Ashtium: City of Sun Book 1

By Penny Morrow

Greta sees only in the colorless hues of silver and black inside her star's city, Ashtium.

Ashtium's source of light is kept hidden. Without it, the star's empirical city will fall into shadow.

Enoch, the empirical prince, tries his best to help the seemingly helpless and incompetent twenty-three-year-old woman in the haven city. As time goes on, Greta ends up helping his twisted family heal, but such a change will spark a peculiar case of forbidden love, as she gains her own power by drawing the attention of the Emperor.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penny Morrow
• Release date: Dec 19, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463483183

Book preview

ASHTIUM

ASHTIUM

City of the Sun Book 1

Penny Morrow

Copyright 2019 © Penny Morrow.

All rights reserved.

All names, places and events occurring in the story are fictitious. Any fictitious material resembling persons, places or events in real life is purely coincidental.

Contents

ASHTIUM

Glossary

Chapter 1-A Bug Without a Sun

Chapter 2-Whipped Workers

Chapter 3-Krexbin

Chapter 4-Newcomer

Chapter 5-The Courtyard

Chapter 6-Cat and Mouse

Chapter 7-The Temple

Chapter 8-Blending In

Chapter 9-Dispute of Delivery

Chapter 10-Spoils of War

Chapter 11-Found Filth

Chapter 12-Mother’s Court

Chapter 13-Reflective Pool

Chapter 14-Unfoiled Feelings

Chapter 15-Hunger

Chapter 16-Family Dinner

Chapter 17-Garden Talk

Chapter 18-Searching the Skies

Chapter 19-Pets

Chapter 20-A Place to Nap

Chapter 21-Heart to Heart

Chapter 22-Remodeling

Chapter 23-Bite

Chapter 24-Whispers of War

Chapter 25-A Cat’s Bath

Chapter 26-Payment

Chapter 27-The Party

Chapter 28-Damages

Chapter 29-The Hospice

Chapter 30-New Home

Chapter 31-Decay

Chapter 32-The Trove

Chapter 33-Subtle Acceptance

Chapter 34-Taken

Chapter 35-The Search

Chapter 36-Counseling

Chapter 37-The Enocrote

Chapter 38-Pass of Power

Chapter 39-Training

Chapter 40-Gifts

Chapter 41-The Mouseio

Chapter 42-A Taste of Power

Chapter 43-Crumble

Chapter 44-The Descent

Chapter 45-Sea of Shade

Chapter 46-Departure

Author’s Note

Glossary

Ashtium-empire of the black desert. Located on the faraway star, Ashta. Ashtium city (the empirical capital) was built up from the ashes of a forgotten war long ago. The huge marble dome of the city gives it an ancient Greek-like appearance in design just like the architecture and laws of the city nestled beneath. It is the only city known on Ashta to not rely on fire for its light source.

Book of Sood-sacred text about the origin of the Ashtium people. The book describes their empire's creation and the workings of the light in their domed empirical city. The book is rumored to be kept locked away in the library of the Ashtium palace. Its contents remain secret to the city dwellers and are only for the eyes of the empirical family to read. It is more importantly known for holding the secret to the city's source of light which other kingdoms and alien colonies seek to steal.

Urkmink-most common fatty beetle found in the deserts of Ashta.

Larvitch-common small mosquito-like bug found flying around in Ashtium.

Bathing Pool-also known as a bathhouse. The Shelliv have a giant community one they share in the city of Ashtium. Families go there to bathe. Richer Shelliv can afford their own private ones to be built in their homes.

Baargi-a juicy red fruit shaped in an oval that drips when ripe. It is a rare plant that is expensive to grow in Ashtium due to its delicate skin that makes it bruise easily and rot quicker than most fruits.

The Enocrote-an exclusive gym-like facility used by the empirical guards to train and exercise in.

Hospice-an ancient hospital-like facility founded by the empirical empire of Ashtium. The facility is run by The Sisters who are believed to be the city's oldest women.

Harlong Kingdom-previously known as Ashtium's closest ally. They were catching up too quickly technology-wise to Ashtium and considered a threat so they were ransacked and destroyed without warning by Ashtium.

Kingdom of the South Sea-the kingdom controlling Ashta's only sea. They have loose ties with Ashtium.

Limpnut-small mouse-like creature with blue fur.

Treatch-wristlets, tattoos or piercings worn to show a status of power, wealth or marriage.

Bint Oil-an expensive substance vaporized and smoked through glass pipes and cylinders in the homes of the wealthy Shelliv.

Noyk-small crib-like bed made to keep Shelliv children warm and comfortable while sleeping.

