*A minor update before your Tuesday-Sunday book promo. For those who saw me at ConFinement coughing and hacking and having trouble with the whole upper respiratory symptoms: I actually brought meds in the car for the trip in fear it would be doing that all the way home. And it was fairly horrible at the con, to the point I was always exhausted JUST from coughing. Spoiler: I stopped coughing completely about an hour into our car trip, and haven’t needed inhaler or cough syrup or any of it. I think the issues was a combination of very strong scent soap booth (Don’t get me wrong. It’s that lady’s right to sell them, and the booth was very popular. I use scented soap myself. It was just a LARGE booth and therefore overwhelming) and some ijit smoking pot near our room. I’ll note here that since the latest bout of thyroid I have ALMOST no sense of smell, but I smelled pot in the elevator and apparently it was very obvious on our floor. Again, for the record, whatever, and there are actually people who use it for medical conditions, but if you’re in a hotel would you have mercy on us poor asthmatics (I can’t smelll it but my bronchi and lungs still respond, and I’m deathly allergic) and use comestibles or whatever. Thank you. My lungs thank you. Anyway, if you were worried, I’m perfectly fine. Of course I started coughing while writing this, because my brain is like that. But it will stop as soon as I do the rest of the promo.
HOWEVER, I SPENT A LOT OF TIME HIDING IN MY ROOM, BECAUSE EXHAUSTED, SO I MIGHT HAVE ESCAPED CONTAGION — FINGERS CROSSED — BUT APPARENT THE FLU WAS MAKING THE ROUNDS OF THE CON. SO IF YOU’RE FEELING ODD, GET TESTED. – SAH*
If you wish to send us books for next week’s promo, please email to bookpimping at outlook dot com. If you feel a need to re-promo the same book do so no more than once every six months (unless you’re me or my relative. Deal.) One book per author per week. Amazon links only. Oh, yeah, by clicking through and buying (anything, actually) through one of the links below, you will at no cost to you be giving a portion of your purchase to support ATH through our associates number. A COMMISSION IS EARNED FROM EACH PURCHASE.*Note that I haven’t read most of these books (my reading is eclectic and “craving led”,) and apply the usual cautions to buying. I reserve the right not to run any submission, if cover, blurb or anything else made me decide not to, at my sole discretion.– SAH
BY JOHN VAN STRY: Lock & Load (Valley of Fire)
In the heart of the Fire Nebula, war rages across the stars. Crown Prince Wolf Alexander-Morgan and Princess Mariella, forged in the crucible of combat and mech warfare, stand at the forefront of a desperate counterstrike against a ruthless empire that has already struck at their homeworlds. With elite squadrons, aging battleships revived from slumber, and hard-won alliances hanging by a thread, they prepare to carry the fight straight to the enemy’s stronghold.
But victory demands more than firepower. As hidden truths surface, old grudges resurface, and the line between ally and threat blurs, Wolf and Mariella must navigate treacherous politics, overwhelming odds, and the weight of their own destinies. One wrong move could doom their kingdom—or end the war in flames.
Pulse-pounding space battles, brutal ground assaults, and the clash of crowns await in the explosive conclusion to the Valley of Fire trilogy. In a galaxy where loyalty is tested in fire, some legends are born… and others are extinguished.
FROM CEDAR SANDERSON: Tanager’s Fleet (The Tanager Book 3)
Captain Jem Raznick and the weary crew of the Tanager crave a moment’s peace after grueling evacuation runs across star systems. But spymaster Jade Star’s urgent summons shatters that hope, yanking them back to the fog-shrouded swamps of Boudreaux. Posing as orchid hunters, they must infiltrate the murky underbelly of the port to find missing operative Dilar Restin, and the explosive secrets he’s uncovered, before it’s too late.
What begins as a covert rescue spirals into a deadly trap: buried family betrayals surface, pirate shadows close in, and unexpected allies emerge from the mist with their own hidden agendas. Only when the true stakes are revealed, the culmination of Jade’s decades-long master plan, does the crew realize the galaxy itself hangs in the balance, with one wrong move dooming them all.
In this gripping space opera finale, Jem races to untangle a web of galactic deceit, protect his makeshift family, and ignite a defiant legacy. Heroism isn’t born in solitude. It is forged in the fierce, unbreakable unity that defies the encroaching void.
FROM SHANE GRIES: Battle Drills: Kill Zone
In the frozen kill zones of Tau Ceti IV, Terran Marine Private David Hernandez fights a brutal war against the relentless Kharkan hordes. But when peace shatters the battlefield in the most unexpected way, survival takes on a new meaning—one far from the front lines.
