Heir to Empire:  Tess had been cursed by an accident of birth, cursed to be the sister of the one man honored by the alien conquerors of human-run space.  Her brother, Charles Soerensen, the leader of Earth's rebellion, had been given a dukedom after his defeat and now ruled over far-distant worlds.  And Tess was his only heir, a position and a responsibility she was not yet willing to assume.  So she fled to a world in her brother's domain, a world where -- she was soon to discover -- the alien conquerors were themselves involved in some covert and dangerous mission.

And despite herself, Tess was suddenly forced to become both player and pawn in an interstellar game of intrigue and politics, caught between protecting her brother's interests, and her own growing involvement with Ilya, the leader of the nomadic tribe with whom she had taken shelter.  But it soon became apparent to Tess that whether Charles or the aliens were the victors here, Ilya and his people were balanced at a crucial point in their history -- a point at which they must either learn to adapt to the incursions of more advanced civilizations or, by remaining rooted in their own traditions, face inevitable extinction.
 
 

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She dusted herself off, flicked a stem of grass away from her mouth, and walked back to the charred sight of the shuttle's landing. Such a faint scar, to mark its having been here. The breeze cooled her cheeks as she strode along the trail of beaten-down grass left by the horses. Snow patched the shadows, but her clothes adjusted their temperature accordingly. She did not bother to pull on her gloves. After all, she would catch up with the Chapalii soon enough. The island on which Charles's engineer had disguised his spaceport was tiny; every hill overlooked the sea. Off-world women and men in Charles's employ lived in the island's only village. There, Tess could find a galley sailing the rest of the way across the vast bay, to the harbor at Jeds. There was no other way off the island.

By the sun, she guessed that her trail led east. Climbing, she felt invigorated, enjoying the sweet pungency of the air, the untainted crispness of the wind. She came to the crest of the nearest hill quickly, her cheeks warm with the effort.

There was no ocean. There was nothing except grass and snow and broken forest straggling along the march of hills. As she stared out at the unvarying expanse, dwarfed by the huge bowl of the sky and the wide stretch of hills, she knew that she had never seen this place before. This was not an island.

All material in this excerpt Copyright 1992 Katrina Elliott. All rights reserved.

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All material Copyright Katrina Elliott 2000. All rights reserved.