by Jack Conner
Ani shoots Sheridan. Avery activates the Device. The Over-City falls. The War of Octung is over. But Avery knows that Sheridan is right. Now the R’loth, denied their puppet Octung, will act themselves. Avery braces himself for the worst.
BOOK SIX
The worst arrives. The R’loth send giant beings that look like starfish to obliterate one island after the other, killing millions. The Starfish drive toward the mainland. Avery and Layanna collect samples of Starfish tissue and mean to analyze them, find some weakness of the Starfish.
The band has been picked up by a whaling vessel, and in its medical bay Avery works on Sheridan, saving her life so that Ani will not be a murderer … and maybe for some other reason, too. Layanna is very suspicious of that other reason and she refuses to sleep with Avery because of it.
Sheridan, once well, betrays them into the hands of pirates, who seize the whaling ship. Pirates have replaced Octung as the R’loth’s power at sea, and the pirate fleet, ruled by Janx’s former boss and old enemy Segrul the Gray, worships the R’loth. The band is brought to Davic, a Collossum and Layanna’s former husband. He attempts to kill them, but they manage to escape, after having seen Sheridan be sent off on an important assignment, something to do with an Atoshan relic. She’d been dispatched to Ghenisa, but for what they don’t know.
They arrive at the mainland to find Prime Minister Denaris at odds with Grand Admiral Haggarty, a puppet of Sheridan’s and an agent of Octung. The Grand Admiral is trying to stage a coup and take over the government. Denaris gives Avery’s band refuge and allows them to set up lab in which they analyze the Starfish samples.
During this time the Voryses make contact with Avery. His late wife Mari was a distant relative of the old ruling family, the Voryses, commonly referred to as the Drakes. Despised and hated, they had been dethroned half a century ago and their members killed or driven into hiding, like Mari. Ani is a descendant and they want her to rejoin her family, led by a man called Idris, who would be King of Ghenisa like his forefathers. He wants to take power, using the turmoil to his own advantage. Avery refuses the request, but Idris asks him if Ani’s been having strange dreams. Sure enough, she has, and they’ve been bothering both her and Avery. She dreams of singing, and a doorway. Could these dreams be shared by other Voryses, and might they have some insight into what they mean?
Meanwhile the Starfish drive ever closer to the mainland, wiping out one island after another. There is no sign of Sheridan and no news of what her special assignment could have been. Finally Avery and Layanna have a breakthrough in the laboratory. They discover that the nectar of the rare “ghost flower” allows Layanna to establish a psychic link with the Starfish tissue. In theory, if she can ingest enough fresh nectar and can “plug herself” into the brain of one of the giant Starfish, she can send a psychic pulse out to all the Starfish, killing them and saving the world from the wrath of the R’loth.
The hitch is that the ghost flower only grows in the Crothegra Jungle, also known as the Atomic Jungle. A man named Losg Coleel holds the sole rights to the nectar, and he resides in the war-torn city of Ezzez. Avery leaves Ani with her “Uncle Id”, patriarch of the surviving Voryses, hoping for the best, realizing he can’t take her into the Atomic Jungle, and the four members of the band depart for Ezzez at once, only to learn that Sheridan knows where they’re going … and why.
BOOK SEVEN
They arrive in Ezzez to find a city torn by war. Octung's presence is strong but heavily disputed. The city is also half-overgrown by the Crothegra Jungle, the so-called Atomic Jungle, which is resurgent due to the recent conflict which has distracted those who'd tended it before. Avery and the others make their way through the chaotic city with the help of local rebels, are attacked by Octunggen-controlled soldiers and scatter.
Avery finds Losg Coleel in hiding in the Maze of Dark Delights, and the doctor and Layanna help the merchant find a place of relative safety in the rebel headquarters. In return, Coleel tells them where they can find the ghost flower. He is out of the flower and Layanna needs the raw nectar, so their only option is to journey into the Atomic Jungle itself to seek out the flower.