Years later, Hernandez joins the elite mercenaries of Jackson Solutions, trading fatigues for high-stakes contracts in the lawless Zone of Separation. Amid corporate betrayals, pirate raids, and shadowy alliances, he uncovers a conspiracy that could ignite interstellar chaos.
As loyalties fracture and enemies close in, Hernandez must master the deadliest battle drills of all: trust no one, and fight to the last breath.
FROM URNA SEMPER: The Pearl Crucible: A Dardana Fenek Mystery (Incidents on Iphigenia Book 4)
In Aulis, capital of the distant world Iphigenia, Dardana Fenek is a detective with more secrets than clients. Stumbling into a high-stakes murder investigation, she finds herself in a race against time to make her career—or end her life.
In a society where clones are property, and women are second-class citizens, Dardana lives on a knife’s edge. Can a detective with everything to lose solve the case of a lifetime? Or will enemies seen and unseen destroy her?
With her loyal partner and lover Barsina—an indentured clone girl won at cards—she finds conspiracies reaching from grimy Aulis markets to a desert archaeological dig. Complicating the case is handsome Ensign-Captain Mardonios, whose attraction to Dardana is matched by his dedication to justice.
As the clock ticks and a household of servants faces execution, Dardana confronts corrupt officials, a ruthless madam, and her own mysterious past to unveil the truth about a fifteen-hundred-year-old painting…
FROM JOE HUFFER: Hoosier Flats: A Novel of the Greatest Generation
In rural small-town 1930’s Indiana, a boy becomes a bootlegger– and a man too.
Fifteen-year-old Matt Wyatt knows the Depression is squeezing the life out of his family’s farm. When the Crawford clan offers his father a lifeline — cash in exchange for quiet runs of moonshine–Matt becomes the least-suspected bootlegger in Polk County. What starts as a thrill soon plunges young Matt into a world of violence, loyalty, and moral compromise.
Anchored by the girl who steals his heart, Matt navigates dusty back roads, outlaw justice, and the thin divide between right and wrong as one run goes terribly wrong and the consequences will follow him far beyond the Indiana flatlands he calls home.
Spanning the last days of Prohibition to the shock of Pearl Harbor and World War II, Hoosier Flats is a coming-of-age novel about duty, family, and the heavy price of growing up in hard times.
FROM JAKE BARTER: The Sniper
A debt of honor. A murdered son. A war that comes home.
Joseph Boghadair was once one of the U.S. Army’s deadliest snipers. Now retired and struggling to support his family, his life is shattered when his son is murdered.
With the justice system offering no answers, Boghadair turns to the one man who still owes him everything.
Paul Connors is the richest man in the world—though almost no one knows it. Years earlier, in Iraq, Boghadair saved Connors’ life. Now Connors intends to repay that debt, using resources and influence few people even realize exist.
What begins as a personal mission of revenge quickly uncovers a powerful conspiracy buried deep within the federal government. As Boghadair takes up the rifle once more, Connors brings overwhelming force to bear, pushing the conflict into the open and making secrecy impossible.
Each strike raises the stakes. Each move draws more attention. And once the war is declared, there’s no turning back.
The Sniper is an action-driven techno-political thriller about loyalty forged in war, justice pursued outside the system, and how far two men are willing to go when the enemy is no longer overseas—but at home.
FROM MOE LANE: Frozen Dreams (Tom Vargas Mysteries Book 1)
This is going to be the best post-apocalyptic high urban fantasy pulp detective novel you will read today!
Cin City. The tinsel crown of the magical Kingdom of New California – and Tom Vargas’s favorite place in the whole, wide world. Sure, as a Shamus he has to Clear a lot of Cases, listen to a lot of lies, and get battered and bruised in the process, but it’s worth it. Cin City is worth it.
But when trouble shows up as a dead mage at the Castle, he’s got to work fast and smart to save his city. New California doesn’t have mages, you see. And Cin City is safe for just as long as nobody can prove otherwise.
(Note: this book has a sequel, but it is not part of an epic fantasy trilogy.)
FROM CHARLI COX: The Fae Wars: Northwest Front
Fae Wars returns on a new front as war rages in the Pacific Northwest!
Corporal Erik Doherty isn’t some kind of special operations super soldier; he’s just an infantry grunt trying to get by in what was once the United States Army, now an enforcement arm of the Fae overlords. When orders come down from a chain of command more interested in boot licking their new masters than protecting American citizens, he has to make the choice. To serve and live, or run and die?
Ashleigh Greene is a teenage girl with a price on her head, the Fae looking for retribution for the killing of one of their nobles. As her hometown burns behind her, she flees into the mist shrouded forests of the Pacific Northwest, her family killed by dragon fire and her world destroyed.
On separate paths, each human comes face to face with a haunting legend that has lived for thousands of years. One that has been waiting, watching, and hating the old enemy that has finally returned. Together, they bring war to the Fae in a battle for honor and revenge.
