Where Giants Sleep

Artwork: Stefan Keller, Kellepics, Pixabay.

Influenced by the work of authors such as Paolo Bacigalupi, Anne McCaffrey and N K Jemisin, the scifi trilogy ‘Where Giants Sleep’ comprises three epic fantasies. Aeons after inter-planetary war, an undersea city (City 5) containing a dystopian society emerges into an Eden where magic is real. The ripples from this event will spread back in time and across the galaxy, leaving nothing unchanged. The trilogy centres on feisty Caia Esvane and her troublesome daughters. Not forgetting the power of magic, and love, and the ever-challenging and fascinating wyverns.

Emergence – first in the scifi trilogy

First novel Emergence centres on the arrival of the undersea city City 5 in a new and magical Eden. Conflict and love soon follow.

City 5

City 5 is the fifth undersea survival colony established during interplanetary war against the Scitha, a war-like race from across the galaxy. After 17,000 years, the despotic and bizarre society discovers that the surface is habitable. Wyvern-witch Caia Esvane’s curiosity is the root cause, with disastrous consequences.

Rebellious daughter of traditionalist shaman Robin Esvane, Caia detects an escape pod circling the planet. Inside, Squadron Leader John Mack has been in stasis since the invasion many thousands of years earlier. Caia awakes him, and he sees a living world below.

John Mack is already dying, but the escape pod returns him to City 5 where Lawkeeper Lucas Venn discovers the pod. John Mack’s last words to Lucas are that the surface is safe and it’s beautiful. As a reward, Lucas goes to the surface and encounters Caia Esvane. They are destined to fall in love, and hold the key to a future unity. As the news that the surface is safe spreads in City 5, the dystopian society within the city falls apart.

The Rift

Beloved home of Caia Esvane, the Rift is a fertile, forested valley cutting through wastelands decimated by the ancient inter-galactic war. The peoples of the Rift deny that war ever happened and have created their own mythology. Only the fallen Machines of the Scitha felled by a magnetic pulse bear witness to the truth. The Machines lie scattered the Outlands and the sea floor, and many fear their strange powers. The People of White (one time navigators to the Scitha) that survived the war live in the far north and will one day return.

Conflict

The shaman Robin Esvane banishes Caia to the Outlands. There, she discovers her estranged brother abandoned as a child, and learns of her own past. Meanwhile, City 5 emerges, hungry for new resources. The ensuing struggle between technology and magic leaves Caia with a fragmented people facing climate change and shrinking resources. In the midst of conflict, Caia realises she is in love with Lucas Venn, now blinded and outcast from the city. Together they must unite warring tribes and refugees to overcome City 5 and its dark forces.

Second Dawn – second novel in the scifi trilogy

Second Dawn is the second novel in the trilogy ‘Where Giants Sleep’. Seven years have passed. Whilst survivors from City 5 struggle to adapt to a new way of life, the conflict has attracted a second survival city to the surface. Unlike City 5, the city of Rax has adapted its occupants to existence under the sea, and with very different values. To Rax, all life on land is a threat. Pregnant with her second child, Caia has to reunite a divided society whilst the cities fight for supremacy in a war with no winners.

The city of Rax

Ex-waste disposal drones Hath Ban, his brother Octo and Dil Crown have not enjoyed emergence. Now collecting night-soil, they have the first encounter with Rax, when Dil is abducted by a shape-shifting creature called a biosynth. Dil is taken to the undersea city and sees many wonders. He is adopted by Meena, a tall and beautiful humanoid and double-agent. Later, Hath and Octo arrange for Dil’s rescue, but Meena goes with him. Meena, Hath and Octo are central characters, all forced to challenge their beliefs and their lives change.

Now an outcaste, Hedra Darke, former supreme ruler of City 5, has been imprisoned in the far North by the mysterious People of White, twelve survivors from the Scitha invasion. Originally serving as navigators for the Scitha, the People of White share a single mind and want to return to their home world. Their leader, Regis, forms a special relationship with Hedra Darke, and agrees to help her regain control of the city.

Unknown to Hedra, City 5 contains the means to contact the Scitha and open a tunnel through space-time. In order to control Caia, Hedra takes Caia’s seven-year-old daughter Leah hostage, but Leah is also a wyvern-witch and her powers are formidable. None of the People of White survive the ensuing onslaught, but they have opened the tunnel. One day, the Scitha will return.

Ouroboros – final novel in the trilogy

Ouroboros is the last novel in ‘Where Giants Sleep’. 14 years in the future, the second Scitha invasion is imminent and this time there seems to be no hope of survival for the nature-loving society of the Rift. Leah Esvane, now aged 21, is more gifted than Caia. Feisty and passionate, she is also very like her mother, with whom she agrees on nothing. Leah can also mind-join across time, and perhaps find a way to prevent the emergence of City 5, even if this means she can no longer exist.

As the conflict begins, Leah seeks a host 17,000 years in the past and mind-joins with trainee fighter pilot Leanne Tai. Her objective is to find and kill John Mack. When Leah awakens within her host, the seven survival cities are underway. A pulse weapon is also being designed that will destroy not only the invasion, but all technology on the surface. There’s a chance that the same technology exists in her own time – and she has no idea what the death of John Mack would mean for her people. As Leah gets to know John and his family, and assumes the life of Leanne Tai, the choice becomes impossible.

Ouroboros Finale

Caia has to find a way to impede the Scitha and buy time for Leah, even if it means the sacrifice of her wyverns and endangering the forests of the Rift. Some of the Outlanders, led by the sadistic commander Hol Xan and his centurions, want to side with the Scitha. Eventually, Caia must confront the Scitha Prime, calling upon all her magic to buy time for Leah. But Leah has got to know John Mack and his family, and Leanne has a complex life. Leah is having an affair with John Mack. If Leah kills him, then she and her sister Asha will no longer exist.

The past and present are endlessly linked

The only alternative is a gamble – to find and somehow re-arm the magnetic pulse weapon that was used so long ago. But this requires the people from the city to join with Caia’s people and work as one. When Leah returns to her time, there is a final surprise. She is pregnant with John Mack’s child.

Will there a sequel to Ouroboros? Maybe.