Chapter 1

(Death of the Rȏgmüdian Duke)

© Mark Fairchild, 2005, Lincoln, Nebraska, USA

Nwoc Hvril, the Lord Rȏgmüd ag Escovia, the 7th of his line, lay dying on his bed. The Escovians determined lineage by choice then age, not gender. The eldest offspring of the ruler was eligible to be considered by the Lord's Council for the title Lord Rȏgmüd ak Escovia. In this case it was to be Nwoc Hvril's daughter Yana. She was an Earthling, as was all of the Hvril Dynasty, and she had been Earthing for several years. Even if her parent had not been on his deathbed it was time for her to return and prepare herself to take the Reins of Coordination And Power.

She had been summoned.

She had not returned.

Indeed, she had responded to say that she was returning, but in fact she had not. Investigators had been sent and had determined that she had left Taegenbo, in the Region of Tryth. She was on the coach when it had left Parsk in the northeast part of Taeg, and yet she had not arrived at the World Portal, which would have been near her terminus. The route was traced, and the wreckage of the carriage was found in an area of hills east of the Portal, but no sign of Yana was found.

This was unfortunate. Nwoc now lay dying, surrounded by courtiers and counselors. His illness was age, for sentient Escovians were never victims of illness or foul play. Their entire physical being was designed by nature around a single principle: defense—mostly passive defense. Yet the body fails: parts wear out, entropy finds its way. For most Escovians, however, it can take well over a century for entropy to have its final crowing. Nwoc was near his end. He was hanging on by a thread.

Factions were gathering in the shadow of his dying. In fact civil war was brewing. Much of the contention was concerned with the fact that the Hvril Dynasty was old, too old many felt. New blood was needed, they felt, so that innovation could proceed along non Hvrilian lines.

Yet there was another reason. The Hvrils were human.

There was another, naturalized, sentient species—humans. Thousands of years ago they were Terrans, but now their descendants were Escovian, and had even adopted a few distinctively Escovian features. The Hvrils were humans.

Humans had been on Escovia (and Escovians on Earth) for thousands of years, almost 4,500 years at least. Maybe much longer, so far as anyone knew. The only difference was the the Escovians know that a number of their people were on Earth,whereas Terrans did not know Escovians even existed, anywhere. Escovians were naturally invisible to Terrans . . . to any stranger or predator, in fact. They had evolved in an extremely hostile environment, and the coping mechanism that evolution selected for them was camouflage, but not just the basic physical and behavioral camouflage methods found on Earth. Escovians, when afraid, emitted one of several types of alamones at their disposal.

But bigotry and bias ran amok among various Escovian individuals and groups. In court, this faction was presided over by a Scog named Stmnc (anglicized as Stemnec). He (really “it,” as three of the four sentient species had no sexual gender) championed removing the Humans from power; many wanted them removed from Escovian space—period.

Another faction defended the naturalized human presence on Escovia (and of Escovian prence on Earth). This faction was led by another Scog, Tremvane (Trmvn).

Upon hearing of Lord Rȏgmüd death the factions assumed their stances, and it was not long before Civil war commenced.

This war had been in the wings for quite some time, three hundred Earth Years at least-since Nwoc's parent had held the Reins of Coordination And Power in the Rȏgmüd Escovia. Some on the Lord's Council had long felt that the power of Coordination And Control had lain in the hands of the Hvril dynasty for far too long, although a thousand years was not all that long for Escovians who frequently lived for over 200 Earth Years. Just the same, there was opposition to the Reigns passing to Yana.

Her disappearance gave the anti-Hvril faction much to crow about. Nwoc had been a good ruler, but a ruler's children are not automatically reliable, and Yana had been off world for far too long anyway. She had been sucked into a fascination with Earth, when what she needed was to nurture a fascination with her home world, Escovia, and her home land, the Rȏgmüd.

The tipping point had come when she declared a Terran, Berman Of Taeg, as her Heir of Choice. Many in the Lord's Council found this to be outrageous, totally unacceptable. Nwoc, however, had no difficulty with the idea, and gave it his official stamp of approval. That, really, is when the Rȏgmüdian Civil War began in the hearts of the Council, because that is when the Terran, Berman Leyerd, became the Lord Rȏgmüd ag Escovia, the 8th of the Hvril Dynasty—although he had not the slightest inkling that this had happened.

Or that it even might happen. Yana, the true heiress, and Berman's sweet-heart, declared him her successor in what Berman thought was a moment of love-play. He never gave it a second thought, except as love play. Now, however, it mattered. Now he was royalty on two planets, not even aware of the fact. Now alien creatures quietly stole onto the planet Earth with the intent to find and kill him. Now also alien creatures quietly stole onto the planet Earth with the intent to protect him and to whisk him away to a planet some billion light years distant to essentially crown him king. 

And Berman knew nothing of any of this.