Book seven in the best-selling Fae Wars series!
BY ED LACY, REVIVED BY D. JASON FLEMING: Room to Swing (Annotated): The Pulp Noir Classic
Black private eye Toussaint Moore knew a murder frame-up when he saw one, especially when it was hung neatly around his neck. Instead of dawdling around New York waiting for the NYPD to arrest him for a murder he didn’t commit, he followed the one lead he had: the victim’s hometown in Ohio. Only a stone’s throw north of Jim Crow Kentucky. If he can’t find who wanted that white man dead, and quick, all he’s going to have left is room to swing!
Winner of the 1958 Edgar Award for Best Mystery Novel by the Mystery Writers of America.
- This iktaPOP Media edition includes a new introduction by D. Jason Fleming giving historical and genre context to the novel.
FROM NATHAN C. BRINDLE: On Account of a Dame (Timelines Universe Book 9)
Welcome to the New Jazz Age!
It’s the Roaring Twenties all over again — well — the 2120’s, that is. Where New York City has reverted to its Jazz Age roots of two centuries before. What’s missing? Prohibition, and gun control. What’s not missing? Tough guys, and the dames who (sometimes) love them. Gin joints. Speakeasies. Dance halls. The Social Register is still a thing, and the Beautiful People litter the society pages of the local hypernews sites.
Enter a typical gumshoe private detective — a member of that high society himself, yet a man who left society long ago for other pursuits. And his latest client, a rich young woman of leisure, who needs her new husband followed.
Throw in the recently-crowned queen of one of Chinatown’s tongs, a beautiful investment wizard from upstate, and a hundred million dollars in assets, and suddenly it’s allOn Account of a Dame
We’ve all seen the memes about that… crossword puzzle game being played in German, right? Well, here you have a collection of some of the most staggering linguistic morphological nightmares ever found in the wilds of German and Austrian newspapers, magazines, nature shows, legal documents, websites, and academic publications. All of these are to prove just how accurate those memes really were… no…. to prove how understated those memes really were. Along with the gigantic chimeras of the compound word world, there are some everyday vocabulary items you might actually use some day. Viel Spaß!
FROM JOHN BAILEY: Quade! Book I: The Titan Contract (The Quade Expeditions 1)
On Titan, survival isn’t guaranteed. Trust is even rarer.
Commander Elias Quade was preparing to retire.
Then the offer came.
A buried alien vault beneath the methane storms of Titan.
A sealed artifact no one has opened.
A private contract no one else will take.The risk is extreme. The pay is exceptional.
But Quade quickly discovers he’s not alone.
A rival expedition—backed by the powerful Axiom Directorate—is already moving in. Corporate interference, sabotage, and cryovolcanic instability turn the mission into a race against time.
As drones fail, temperatures plummet, and the terrain fractures beneath their feet, Quade must rely on skill, discipline, and human resilience—not just machines—to survive.
What they recover will point to something far larger than a single artifact.
And someone is willing to reshape humanity’s future to control it.
The Titan Contract is the first novel in The Quade Expeditions, a hard science fiction survival series blending realistic space exploration, corporate rivalry, and high-stakes planetary danger.
Perfect for readers who enjoy:
- Competent protagonists
- Realistic technology
- Survival against hostile environments
- Moral tension without melodrama
The expedition begins here.
FROM KAREN MYERS: The Ways of Winter – A Virginian in Elfland (The Hounds of Annwn Book 2)
Book 2 of The Hounds of Annwn
TRAPPED BEHIND ENEMY LINES, CAN HE FIND THE STRENGTH TO DEFEND ALL THAT HE VALUES MOST, OR EVEN JUST TO SURVIVE?
It’s the dead of winter and George Talbot Traherne, the new human huntsman for the Wild Hunt, is in trouble. The damage in Gwyn ap Nudd’s domain reveals the deadly powers of a dangerous foe who has mastered an unstoppable weapon and threatens the fae dominions in both the new and the old worlds.
Secure in his unbreachable stronghold, the enemy holds hostages and has no compunction about using them in deadly experiments with newly discovered way-technology. Only George has a chance to reach him in time to prevent the loss of thousands of lives, even if it costs him everything.
Welcome to the portrait of a paladin in-the-making, Can he carry out a rescue without the deaths of all involved? Will his patron, the antlered god Cernunnos, help him, or just write him off as a dead loss? He has a family to protect and a world to save, and little time to do it in.
FROM HOLLY CHISM: Universal Donor (Modern Gods)
Same liver, different vulture…
When you know you can regenerate any organ, fast…why not donate your kidneys?
Prometheus has been a teacher all of his life, nearly. Sometimes, like with teaching Man to harness fire, it got him in trouble. Sometimes, he’s able to make an even bigger difference for his students. Especially when they need a kidney as much as they need knowledge.
