' he told one of his Csendook. He turned to Ulbok. 'You will attend to my Zemoks.'

'Of course, Zaru. Ovarz will show them to their quarters. If you will come with me.'

Vorenzar gestured to Ipsellin to join him. Etrascu shuffled out of view, but Vorenzar guessed that he would be scuttling up some inner stair to have a last word with his master before Vorenzar confronted him. Vorenzar smiled to himself. He felt completely at ease here, though he wondered how many eyes looked down upon him from the huge fortress walls. But those eyes would have seen the twin circles, the eyes of Auganzar. And they would know how far-seeing those eyes were.

Vorenzar took a leather satchel from his saddlebags and nodded to Ulbok. Together with Ipsellin they mounted the outer stair and passed within the fortress.

It was a gloomy, cold place, not built for pleasure, but as a house of war, a testament to the battles that had once been fought on Eannor. Man had first built this bastion, but Csendook had added to it, expanding it. Vorenzar nodded to himself. It would be a fitting setting for what he had planned.

High up in the castle, he approached a chamber where several guards waited stiffly. Their eyes gazed ahead of them, but Vorenzar knew they would be longing to gaze at him, to see what kind of a Csendook the legendary Supreme Sanguinary had sent here to their forgotten realm.

Ulbok spoke to them and they opened the thick doors to the chamber beyond. A voice spoke in low, guttural tones. Vorenzar and Ipsellin walked past Ulbok and into the chamber. Like the castle, it was austere, its walls bare except for a number of stacked weapons, spears and shields.

There was an elaborate desk between Vorenzar and the Csendook he had come to see, Zolutar Cmizen, who had risen, keeping himself behind his desk. He was unusually short, his stature not as broad as one would expect for a Csendook Zolutar, but Vorenzar knew that he had been picked to come to Eannor because he was weak and unambitious, a warrior who could be trusted to keep to himself and to do the minimum required of him. His skin was pale, as though, unlike his Zemoks, he did not spend much time in the sunlight of this pleasant world, and his eyes were sunken, his large teeth uneven in his mouth.

Cmizen saluted, too stiffly, holding himself rigid. His fear of the intruder he could not quite disguise. His eyes shifted nervously from Vorenzar to Ipsellin, who himself felt no awe at being before the Zolutar. There were other captains in the ranks of the Csendook who filled him with coldness with a mere glance.

'It is a pleasure to have you here, Zaru,' said Cmizen, though his expression suggested that pleasure was the last thing he felt.

Vorenzar took off his war helm and dropped it noisily on the desk. Papers fluttered to the floor. He ignored them, enjoying Cmizen's expression as the latter's eyes followed the drift of the sheets, and did not meet his own cold eyes. 'Good. I am sure I shall enjoy Eannor.'

'Yes, of course. As you know, Zaru, it is not the devastated world it was believed to be –'

'I understand all that,' said Vorenzar, cutting him off. He dragged one of the wooden chairs over and sat comfortably in it, gesturing for Cmizen to sit. The Zolutar did so, though slowly and as if he might be in pain.

'Quite so, Zaru,' he said, clearly unsure of himself and how to react to the commander. Vorenzar's face was the face of a true warrior, the hunger for battle, for the hunt, carved there in every fierce line. Such a warrior had not stood on Eannor for many years.

'You have received orders from the Supreme Sanguinary, I believe?' said Vorenzar.

'I have.' Cmizen reached across the desk and fumbled among the papers until he brought out written instructions, though he knew by heart what they contained.

'And do they refer to further instructions?'

Cmizen nodded. 'To be brought by you, Zaru.'

Vorenzar grunted and thrust the leather pouch across the desk. 'You'll see that they are signed by the Supreme Sanguinary himself, approved by the Garazenda.'

Cmizen broke the seal and pulled out the papers, reading them quickly, a sheen of perspiration gathering above his brows. He nodded, sitting back.

Vorenzar could see the mixed reaction on Cmizen's face. 'They are clear?'

Cmizen looked up at him. 'Why, yes. Yes, Zaru, quite clear. Though I am a little puzzled –'

'Oh? What is it that puzzles you?'

'I had assumed that you were coming here to relieve me of my command and that my Zemoks and I were to return to the Warhive, or to be sent to another region to act as Keeper, or something appropriate to my rank.' He was beginning to babble. 'But I see from these orders that I am to remain here, under your command –'

'It concerns you?'

'No, no,' said Cmizen quickly. 'I just thought it perhaps wasteful. I know I am not the most valuable of the Garazenda's servants –'

Vorenzar scowled. Such a Csendook was hardly worthy to be a warrior. But the Zaru masked his thoughts. Cmizen had been picked for his weakness. In the past the Garazenda had wanted Eannor sealed off. In that sense, Cmizen had been useful.

'But you know Eannor better than anyone,' said Vorenzar.

Cmizen glanced uncomfortably at Ipsellin. Why had the Zaru found it necessary to bring his own Opener? Surely Etrascu was ideally discreet? No one could have attempted to study Eannor without alerting him. 'I have not made a study of the world,' said Cmizen. 'That was not my brief –'

'You know its history.'

'Well –'

'Its true history. You have kept its secrets well. To the Csendook nations it is a desolate world, a world destroyed by Man in his abortive attempt to break free of the cycle of worlds. The Supreme Sanguinary is most pleased with the way you have strengthened these myths.'

Cmizen waited. He knew there was more to this, far more.

'The Garazenda have decreed that Eannor should be forbidden to all Csendook. In a sense they have cursed it. You understand why?'

Cmizen straightened, speaking now as if reciting lines he had learned by heart. 'Man is worthy of contempt. In attempting to escape us, he destroyed Eannor. It is a testament to his folly, and a witness to the futility of all Man's works, the evil of his ways, his lust for sorcerous powers –'

Vorenzar nodded impatiently. 'Yes, yes. It is the picture that the Csendook nations have, and rightly so. But you know better.'

Cmizen's pallor became paler. 'I know that Eannor is not a wasteland –'

'And?'

'It would be a fine world for Csendook to live upon.'

Vorenzar leaned forward. 'And what of Man?'

Cmizen frowned, his fingers interweaving, his tension evident. 'Man, Zaru? There are no Men here. Only those you have brought.'

'You've searched the entire world?'

Cmizen nodded. 'There are no Men here, Zaru. No intelligent life forms.'

Vorenzar sat back with something approaching satisfaction on his face. 'I'm sure you are right.'

'Man may not have destroyed Eannor, Zaru, but clearly he destroyed himself in his efforts to create a Path into another realm –'

'Beyond the world circle?'

'So it is believed.'

'By whom?'

'I have had Etrascu, my Opener, study the ruins –'

'So there are ruins?'

'Yes. It is a place I have sealed off. I think it unsafe. The reek of death clings to it still.'

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Thief Of Dreams by Adrian Cole. Copyright © 1989 Adrian Cole. Excerpted by permission of OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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