During all of this Avery's band is menaced not only by Octunggen-controlled soldiers but by a mysterious new enemy, a group of robed figures that appear to be walking, maggot-infested cadavers. The maggots are unnatural. The Infested beings want Layanna for some reason, though Avery's group doesn't know why.
The band ventures into the jungle, finding one of the villages Coleel employs to harvest the ghost flower, but still the flower's nectar is not strong enough. The band will have to penetrate into the "haunted" quarter of the jungle where the ghost flower "vines" originate.
They also discover more Infested beings and believe the source of the "Infection" may stem from the Gomingdon, the so-called haunted quarter ... the same place the vines originate from.
Troops led by Sheridan attack the village and the band is forced into flight. In the chaos Avery finds himself separated from the others. Lost in the Atomic Jungle, he nearly falls prey to local wildlife, but Sheridan, also separated from her group, saves him, and the two travel together. Along the way, they renew their bond somewhat, although neither quite trusts the other.
The Atomic Jungle ends, becoming a strangely mundane jungle, right where the Gomingdon starts, and there, right in the middle of the Gomingdon, is a long-abandoned, pre-human city of great size and eeriness. Avery and Sheridan explore the outer edge of the city and climb one of the spires to its top. Where are the others? They don't know.
They sleep beside each other that night on the building's rooftop, but Avery vows not to make love to her. Despite this vow, in the morning the two begin to make love ... when they are interrupted by the arrival of Layanna, Janx and Hildra, all of whom are horrified.
Janx begins to strangle Sheridan, but Avery convinces him to at least let her speak. She says that her party arrived by dirigibles and that she'll give the band one of the airships if Janx releases her. Reluctantly, he agrees. Without the airships they'd have to find their way back to civilization through the vastness of the Atomic Jungle on foot, a journey which would almost surely kill them.
It's then that Avery notices that Layanna, Janx and Hildra didn't arrive alone. Several of the "Infested" are with them, and they mean to take the group for an interview with the Colony.
BOOK EIGHT
Avery's group is taken by the Infected to a great maggot-like being who is one of the lords of the Infested, and it reveals that it and the others of its kind have been waiting for one who will "awaken the Sleeper". They believe that Layanna is that being, because only one with otherdimensional abilities can do the job. When the great maggot orders Layanna to be taken to the massive black dome at the heart of the city (where she will "retrieve the Key"), it simultaneously orders Avery and the others to be killed.
With some help from Sheridan, they escape with Layanna and make their way to the Dome, which they enter and seal the door behind them. They find the Key at the nexus of the glowing ghost-flower vines. There Sheridan betrays them. She tries to destroy the essence of the ghost-flower nectar and take the Key, but the others stop her. They can't kill her, though, because only with the aid of her dirigible fleet can they make their way out of the jungle alive.
Layanna absorbs the nectar and Sheridan takes the Key. They rendezvous with the airships and separate, Sheridan going with the Octunggen and taking the Key (whatever it is) with her, while Avery's group goes off on their own. They return to Hissig, which they find to be in turmoil. Admiral Haggarty has tried to overthrow Prime Minister Denaris, who is in hiding. There is fighting in the streets. Avery and the others take refuge in the mutant-filled sewers. There they learn that a cult centered around a Collossum is spreading fear and taking human sacrifices. Worse, the Collossum has threatened the city: either Ghenisa turns to the worship of the Collossum or the Starfish will raze Hissig.
Avery and Janx penetrate the lair of the Collossum,
find Denaris and confront the Collossum, a man known as Rigurd. Denaris has been given the Sacrament and is to be given by Haggarty to Rigurd in an official ceremony in the main city square that evening, a symbolic act signaling that Ghenisa now worships the Collossum. While in the lair, Avery learns that Sheridan had delivered a strange artifact to Rigurd, and that only after activating the artifact did the ghost flower nectar become effective. This makes no sense.
Shaking it off, Avery's group stops the ceremony and rescues Denaris. They receive some unexpected help in the form of the Drakes, the old royal family. Among them is Ani, who, oddly, is treated with deference by the other royals.