FROM SARAH A. HOYT: Done With Mirrors: A Collection of Short Stories (Sarah A. Hoyt’s Short Story Collections)
DONE WITH MIRRORS
From Prometheus Award winner Sarah A. Hoyt comes a dazzling collection that showcases why her work has appeared in Analog, Asimov’s, and Weird Tales—and why readers can’t get enough.
Magic-soaked noir in 1920s Denver. Mirror-hopping time lords fleeing across infinite universes. Survival in John Ringo’s zombie apocalypse. Murder and mystery in the world of Darkships and Rhodes. Each story in this collection pulls you into a different world—and refuses to let go.
Previously published in acclaimed anthologies from Baen and Chris Kennedy Publishing, these nine tales span Hoyt’s most beloved universes alongside standalone adventures. Whether she’s writing in Ringo’s Black Tide Rising series, exploring her own Darkships and Rhodes worlds, or crafting speculative noir that defies categorization, Hoyt delivers the vivid storytelling and emotional resonance that has earned her a devoted following.
From rain-slicked streets where magic and murder collide to the far reaches of space-time itself, Done With Mirrors demonstrates the genre-hopping brilliance of one of speculative fiction’s most versatile voices.
Nine stories. Nine worlds. One unforgettable collection.
Contains the short stories: Honey Fall; Scrubbing Clean; Last Chance; Great Reckoning in a Small Room; Horse’s Heart; Do No Harm; Dead End Rhodes; Knights of Time; Done with Mirrors.
With an introduction by Holly Chism.
Vignettes by Luke, Mary Catelli and ‘Nother Mike.
So what’s a vignette? You might know them as flash fiction, or even just sketches. We will provide a prompt each Sunday that you can use directly (including it in your work) or just as an inspiration. You, in turn, will write about 50 words (yes, we are going for short shorts! Not even a Drabble 100 words, just half that!). Then post it! For an additional challenge, you can aim to make it exactly 50 words, if you like.
We recommend that if you have an original vignette, you post that as a new reply. If you are commenting on someone’s vignette, then post that as a reply to the vignette. Comments — this is writing practice, so comments should be aimed at helping someone be a better writer, not at crushing them. And since these are likely to be drafts, don’t jump up and down too hard on typos and grammar.
If you have questions, feel free to ask.
Your writing prompt this week is: SOAK
According To Hoyt 
“So I said go soak your head and he said that I should soak my head as well. How did I know that he was stronger than me and could breathe underwater!”
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“So. Who was that?”
“Sandra Oscar’s alleged killer.”
“Seriously? Why were talking to her?”
“Work. Someone has to defend her and, as usual in this county, the job falls to me.”
“Huh. Did she do it?”
“I don’t care. I do my job and let others decide.”
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/slow claps at the clever way the prompt was used
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To be honest, I don’t know if I used the word soak in any of my books…
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Everyone who attends a con needs to take vitamin C before, during, and after.
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having seen your note in the diner: no there is no commenter by that name. WP just created an ersatz one for you. It often does that for me for no reason when I comment on my own blog. Eh. Don’t worry about it.
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I edited your name. Don’t know if it took.
BTW, I HAVE taken vitamin C. Of course, I didn’t catch anything.
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Take vitamin D, too. B12, magnesium and zinc wouldn’t hurt.
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They’re trying to soak us again, Cedra thought as she listened to her father arguing with the Port of Ceres space boss.
Last time the Deke Slayton had come here, they’d tried to claim the hard-dock had failed — a pretext to force them to bring everything in and out via the airlocks. Expensive as docking fees were, airlock fees were even steeper.
The worst thing about the situation was the knowledge that they only wanted the ship. It had value, but most of the people aboard it were just the descendants of people who’d fled Earth in those last desperate days before the spaceports were destroyed by the religious fanatics who considered spaceflight an affront, even cosmic lese majeste.
Her father might have come from a respected mercantile family, but he’d lost that when his grandfather chose humanity above orders — and then he chose love over status. They would never stoop to bailing him out.
Which means we have to figure out a way to outwit this slimebag.
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How funny that “soak” is the word of the day, I just finished this story today.
Sam was relaxing in the hot spring behind his house. His reward after wrangling 12 horses and a cow before breakfast, when the sun was barely peeking out. The goats, chickens and ducks looked after themselves, but the horses needed to be brushed, have their feet checked for problems, and a host of other things that made them a lot of work. Presently they were getting exercise, being ridden by the Valkyrja to keep the skills of horses and riders sharp, giving Sam time to soak some ache out of his muscles.
