New Space Series Legacy of the Unsworn Sneak Peek!

I have been writing! Finally. I’ve recently had some personal challenges that have really prevented me from doing what I love, but I have started a new series while also at the same time continuing something older and beloved. This new series is about the descendents of my Unboundaried/Unbounded/Avowed/Unsworn. The working series title is Legacy of the Unsworn because at the end of my Unbounded series, it was the Unsworn who bucked the system and helped Erin and her team win the day. Her fourth great granddaughter is going to be having her own adventures in space and the goverment alliances begin to fail around them.

Background

I always wanted to write a space opera. I’ve loved watching Star Trek, Star War, Star Gate, Babylon 5, Firefly, and Battlestar Galactica. I love sci-fi books like those by Jack Campbell and others. It seems natural that I should want to write my series set in space. So now, I’m going to do it. Here is the prologue that I wrote mostly to center myself to the backstory. What do you think? Let me know in the comments below. (I’m already on chapter four!)

Prologue

From the Unbounded Earth Histories

They had many names over the ages—Avowed, Unboundaried, Unbounded, and, much later, Unsworn and Aeternai. Before mortals on Earth knew of their existence, they were also called vampires, fae, or immortals. They were indeed unbounded by time. Their two-thousand-year life expectancy seemed everlasting to the mortals whose relatively short lifespans burned and flickered out like the flame of the thinnest candle.

They were not, however, immortal, and they could be killed in two ways. The most common was the complete severing of the three focus points of mind, heart, and reproductive system. Starvation in a sealed room where they could not absorb nutrients necessary for life was another way, though this was essentially the same as the first, as true death would only occur after a complete breakdown of the focus point connections, perhaps decades later, after which there was no return.

Their advances in both the science and arts made them envied and desired—and also endangered, secretly hunted by the mortals who wanted to use them. So the Avowed left, shielding their majestic city Sinalta and sinking into the depths of the ocean to live hidden for over three thousand years.

Yet many remained topside, living in secret among the mortals, having separated centuries before from the Avowed. These called themselves Unboundaried or Unbounded. Eventually the Unbounded divided into two groups, the Renegades who protected mortals, and the Emporium, a mega corporate conglomerate, who preyed upon and used them. Mortals called Hunters, themselves originally descended from Unbounded but not gifted with the Change, sought to kill all Unbounded. The Renegades won the war—but only after making themselves known to the mortal world and forging a temporary truce with Hunters.

Eventually, the Unbounded discovered and raised Sinalta from the ocean. Then, using a combination of Avowed and Unbounded technologies of shielding and folding space, they built ships, finally leaving Earth in search of their origins, eager to leave behind the mortals who still either hunted or worshipped them.

Yet refusing to completely abandon the mortals they had protected in secret for so many generations, they also passed on their technology. The mortals followed them into space, multiplying and exploring until they had colonized much of the galaxy. The discovery of inhabited human worlds whose history also mentioned Unboundaried and long-lived humans made it logical to establish the Galactic Unity Alliance to preserve the peace and protect mortals and Unbounded alike.

After several centuries of searching and more than fifty light years away from Earth, Unbounded and Avowed discovered not a world of long-lost Avowed or Unboundaried relatives but an uninhabited ancestral planet decimated by a civil war. Only their records remained. The Unbounded rebuilt, creating a system of governance that they hoped might, finally, stand the test of time. They gave the planet a new name for a new age: Aeterna.

Aeterna is now home, a refuge of peace for nearly a thousand years. The Avowed, Unboundaried, and Unbounded—all those whose DNA causes them to Change—have become Aeternai. Their mortal offspring, which result in fifty percent of their births, even with fertility manipulation, are called Aeternix. Both live peaceably on Aeterna, a private people, who prefer to remain apart from the rest of humanity.

Aternai are revered throughout the galaxy for their wisdom, honored for their history of protection, and often worshipped as near-immortal gods. But they are also hated and feared—and not without reason. Some mortals, Hunters, still pass down the memory of secret hurts and murders perpetrated by early Unbounded on Earth who once strayed from their duty.

The few Aeternai who choose to leave their new world call themselves the Unsworn. Far too many of them never make it home.

Hope you are excited for this new series! Let me know in the comments!

Copyright 2024 Teyla Rachel Branton

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