Stopping the ceremony, of course, only prompts the wrath of the Collossum. The Starfish emerges from the waters and begins to lay waste to the city.
Avery takes over the last known ray, a massive creature, which had been in Sheridan's charge. She is taken captive. Layanna psychically controls the ray and smashes it into the Starfish. With its exoskeleton cracked, Layanna slips in, absorbs the ghost flower nectar and sends her psychic assault to all the other Starfish through this one's brain, killing them all.
But why did Rigurd make the ghost flower nectar effective in the first place? The Octunggen are up to something. When Sheridan turns the tables and makes her escape, Avery comes with her, which she allows. Layanna helps by "pretending" she is through with Avery. Avery worries that the pretence is all too real. Not only that, but his feelings for Sheridan are more complicated than he would have thought.
He goes off with her to a zeppelin controlled by Octunggen, who have accomplished their strange ends. The Starfish may be dead, but the Octunggen's true motive was to obtain the Key, and that they have. The Starfish could not have survived long out of the water and could only have subdued the coasts. Sheridan and the captain in charge of the zeppelin reveal that the Octunggen mean to prevent the R'loth from activating their doomsday weapon, whatever that is, which they will do if it looks like the war will turn against them.
Wondering if he's been on the wrong side all along, Avery agrees to help.
BOOK NINE
Avery, Sheridan and a group of Octunggen soldiers aboard the zeppelin head into the frigid arctic country of Xlaca, which is embroiled in a vicious civil war led by pro-Collossum elements of its own culture. But somewhere in its capital city is the Codex, which is the artifact that the Key is meant to decrypt. The Key, meanwhile, has been taken to the Flying Fortress, an aerial scientific station of Octung.
Avery and Sheridan penetrate the warzone after most of the soldiers have been killed and locate the Codex, but to retrieve it they must free Uthua, the terrible Collossum that has possessed Muirblaag. The Xlacan warlord Onxcor has abducted him and is trying to auction off both him and the Codex. Uthua was rendered incapacitated by a new enemy that Avery and Sheridan take to calling the “mystery party”. The mystery party also wants the Codex. The members of the mystery party are apparently invisible and can wound, perhaps kill, a Collossum.
Avery and Sheridan free Uthua, steal the Codex and board the Octunggen zeppelin just as the capital city succumbs to chaos. At a big conference meeting involving Uthua, his priests, Sheridan, Avery, and the captain of the zeppelin, Avery learns the Octunggen’s true motive for needing the decrypted Codex: to learn the location of the Sleeper, the last surviving remnant of the race of the Ygrith, who once dominated the world but have since vanished. Only the Sleeper can open the Ygrith’s great and hidden Monastery, where, among other things, the Ygrith kept their terrible otherworldly weapons. Octung wants to seize those weapons and gift them to the R’loth so that the R’loth can subdue the world overnight.
That night aboard the zeppelin the Octunggen and the Collossumist pirates that have come to their aid give sacrifice to Uthua, and Avery trembles to think that he’s made common cause with such people. When he wakes up the next day, his god-killing knife has been stolen.
The zeppelin is bound for the Flying Fortress, there to unite the Codex with the Key.
BOOK TEN
Avery, Sheridan and the Octunggen arrive at the Flying Fortress to find it abandoned and overrun with experimental creatures designed by the R’loth to replace humanity. The experiment failed, though, and the creatures have slaughtered nearly everyone at the station. Avery, Sheridan and Uthua manage to unite the Key with the Codex, creating a small ruby-shaped device, and Uthua communes with it to discover the location of the Sleeper.
Just then, the pirates, who had been helping the Octunggen until this point, turn against them and attack, killing many in the party and destabilizing the station. In the mad rush to reach the zeppelin before the station breaks apart, Avery realizes that the zeppelin must be destroyed already---the pirates would have hit it first. The only hope is to reach the dirigibles.