The pool was wide and low, surrounded by large flat stones like a natural hot spring. It was made to look like Hvergelmir, the sacred pool of the Norns in Norse mythology. Their version was smaller and heated by artificial means, but it was a good representation of the original, right down to the oak log they used for a bench next to the spring. Their bench was fancier; it was carved with runes of health and protection. The runes didn’t do anything in Midgard, but they looked nice. On the other hand, if by some misadventure the pool and the bathers were all spirited away to the celestial realm, that bench would be enough to fend off an army all by itself.
Having once arrived in Niflheim while emerging from an aircraft bathroom, Sam kept an eye on his surroundings and didn’t necessarily take the things he saw at face value. He also carried a pistol everywhere, even to have a bath. As his friend Alice Haddison was known to say, better to have it and not need it, than need it and not have it.
He stretched and opened his eyes to discover he had company in the spring. A woman was reclining near him on the wide stones. A very shapely woman clad only in two little gold chains that draped artistically around neck and waist. She was blonde, and her hair was so long it covered her modesty almost as well as a dress would have. She nearly glowed in the morning light.
“Uhm, hi,” Sam said brilliantly, eyeing the vision of loveliness that hadn’t been there moments before. And reaching for his pistol, under his towel on the stone behind his head. She was so amazing it made him suspicious. He felt better with the pistol in his hand.
“Greetings,” she said gravely, her face empty of emotion.
As the silence after she spoke lengthened uncomfortably, Sam decided that he was in trouble. “Nice day, eh?” he offered, to see what she would say.
“The weather is pleasant,” she agreed, raising an eyebrow at him. “Don’t you find me beautiful, mortal man?”
“Sure,” he said truthfully. “You look nice today.”
“Will you take me then, here on these stones?” she asked. The way she asked it was an accusation, not an invitation.
“It’s a little early for me,” Sam told her with a frown. “Besides, my wives wouldn’t approve.”
“Most men would take me,” she said emotionlessly.
“Unlikely,” Sam snorted. “There are kids walking around here, lady. Most men would ask you where you lost your pants. Need some help finding them?”
“You offer me aid?” she sniffed doubtfully.
“Not yet,” he countered. “I asked if you need help finding your pants. The jewelry doesn’t cover much. Like I said, there are kids around here. Their parents are not going to be pleased to find you here, showing off your assets by the pool.”
“Then you will not try to ravish me?” she snarled, becoming angry. “You expect me to believe this? Your pretense is an affront!”
“Not a chance in hell,” Sam told her flatly. “I might shoot you in the ass though. That could happen.”
“How can this be?!” she demanded, languid pose abandoned for a more businesslike crouch, hands extended and fingers curved to reveal sharp claws. “There has never yet been a man who didn’t try, on first sight! Art thou a eunuch?!”
“Art thou a scary monster, lady?” Sam responded skeptically, even as he backed away in the water. “Nice claws. I’ll pass on the ravishing, okay? I’m trying to cut back.”
“You dare jest about such a thing?” she growled. “’Tis a horror, scornful man!”
“That means you’re doing it wrong,” said new voice. From the forest stalked a gigantic spider, her body as broad and long as a school bus, strong legs arching up over her back ending in clawed feet. She was covered in greyish hair, similar in shade to a deer or a moose, and blended into the woods almost invisibly. From where one would expect her mouth to be there protruded the muzzle of a railgun, the bore as large as a clenched fist. Her name was Bertha, the Bright One.
“Hey!” Sam said, waving at her. “Got a visitor here. Lost her pants somewhere, apparently.”
“What is it with you?” Bertha asked him irritably, stomping up to the edge of the spring. “Every time you go anywhere there’s some woman trying to jump you.”
“This one doesn’t seem to be a woman,” Sam pointed out. She was growing claws out of her toes, and there were fangs starting to protrude from her mouth. “Fair point though.”
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Remember, o Readers, that you can be FORCE MULTIPLIERS!
When you read books, you can rate and review them.
Even short reviews are of aid to the writer, because sheer mass helps. (And if you really can’t review, still rate.)
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A cloudburst broke on its head, enough to wash it away, had it been charcoal. It lifted its head and roared. Not like a lion, and its hide looked —
“Is it scaly?” said Violetta.
“Yes,” said Augustus, coming up, his sword in hand. The others, grim-faced, followed. “It’s a dragon.”
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“Very well,” said Susan. “Onward we go. I hope there is shelter ahead.”
“Of course,” said Stephan. “We don’t want to get soaked by every rainstorm.”
Through the forest, Edur walked behind Susan, Honor realized. Also Lucius and Kari. All three watching her every step. She wondered whether Susan noticed.
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She wondered if there were a well nearby. She could not trust the boulder, of course, and everything here was dry as a bone.
“We should have brought more water. To drink. Hoping to so much as wash would be folly.”
