Informationen zum Autor Christopher Ruocchio is the internationally award-winning author of The Sun Eater, a space opera fantasy series, and the former Junior Editor at Baen Books, where he edited several anthologies. His work has also appeared in Marvel comics. He is a graduate of North Carolina State University, where he studied English Rhetoric and the Classics. Christopher has been writing since he was eight and sold his first novel, Empire of Silence , at twenty-two. His books have appeared in five languages. Christopher lives in Raleigh, North Carolina with his wife, Jenna. Klappentext Now available in trade paperback, the third novel of the galaxy-spanning Sun Eater series merges the best of space opera and epic fantasy. For almost a hundred years, Hadrian Marlowe has served the Empire in its war against the Cielcin, a vicious alien race bent on humanity's destruction. Rumors of a new king amongst the Cielcin have reached the Imperial throne. This one is not like the others. It does not raid borderworld territories, preferring precise, strategic attacks on the humans' Empire. To make matters worse, a cult of personality has formed around Hadrian, spurred on by legends of his having defied death itself. Men call him Halfmortal. Hadrian's rise to prominence proves dangerous to himself and his team, as pressures within the Imperial government distrust or resent his new influence. Caught in the middle, Hadrian must contend with enemies before himand behind. And above it all, there is the mystery of the Quiet. Hadrian did defy death. He did return. But the keys to the only place in the universe where Hadrian might find the answers he seeks lie in the hands of the Emperor himself.... Leseprobe CHAPTER 1 BEHOLD A PALE HORSE Silence. The silence about the Solar Throne filled the great hall like water, like the deep dark of the sea. Not a soul stirred. From my place amongst the courtiers, I watched the two common soldiers where they knelt on the mosaic. They had crawled the length of the hall, proceeding down the central aisle flanked by members of the Martian Guard like scarabs in their formal blacks. How long had it been since two persons of so low a station had come to that exalted place? The white vaults had stood like Olympos atop the clouds of Forum for more than ten thousand years, and save for the artisans who had crafted them-creatures whom the nobile people about me would have spurned like insects despite the beauty they had wrought-I was prepared to wager my good right hand that fewer than a hundred serfs had knelt before our Radiant Emperor in all that time. That they were in that place at all was a signal-clear as the changing of bells-that the world had changed. That they would speak in that place of gold and carnelian, that hall of ivory and jet, was a sign that the change was terrifying. Both soldiers knelt at attention, eyes carefully fixed at the base of the dais where fifty-four steps rose toward the gleaming throne flanked by the Knights Excubitor in armor of mirrored white. By the stars at her shoulders I saw that one of the soldiers was a ship's captain, but it was the other who spoke, rough tones betraying him for a common legionnaire. He had been prompted, coached on what to say by logothetes and by the eunuch homunculi who served the Imperial presence. But fear floated off the man in waves, and for a tenth and unnecessary time he bowed and pressed his forehead to the tile. "Your Radiance," he said, voice breaking. "Holy Emperor. I abase myself before you. I am Carax of Aramis. I have been your faithful servant for nearly eight hundred years." His tongue tripped over the words, and I could tell that he'd tried to rehearse them. "I were at Hermonassa, Radiance. Were on the Inviolate when it fell." From the reports I'd seen ...

Autorentext

Christopher Ruocchio is the internationally award-winning author of The Sun Eater, a space opera fantasy series, and the former Junior Editor at Baen Books, where he edited several anthologies. His work has also appeared in Marvel comics. He is a graduate of North Carolina State University, where he studied English Rhetoric and the Classics. Christopher has been writing since he was eight and sold his first novel, Empire of Silence, at twenty-two. His books have appeared in five languages. Christopher lives in Raleigh, North Carolina with his wife, Jenna.

Klappentext

Now available in trade paperback, the third novel of the galaxy-spanning Sun Eater series merges the best of space opera and epic fantasy.

For almost a hundred years, Hadrian Marlowe has served the Empire in its war against the Cielcin, a vicious alien race bent on humanity’s destruction. Rumors of a new king amongst the Cielcin have reached the Imperial throne. This one is not like the others. It does not raid borderworld territories, preferring precise, strategic attacks on the humans’ Empire.
 
To make matters worse, a cult of personality has formed around Hadrian, spurred on by legends of his having defied death itself. Men call him Halfmortal. Hadrian’s rise to prominence proves dangerous to himself and his team, as pressures within the Imperial government distrust or resent his new influence.
 
Caught in the middle, Hadrian must contend with enemies before him—and behind.
 
And above it all, there is the mystery of the Quiet. Hadrian did defy death. He did return. But the keys to the only place in the universe where Hadrian might find the answers he seeks lie in the hands of the Emperor himself....