The Octunggen disagree, violently, and Sheridan is forced to choose between Avery and the Octunggen. She chooses Avery, and the two steal the decrypted Codex, abandon Uthua’s party and take off in a dirigible just as the Flying Fortress explodes. There is no sign of the zeppelin and it is presumed all in the party died … except Uthua, who would have lived.
The question is why the pirates would have turned against Uthua and Octung. The pirates worship the Collossum, after all, just as the people of Octung do. And just who or what is the mystery party, damn it?
Avery and Sheridan are picked up by Janx, who commands a Ghenisan Navy zeppelin, and Avery relates what Uthua had informed him during his communing—that they need to go to Salanth, capital of the Ysstral Empire, and awaken the Sleeper there. Only the Sleeper can open the Monastery. But what, Sheridan wonders, will they do once they awaken the Sleeper? Won’t it be just as dangerous as the R’loth? And what will it do with the Monastery? Avery has his own plans, but he keeps those to himself.
Janx informs Avery that Layanna has founded her own church and that now those Ghenisans who had turned to the worship of the Collossum during the Starfish crisis have switched their devotion to Layanna, who is after all a Collossum, however rogue. Layanna, now sole goddess of her own religion, calls the faith the Pool of the Deep One.
The party travels to Salanth, are captured by Duke Leshillibn, who is in league with the mystery party and the pirates, then escapes and make their way to the Empress-Regent, whom they state their case to. She says that only the Chosen One may wake the Sleeper. Uthua, in his communing with the Codex, had mentioned “the Pocked One”, and Avery is all too sure he knows who that must be: his daughter Ani, descendant of the Ysstral royal family, imbued with their strange powers, who has surreal and terrifying dreams about a crystal door ...
When the Empress-Regent demands Avery reveal his plan, he says he intends to get the Sleeper to open the Monastery just as the R’loth intend … and then betray them by stealing the Ygrithan weapons located in the Monastery and using them against the R’loth, thus winning the war against them for all time.
Chapter 1
The others stared at him—whether incredulous, stunned into silence, or about to burst into laughter, Avery couldn’t tell. When no one laughed, he dared to look around. Their faces were still, but he could see something in their eyes, or at least some of them—excitement? Hope? He thought so.
“By gods, Doc!” Janx said. “That’s a plan.”
Hildra laughed, but not in derision. “I like it, bones. Shit, that’s why we stick with you. You are a pain in the ass, but what a pain in the ass!”
“Thank you,” Avery said.
Sheridan was watching him warmly (to his intense relief), if a touch amused. “Yes, indeed,” she said. “I believe I made the right call.”
“You don’t regret turning against Octung, then?”
She touched his hand. “Not a bit of it.” Then, almost unconsciously, or perhaps not—perhaps wanting clarification—her eyes flicked to the Empress-Regent.
“Oh, I know of you,” the monarch assured her. “I know you’re a fugitive of Ghenisa and a supposed traitor to the realm. I only admitted you becau
se I had vetted Lord Avery, and you were his guest. It would have been poor form to arrest you. Fear not. I have no intention of doing so now.”
“Well?” Avery pressed Issia. “What do you think of my notion?”
The Empress-Regent shared a look with her son, then regarded Avery. “I like it in broad strokes, but do I see some problems with it.”
He had been dreading this. “Such as?”
“For starters, how do you mean to utilize these, well, holy weapons? You don’t even know what they are. For all you know, humans may not even be able to manipulate weapons of the Ancients.”
“I was rather hoping Layanna would help with that.”
“The rogue goddess you talked of. Well, I suppose ... if we had her flown in ... and she would do it?” When Avery nodded, the monarch said, “Very well. I suppose it will have to be good enough. I can certainly think of no better plan. Doing nothing and keeping the Sleeper where it is will only result in the death of us all, apparently, and quite soon.”
“There is nothing apparent about it,” Sheridan said. “The R’loth are quite capable of it, believe me, and they are already designing our replacements, as we saw aboard the Flying Fortress. If that is how they mean to go. Their failsafe could take all manner of forms.”