“I can look about,” said Rosalind. “Unseen, at night.”
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Hello Sarah:
Thanks so much for the book promo. It has given my book launch for “The Sniper” a very nice bump!
Best regards,
Jake Barter
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“Next.” The young officer was in many ways the very picture of mid-20th British service, maybe even mid-19th century with a few updates. Short straight black hair over bold black eyebrows, welcoming hazel eyes, even more than a hint of the familiar old dialect in that one brisk word.
“Erzhebet Nadezhda Borisovna.” She held up, cupped in her right hand, a holographic ID that had not only an image of her and the Federation seal and other identifying things — it also had data encrypted into speckles decorating the edges of the image, decodable if you had the keys. The 3-D image came up bright and plain in the multicolor reading laser.
It didn’t matter that her hand was shaking a bit as she held it; or that she really had no need at all any more to hide it from anyone… here.
Just as she could stand here quite bareheaded, and most comfortably so.
“Pass, Federation citizen. And?” But his khaki uniform could never have been mistaken for British of any era; the eight-pointed star inside a crescent moon’s arms was inconsistent, as was the old French motto writ bold and clear around it, “Dieu et mon droit.” Most of all, the smaller words: Starlight Principality, in English and two other tongues.
Best of all: not Provisional Republic — finally, blessedly not.
“Anna Simone Hayakawa.” Anna’s hand was quivering even a bit more than Erzhebet’s had; but her voice was just as firm, just as clear. As if her life depended on it — but then, in many practical ways, likely enough it had. As Erzhebet’s had too; and measurably still in some few ways did.
“Pass, Federation citizen. You both can go on through the gate.”
What came out of Anna’s mouth was something between a sigh and a gasp; followed more intelligibly by, “I can’t quite believe we made it out.” Said softly. But, also, inevitably and irresistably; as if she couldn’t not say it, after so long of keeping words forcefully within.
The man at the table under the little tent only grinned at them both. “But both of you did. And that’s enough. Next.”
And now they were only twenty sun-drenched feet away from the fence.
There were two Principality soldiers on either side of the pneumatic gate and they held very serviceable-looking multimode small arms. Surely high velocity rifles; and either laser designators or actual weapons too. But they smiled, much as the man had; and it was almost strange that they did not scowl when they saw women, or scan the two of them blatantly head to toe on first sight for any minuscule apparel violations.
The Arab-looking one said, “Enter, citizens,” with a tilt of his head.
And the gate hissed open — almost certainly by remote control from some nearby but unreachable place — and Anna took Erzhebet’s hand, and then they just walked through onto the spaceliftport itself. The gate hissed shut behind them. On the new ‘Republic’ and all its doings.
Right in front of them was a far larger version of the Principality seal, maybe thirty inches across. With the words “Entering Crown Territory” in English above it, and in Persian and Arabic below it. Between two worn lanes marked on the exo-concrete they now stood on, for coming and going.
With the eight-pointed star that went back at least to Mesopotamia; in a position where it had to be either on the surface of the pictured generic moon, or out in the space in front of it. That suggested a reference to Islam, without insisting on it. And made clear reference of the full name of the star association — the Principality of the Light of the Stars.
The Emaarat-e Nur-e Setaaregaan. The Imaarat Nuuri n-Nujuum. Where those cognates ‘noor’ both meant not only physical light, but the poetic kind too.
It wasn’t the Federation of Like-Minded Peoples; but it would do, oh yes.
“I just want to soak it in, Liz. I know there’s a transport schedule, I don’t want any moss growing under my feet as we leave, either, but… now I want to just stand here, and look around, and do not very much at all.”
They moved off the walkways a bit, since there was a Greek-looking man coming up behind, having been passed through (it seemed) just after they were.
“Excuse me?” The speaker was a long-dark-haired youngish person, also in a Principality uniform, speaking nearly-British English. “I’m Esther, and I want to welcome you back to Principality territory. We’ll be lifting you off the planet shortly, if you please, because this world is designated a war zone.” Of course it was; the secession declaration had been linked to the declaration of planetwide Sharia law — the old civil-secular, all-embracing not only purely-religious, Sharia law. Like some old, cold, dark thing risen up out of the far past; out of the Iranian Eclipse years perhaps, or the informal Shadow Caliphate in 21st-century Europe, or some of the Old Kingdoms in and around Arabia back before the Reformation had ever even properly got started.
“Yes, please, please do.” Anna spoke almost in a rush. Almost in a sob.
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(Part 2/3)
“And me too.” Erzhebet found her voice was more controlled, but she still had a dagger-stab pang at even the merest thought of being stuck here. It ‘objectively’ had been no more than eight or nine weeks — but a society overtaken by what careful terminology clinically called atavist Islam (and more precisely and even more threateningly atavist Islam-ism) could fall so very far, so very fast.
