Children Of Orion
by Robert Ipcar

The Setting

N'ayu...

Thousands of light years into the Great Wall lies a planet known as N'ayu, its very existence an accident of nature; its once diminutive red sun long relegated to that a nighttime moon by the force of a binary companion, a fiery double helix formed from a collapsed black hole known as The Twins Above.

Though endless winters periodically vie with decades of scorching heat, sentient life has somehow thrived, emerging beyond its aquatic origins to establish a nomadic society of telepathic humanoid warriors who lead lives of integrity and simplicity—the High Forest People known as the Mateek.

As with any island, there are always the castaways, those who would seek out their time beneath the twin dark suns at the expense of those who have adapted. First it was the Wai'min, an empathic human race of stellar origins who came to embrace the ways of the indigenous Mateek. Now more recently come the so called Children of Orion, who arrive aboard five shuttles from a doomed colony ship, humans who represent the best and worst of Terran society.

For almost twenty four thousand years, their descendants keep Orion alive, not as a memory of a colony ship but as a God who will someday return for his children. And haughty children they are, children whose feudal system of Kings and Lords have relegated the once proud Mateek and Wai'min societies to that of a scorned subculture. Yet beneath the great red moon are those who secretly follow the majiskalas—those who would draw on the powers of the occult; those who would lead the Mateek and Wai'min together in victory, regain their rightful place.

Book One
Children Of Orion