Starship's Mage: Omnibus: (Starship's Mage Book 1) (52 page)
Read Starship's Mage: Omnibus: (Starship's Mage Book 1) Online
Authors: Glynn Stewart
“All ships confirm minimum safe distance,” another voice reported. “We are fully clear.”
“Fire tube one,” the soft contralto of the
Gallantry
’s captain ordered.
A flash of light struck out from the cruiser. At thirteen thousand gravities, the missile crossed four kilometers in a blink of an eye, a bright streak that didn’t, quite, connect the two ships.
Then the warhead detonated. A filter automatically darkened, shading the watcher’s eyes from the glare of a one gigaton antimatter explosion.
When the light faded, nothing remained of the old ship, vaporized in a single moment.
Damien blinked away tears, and felt Kelly cuddle up to him.
“It’s sad,” she said softly. “It’ll be better when we get to Tau Ceti and see the new ship the Captain’s been promised.”
“I’m not coming to Tau Ceti,” Damien admitted. Evacuating the ship had been a rush. Now was the first moment of relative quiet he’d had with Kelly, for all that he knew it was probably the worst possible time.
“You’re not?” Kelly sounded a lot calmer than he’d been afraid of.
“I’m going with Stealey,” he told her awkwardly. “She knows someone who can train me in my gifts, and then I think I’m going to be working with her. Trying to make the Protectorate a better place.”
The engineer turned away from him, and he laid his hand gently on her shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“We’re spacers, Damien,” she told him after a long pause. “I always knew we would never last forever. Always figured you’d find some cause that would drag you away – you’re that type. I just hoped we would have more time.”
“Me too,” he admitted. “I always seem to be leaving people behind, wherever I go. I’m going to miss you.”
“But not enough to stay.” It wasn’t a question. She laid her hand on top of his and squeezed hard. “I get it, Damien.” Her voice was choked with unshed tears. “I get it. But with everything else, it hurts.”
He wrapped her in his arms.
“I know. I’m sorry.”
#
Damien walked through the unmarked stone corridors Alaura had led him to in silence. The walls pressed in on him oppressively, and he honestly wasn’t sure where they were. The underground facility they had entered was
immense
, but it wasn’t as if the Protectorate didn’t have dozens of facilities that would meet that description.
They’d spent sixteen days jumping, so they could be almost anywhere in the half of the Protectorate on this side of Sol. Alaura had taken an almost childish delight in
not
telling him where they were going, and they arrived on planet via a Marine drop shuttle – which noticeably lacked such amenities as windows.
Now the Hand led the way through the tunnels with calm assurance, while Damien tried not to be distracted by the complex twists of silver runes snaking across the walls and roof around them. They moved too quickly for him to read them, but they seemed to be an amplifier matrix of a scale he could barely comprehend.
The runes and the Hand led him to the same place, and they stepped out into a single massive chamber at the heart of the mountain, and Damien gasped in shock.
The air above them was filled with a scale model of a star system. Everything from the sun at the center, to the four massive gas giants, to the asteroid belts and even, he was sure, the tiniest of ships was duplicated in floating molten silver sand that carried every minutiae of the reality of the system. It was a simulacrum, but unlike anything he’d ever seen.
“It affects most people who see it for the first time,” an amused deep voice told him, and Damien looked up to see the only occupant of the room. He was a tall man, with silver hair but an unlined face, and he stood before a throne carved from the solid stone of the mountain – a throne that all the runes of the amplifier and the simulacrum ran to.
“This is the man I meant,” Alaura Stealey said softly. “The only person who could even begin to train a Rune Wright.
“Damien Montgomery, be known to my master: Desmond Michael Alexander the Third, Protector of Man, and Mage-King of Mars.”
###
Starship’s Mage began as an experiment in short story writing sometime in 2012. My agent, Mike Kabongo, liked it and suggested I expand it. The story could quite neatly become a novella, but to turn it into a novel I was going to have to add a lot of content, which would in some ways be completely separate arcs.
At the same time, I was starting to read a lot more self-published fiction, and had come across several serials of novellas and novels that caught my eye and gave me the idea of releasing Starship’s Mage as a series of novella length episodes.
I was also having problems at the time with completing novels, and figured that writing what was basically a full novel in multiple shorter pieces would help me break through the barrier I was struggling with. As it turns out, announced release dates are a very effective motivator for me!
The first month that "Starship’s Mage: Episode 1" was out, I sold twenty novellas. In October 2014, ten months later, I sold over
two thousand
.
This Omnibus is the culmination of the year of effort that went into the Starship’s Mage serial, fuelled by the interest of you, the readers. Getting to this point took the help of more people than I can quickly name, but at the top of the list are the crazy souls who have been my beta readers throughout: Russell Rokos, Meg Anderson, Stef Herrel, and G. W. Renshaw. Right next to them on the list is my wife and cover artist, Jack Giesen, without whom these books would be much less pretty!
It’s been a whirlwind journey (cut) for both myself and poor Damien, but this isn’t the end of the story for either of us. A month before the release of this Omnibus, I put my first full-length novel,
Children of Prophecy
, out into the world in both e-book and paperback forms. Next year will see me release two full novels—and yes, one of them will advance Damien Montgomery’s story.
You can find
Children of Prophecy
, an epic fantasy about destiny, love, and duty—along with a threat that might completely destroy everything the Kingdom of Vishni seeks to defend—on Amazon now.
Space Carrier Avalon
, a space opera about cold war, honor, and the prices soldiers pay to defend their countries, was released in June of 2015, and its sequel, Stellar Fox, was released in December of 2015.
In
Hand of Mars
, the next Damien Montgomery novel, the young mage must master his unique gifts in the service of Mars. The book was released in September of 2015. The third Starship’s Mage book,
Voice of Mars
is expected to be released in March 2016.
Thank you for joining me in the journey so far, and I hope you continue to read and enjoy my work!
-Glynn Stewart
If you enjoyed the novel, please leave a review!
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http://www.faolanspen.com
Starship’s Mage
Starship’s Mage: Omnibus
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