“There will be a delay of perhaps an hour now, though, so I and some of my fellow unit personnel have volunteered to be… guides and companions.” It was a bit strange to think of it, now; having a, what? designated friend?
But Erzhebet would take it, oh yes she would.
“So you’re a sort of… concierge? I’m just trying to understand.” Anna’s voice was full of a sort of no-disrespect, no-harm-meant, don’t-hurt-me tone that Erzhebet Borisovna suddenly found she was quite roundly sick of hearing, there in her voice — or most especially in her very own.
“We volunteered our off-duty or vacation time for this. Simply as a means of pure, human respect. And — well, in my case it’s called paying it forward too. My greaty-grandparents lived in Iran back when the bombs started falling, and the cheers started rising. My name’s from one of the first children they had, in those heady first Constitutional Kingdom days.
“Esther because it’s a Hebrew name. In celebration of all the many Israelis who helped… cut out the tumour.” There was a wistful sound to her voice, with bright red threads of an earthy sort of celebration underneath.
“My name means something like ‘my oath is to God’ in the original Hebrew, though of course it entered Hungarian long before the Eclipse. And then, for my family, passed through into Russian. The Erzsebet I’m named for lived, what, in the mid-1900s? Under Communism. Another sort of Eclipse.”
“So many people don’t get what that means,” Esther said, pointing at the seal and the motto. “That ‘Dieu et mon droit’ part.” (Her French was also very nearly old-country perfect.) “So many outsiders — and you both are, we got only the briefest of bio-summaries, Federationers — seem to read that as being spoken by our Royal Family, to everyone else. That’s really not it at all, though I know our Princess Noor IV takes it much to heart.
“It’s for all of us to say, and mean. Our duty first to God, and then to all those who we love, and then our right to stand on all that to do what we should and we must. So then, here I am, one more time.” She shrugged. As if to say, what else could I do now, anyway?
But Anna’s face had clouded, had looked suddenly troubled. “Oh, I’m sorry, you’re maybe thinking how they might have been saying that, too?”
And Erzhebet watched Anna nod, tightly. Very controlledly.
“There’s a very old saying, noblesse oblige, that applies. As you very likely know, it’s just ‘nobility obligates.’ Obligates, not entitles or licences. Requires, not allows. That’s what ‘Dieu et mon droit’ boils down to, for us. Did you visit or live in much of the Principality, other than here on Aqaba? Or do you just know ‘us’ from here… recently?”
“It’s been pretty much only this one planet for us, so far. And we’re not typically foolish or disoriented enough to take one single world’s — um, religious atavism as they call it — as representing your entire Principality. Not even after these past two, um, months.” Anna looked at Erzhebet, as if to give her a chance to disagree.
“That’s a good word, but it’s not religious atavism that’s the problem; it would apply only to Muslims here at worst. It’s social and political chaos that make it a… problem, we have to solve. Most of the, objectionable stuff let’s say, that you saw was strictly unconstitutional. So very much against the ‘mon droit’ in that motto there, by the book and obviously.
“It might be packaged as a ‘return to traditonal Islam’ and all; but it’s political wrongdoing and subversion that makes it against our law. And it really is something very close to treason, for these people to secede and do such things, to anybody, Principality subjects or not.” For a moment, it looked much like Esther was actually and literally going to spit.
“This might be the wrong way to ask this, but, do either of you have any sort of abuse, to declare? All that process, if any, can be handled once we get up there” — and she pointed up to the moon, halfway up the bluest sky in most of Erzhebet’s life so far, and so very much like Old Earth’s.
“No, I don’t. They smacked us and beat on us a little with clubs at the checkpoints, but nothing ever beyond bruises. You know,” and Anna’s voice turned a little bitter, “like the instructions for correct wife-beating in old, unreformed Islam.” One fist smote her other palm with a meaty sound.
“I don’t, either, I just… want to be gone from this place. Soon.” There was a moment, in which Erzhebet’s silence faded away into an awareness of how tired she was — of ‘Islamic’ this-and-that; of exigencies that ought to have had nothing to do with her; of… all the stupid crap.
“That’s good. I’m not a certified report-taking officer, but of course I can connect you very quickly with ones who are. And, please on behalf of my entire nation, not just from me but from Princess Noor herself, accept our humblest and most sincere apologies. There’s an old military saying with us, that not too many outsiders ever hear… ‘we clean up our own shit.'”
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(Part 3/3)
Was that, just now, Erzhebet couldn’t help wondering, the famous and well-known ‘Persian bluntness’ so many have talked about? If so, she suddenly found, she heartily approved.
