Haze and the Hammer of Darkness (78 page)
Read Haze and the Hammer of Darkness Online
Authors: Jr. L. E. Modesitt
Don't forget the hatred ⦠some of that, too â¦
She touches his fingertips with hers. In turn, his eyes refocus on the quince tree before he looks at her.
He has his vision,
she adds.
Don't we all?
Some men look, and others create â¦
⦠and still others think they are gods.
He turns to her, their eyes nearly level.
Even for me, the temptation is great.
The time is coming when you will have to surrender to it. Our time must come round again.
He shakes his head, for he knows it is true. She is right.
While the past few centuries have been quiet, the times are again changing, and new gods and new empires are building. Gods without understanding, who will have to be cast down, and empires without humanity, which will have forgotten their origin and their purpose.
He sighs, quietly, and looks back at the quince, which is beginning to lose its leaves as the fruit ripens.
She picks the thread of the old song from his thoughts.
Tell me now, and if you can,
What is human, what is man.
Tell me now, and if you must,
Where's the god that men can trust?
He laughs, and his laugh echoes alone above the emerald grass. The pieces fracture and float like mist above the turf, finally dissolving into the sod.
He laughs, and the haunting notes still even the crickets.
He laughs, and the twilight becomes night.
She laughs, gently, in return. Silver bells in the evening wrap themselves around the haunted notes of his rejoicing.
The two laughs mingle, build, rustle the forest leaves and needles as they carry the wind across the black-and-white stone wall, where the monks hear the sacred bells and bend their heads in worship.
On the portico of a white-and-black marble villa, a man and a woman hold hands, just like any other man and woman.
A red-booted old man boards a shuttlecraft.
Three monks in white lift their heads and finish sweeping the nave before replacing the tapers.
The evening star glitters in the eastern sky, and the man and the woman hold that brightness in their hands, and the blackness from his hands and the light from hers twine around it, the one following the other, black and white, black and white.
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TOR BOOKS BY
L. E. MODESITT, JR.
T
HE
I
MAGER
P
ORTFOLIO
Treachery's Tools
(forthcoming)
T
HE
C
OREAN
C
HRONICLES
T
HE
S
AGA OF
R
ECLUCE
T
HE
S
PELLSONG
C
YCLE
T
HE
E
COLITAN
M
ATTER
Empire & Ecolitan (comprising The Ecolitan Operation and The Ecologic Secession)
Ecolitan Prime
(comprising
The Ecologic Envoy and The Ecolitan Enigma)
The Forever Hero
(comprising
Dawn for a Distant Earth, The Silent Warrior,
and
In Endless Twilight)
Timegods' World
(comprising
Timediver's Dawn
and
The Timegod)
T
HE
G
HOST
B
OOKS
Ghosts of Columbia
(comprising
Of Tangible Ghosts and The Ghost of the Revelator)
Â
Praise for
Haze
“
Haze
is the first book by
L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
, that I've ever read.⦠Exceptional.”
â
SF Site
“Modesitt has proved before he can write good action adventure, and
Haze
will certainly satisfy his fans. It also has a bit more political science than usual, but that is seamlessly woven into the story.”
âBooklist
“This psychological SF thriller by the prolific author of the multivolume Recluce fantasy series incorporates carefully delineated characters with believable far-future scenarios. Modesitt's fans as well as readers of hard SF should appreciate this story of imminent interstellar war.”
â
Library Journal
Praise for
The
Hammer of Darkness
“Prolific author Modesitt has created a fully developed world with minimal words, focusing on the âordinary' man as hero.”
â
Library Journal
Â
L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
, is the bestselling author of more than sixty novels encompassing two science fiction series and three fantasy series, including the Saga of Recluce and the Imager Portfolio. He lives in Cedar City, Utah.
Learn more at
www.lemodesittjr.com
or sign up for email updates
here
.
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Tom Doherty Associates ebook.
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CONTENTS
Part One: The Planet of Eternal Light
