Here’s one last free sample from A Throne for an Alien. It’s the very descriptive and gentle introduction as “written” by a new character, Elena Richelo Renbourn. Elena paints the setting for Throne in her own words. Here ya go--

Many of the new terms below I won’t explain here as they are being introduced for the first time in Elena’s words. But you might like to know the title, Duce of Bilan, applies to Malcolm Renbourn, the title he accepted when he bonded with Sasperia Thorwaif which made him a member of the Alman Mentala, roughly the equivalent of England’s House of Lords. The reasons for that are a long story, a huge part of When War Returns, book 3 of the Chronicles.

In her first paragraph, Elena identifies this book as the last in the series. What she couldn’t have known, and what this author didn’t know at the time, was that other adventures awaited Tribe Renbourn on a Third Earth.

So without further ado and hoping those who haven’t read the first three books won’t get lost or confused, meet Elena, her family, and her country. I suspect you’ll experience a big surprise at the end, but an introduction is no place for spoilers:

Alone in my private chambers, I, Elena Richelo Renbourn, sit and skol these painful words by myself. Unlike our Preparations to our first three books, my bond-sisters feel my thoughts are of special interest beginning this, our last chronicles of the first generation of Tribe Renbourn on Beta-Earth. Sister Doret believes my story is the least known and worthy of some introduction. Sasperia believes my perspective sets the stage for the events of these years with a voice not part of the First Circle. Jona prefers to skol not at all. So, I will tell of how the little-known country of Hitalec came to offer its shores to the water-meandering Renbourn tribe and the exiled fleet in their wake in the year, 1735.

In 1720, I was in my ninth year when the word went forth that an alien from a sister-earth had been captured and was living in our northern neighbor, Balnakin. For our island, for all our part of the planet, such news was fascinating but remote. As I grew, the stories of Malcolm Renbourn and his wives, Lorei, Elsbeth, Bar, Joline, Alnenia, and then Doret, Kalma, and Sasperia were adventures of a tribe relevant to the Old and New Continents. But these stories were of little importance in our hemisphere. Hitalec, in truth, was also of little importance in our own region, the island countries part of the Grovsea basin. In the words of my Father, we were the tail of a dog whose history was wagged by others. For Hitalec was a country barely a nation.

Simple said, my mother, Nor, the Queen of Hitalec, ruled as a connector between tribes from three cultures. We had three populated regions that were primarily colonies of our neighbors. Our capital, Satraq, and the lands around it on our western coast, for example, were beholden to Menzia. Menzia was, and remains, the curving land bridging the New Continent with the land mass known as Verashesh.

My Mother's eldest sister, Kinita, ruled Menzia with her three husbands and helped our land with resources and protection. Like her sister, my mother, too, had three husbands in the Menzian royal-blood tradition. Her first bond-mate, the late Marmine Richelo, father to my older sister, Bet, had been Consort-Liege before his ill-timed fall down a mountain face. Bet would one day rule Hitalec with her wary and worried eyes.

In the craggy north coast beside our capital was Rumus, an undisciplined colony of settlers from Rymo, the desert land between Balnakin and Menzia. Once, these were the people who had filled our island before waves of disease, earthquakes, and other now forgotten devastations wiped out a population of mostly farmers and animal grazers.

My father, Tusjin, brother to the dead Consort-Liege, was Lord of this region of survivors. He was a kindly man who adored My Mother and his daughter. One day, I would govern here bonded to one Lord or another from the same culture, obedient to my sister.

Below Rumus, next to my Mother's domain, was the unruly Lumus, our industrial area governed by My Mother's third husband, Gant Thanq, the leader of the thin-haired and cat-eyed Lorilians. They were a race who had founded their own colony there many years past to have a base for their own trade interests in our seas. Unlike most from Grovsea countries, the Lorilians were blue-brown not in their skin tones, but were instead the yellow of puffy Ear-Leaves in planting times.

The daughter of this union, my sister Moy, was both slow of mind and encouraged not by her father to accomplish much in her life. She'd be ill-suited for governance or bonding, which her father desired not for her. For the Lorilians wanted little to do with a central government in our country. With government comes responsibility and restraints. The southern half of Hitalec wanted neither.

The rest of our island, beautiful as it was, was surprisingly sparse in people. For many years, the northern coast to the east was but a land for escaping Balnakin slaves to pass through after short voyages from their unfriendly homeland. Few stayed, wishing to distance themselves from slave-raiders. Those who tried to plant roots were at the mercy of foragers, bandits, and the sea-pirates who roamed freely on that coast. So, over time, few even tried to make use of our fertile soils.

By the time of my maturity, the hills to the south and to the east of Lumus were filled with secretive and hidden enclaves of former slaves only now learning that Balnakin no longer sought them. After Crater Bergarten and the miraculous bonding of Malcolm and Kalma Renbourn, blues still poured through the region as freed people, but they still wanted distance from Balnakin fearing changes in political winds. They still dug the tunnels and underground vikas free from the prying eyes of satellites in the sky.

Only the port town of Weg, an unorganized area of fishers and small farmers, sat unmolested at the end of Hitalec, far from the interests of their government. So, a vast area of land sat dormant. Inviting. Waiting.

Hitalec, remote as it was, had not been untouched by the influence of Tribe Renbourn. The Renbourn reach had, in fact, made its first presence on my island while I began completion of my school years. Helprims and teachers for the Fisher Way were now brought to our disadvantaged people in Weg and to the blue-skin cave-dwellers.

In Rumus, I dealt much with the Salk family who had many contracts with our businesses who bought and sold goods based on Alphan designs. I recall one eve listening to My Father telling My Mother about the Renbourn's visit with the Mother-Icealt of All-Domes.

"There is comfort," he said, "knowing there is another earth like ours. We're alone not."

But such musings had little to do with a young woman's life that was bordered on four sides by the Grovsea. Alma, Kirip, Silvivan, even Rhasvi were my world not, even if I shared the mother-tongue of Alma.

So, in our royal palace, we watched the vicious and deadly turmoil in Alma as if watching dynasties change in Rigel or Minnestt. When we saw the strange fleet leave the Old Continent led by the Duce of Bilan and his tribe, we watched as if seeing a tale of imaginative skolers.

My Mother leaned forward and said to My Father, "Tusjin, I've read the reports of that fleet. Those ships carry Helprims, Legems, fishers, farmers, builders, and perhaps miners and engineers — and the famous Renbourn Tribe. They seek new roots. I cannot see such as the Renbourns settling here. But the others? Tusjin, we have lands that could use such peoples. Perhaps Hitalec could attract some of the unwanted of Alma? If those sailing now settled here, they might well call for their tribes still on the Old Continent."

My Father laughed. "Perhaps. Should I make inquiries?"

And that is how it began.

Elena Renbourn,
Liege of the United States of America

The full A Throne for an Alien is available at:
https://www.amazon.com/Throne-Alien-B...

Book 1 of the series, The Blind Alien, is still on sale for 99 cents!
https://www.amazon.com/Blind-Alien-Be...

Coming This Fall!

The Third Earth—The Beta-Earth Chronicles: Book 5
http://bmfiction.com/science-fiction/...