Esther had pulled out a handheld and looked at it. “Still be a while, we need clear near-atmospheric space to lift. And there’s going to be, in the next little bit, something of a… fireworks show. Old Tehran style.
“I can’t apologize on behalf of The God or the Prophet or the Reformed See in Mecca, by the way. Neo-Zoroastrian and Reformation Christian, speaking; though the relation between the two can be a little hard to explain.” Her voice was almost apologetic, almost proud.
“The way I heard it,” put in Anna a little unexpectedly to Erzhebet, “it’s something like Confucianism versus Taoism in old old China. Zoroastrianism more like a guide to how you should relate to society; Christianity as how you relate to God and exist in His world.”
“That’s… not at all wrong. Surely incomplete, and I know very little of pre-Communist China and not even so much about post; but sounds right.” It seemed incongruous for her to be staring so, even briefly, at her handheld.
“How would you like to see a fireworks show? Maybe energetic, but not any significant danger to us here.”
Both Anna and Erzhebet managed to say ‘yes’ without speaking.
“There’s this thing in Islam, a separation of all the world — of all the worlds, now — into two parts: the ‘Zone of Islam’ and the ‘Zone of Conflict’ — on this our religion and the atavists’ agree. Only there’s a difference on what those mean. The atavists think of the world as already being Islamic, first, or part of a struggle to convert the rest to it, by force and continued watchful coercion if that’s what it takes, second.
“But Reformed Islam sees the Zone of Islam as being a place of peace, or something close, where either our Faithful or those of other faiths are willing to coexist, together, under principles that do not contradict the core teachings of Islam.
“While the Zone of Conflict is where we place those who would annihilate Islam, all kinds of Islam at all; and also where we place those who would make our sort of Islam non-viable, by insisting on its megalomanic rule over everything and everyone. A suicide pact with each other, by eternal war on the greater universe of people and worlds. No. That is… our duty, for those of us who are among the Faithful.” Esther shrugged.
“Now remember, I’m not one of those; but I do live in the Zone of Islam, by their classification. Just as we, people like me, have duties to such people, who don’t share my religion but do share our Principality.”
She pointed up into the sky. “Look about five degrees above the moon, and ten degrees off to the right. You’ll not be able to miss it.
“Now, you’ll see what our Zone of Conflict is all about. Remember that old military saying I quoted you, a few minutes back? Watch.”
And there was a light in the sky, yellow-white like a meteor. Two, three. Ones that moved swift across the sky, then split into a narrow spread of equally-fast-moving bits almost like a condensed version of a star shell bursting at a traditional fireworks display.
“You’re seeing lunar iron, mostly, formed into rods and bunched onto a bus with control and propulsion and guidance; sent down onto an Aqaba-grazing trajectory for a couple of days, then perturbed down into atmosphere.
“They used to call the idea Project Thor, back in the old dawn-age days of spaceflight, before anyone ever settled anywhere or built a stardrive. Still works pretty well, and the individual submunitions are about the shape and size of an old-fashioned straight crowbar.” Esther mimed a bar almost as tall as she was, maybe an inch or a little more in diameter.
Suddenly, it was obvious. They were going to strike over in the city; in the heart of the urban terrtory the Provisional Islamic Republic claimed as their own, to do as they pleased with it and all its people.
“They’re very well guided, they’re really cheap, and the Federation base up there was quite happy to help us make more of ’em, faster.”
By now there were at least a dozen fans of those sun-colored lights, up there in the blue, blue sky. Coming nearer and nearer, ever brighter.
“Take that, you rabid theocratic rebel atavist dogs.” And she did spit.
There was a light in her eyes, the kind that made anyone sane think such thoughts as I’m really really glad she’s on our side.
And seeing that light, that look in her eyes, and seeing the fiery trails in the air branching and re-branching, and most especially hearing the loud, ripping-cloth sound of their overlapped shock waves — Erzhebet realized that paying it forward had another meaning; one that most people she’d known had never even considered.
She also realized, close on the heels of that, how deeply healing it was about to be for her, to simply watch and listen to the Zone of Conflict.
To simply soak it in, as they must’ve done centuries ago in Old Tehran. As a salve, as a balm, even as something eerily like a partial cure.
Light and iron, sound and fury, chased each other swiftly across the sky.
Even after all these thousands of years, the Persians still had the Right Stuff; and no mistake at all.
(Fars-Persian and Arabic translations courtesy of ‘Grok’ — use prompt “translate ‘The Principality of the Light of the Stars’ into romanized Persian and romanized Arabic and briefly explain” — with long vowels doubled, as in Dutch. Also note Erzsebet’s middle name means ‘Hope’ in Russian.)
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Just an observation – saw the post-link at Insty just a moment ago.
Did you know, with the font used there, “INDIE” can be mis-read as “NUDE”?
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No.
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