---

Chapter 1-A Bug Without a Sun

GRETA

Storm clouds drift overhead in clumps of dark grey amidst a sky of black where scattered streaks of marble form the clustered homes of thousands of crying stars. My bleak view of their dull radiance gets cut off completely as the mound of sand beneath my bare feet forms into mushy slop. This grainy earth stretches on as far as my fractured eyes can see. A sea of onyx blanketed in the shadow of the sun – the black desert.

Rain is rare, but it pours now.

It comes only in the evening hours to relieve this barren land. It's just a fleeting moment in time when the god of the sun wishes to spare a parasite like me mercy. I cup my hands toward the clouds begging for more of the supple drink. The lukewarm liquid hits my sweaty palms much softer now as it quickly comes to an unsympathetic end.

The gift is gone, but my hands are full. I must hurry back into my shelter before the ash begins to fall tainting the water's purity.

After gulping down my drink in the safety of my cave, I gaze out into the desert while munching on a crunchy urkmink; a common insect surviving deep within the sand that I must dig through to find. My hands always feel raw from digging. They have been stained in the charcoal color for as long as I can remember. Bugs are scarce and it may take days to find enough to sustain my energy.

Starvation is routine. A bug or two only eases the endless pain. The only other insects out here are goruck and yippel. Rarer delicacies, both of which are fattier and burrow even deeper down under this blanketed ground of black sand.

Everything ranges from silver to black in my unfortunate spectrum of shaded color. Things alive, like me, I can identify in shades of bright silver – a helpful tool when searching for bugs in the sand.

There is no sun to lighten my surroundings, but a moon. A dull grey moon, much more faded now than when my parents walked this desert with me. I had lived ten moons ago with them and now another thirteen without them since they passed. The moon is ever-fading, and today, my skin is the brightest silver out here.

I won't be able to see the moon forever. My vision grows worse. It dwindles daily due to the thousands of grains of sand blowing around. The damage done to my eyes has been building up for years on end. The ashes from the sky are what pollute the sand and make it so harmful. My parents said the ash carries a damaging element that eats away the tissue in our eyes over time.

The ash always falls down after the rain, I don't know why. Neither did my parents. They used to have special sight like me, but they eventually saw no silver or the greys of life. It was when their world turned to complete black that they would die.

I know I will die soon too when the faint moon falls into the shadow of the clouds like my parents experienced so long ago. Then I will sink into this world of darkness like the insects beneath my feet. I do not consider myself worth more than my food. So, I do not mind that my existence will go unknown. My family starved when they lost their vision. I was too young and unskilled to dig deep into the ground on my own to find bugs. It is not a time I like to remember. It was my father who died first and then my mother shortly after.

It was myself who became the insect. Of course, I first tried digging into the ground on my own. However, I could only dig a foot down at ten years of age. I didn't know the depths the bugs lived in the sand. Perhaps it was primal instincts that made me look to the flesh of my parents when starvation set in for the first time.

I grew ill from eating a couple chunks of their skin behind the back of the god of the sun. I threw up the flesh of my parents and did not look to partake in feasting on it again. Instinctively, I turned to the sand again after committing the immoral, unforgivable act.

It happened when we were on our way to the city of the sun. That's what my parents said. We never made it there. We stopped here, at this very cave. I have yet to leave, even thirteen years later, at the archaic age of twenty-three that I am. My parents were much older than me now when they died, but this sand makes time pass quicker. Age becomes meaningless as well as my significance like an unearthed urkmink; I do not care how old it is when I kill and eat it.

It is food all the same.

The desert does not care how old I will be when I go to rest in it, but my god of the sun...maybe.

My father taught me to make a fire before he passed. I eventually grew into my mother's raggy clothes. I do not know why we were traveling alone, but I have yet to meet someone like me out here or anyone for that matter.

The unspeakable things I've done earn me a death alone where no one will ever have to know of my existence. That is the way it should be. The city of the sun isn't real. Even if there was such a place, with the divine being my parents praised, I would be unable to find its light with my fractured vision.

The god of the sun would never want to heal a dirty insect like me anyway.

---

Chapter 2-Whipped Workers

ENOCH

The empirical advisor, who stands in my father's place, finishes beating the slaves as they hammer away at the streets of white marble. The old stainless stone must be flattened until it's suitable to walk on by pedestrians.

There are hundreds of the giant boulders that have yet to be broken down and sanded down flat. The rocks were mined centuries ago when our empire was first structured; it was originally built to shield us from the desert dunes outside. Our city was still lit by flame back then – as many distant cities are now. Since those days, we have advanced. Not far socially at all, but enough to find someone with the brains to create our false sense of light in here.

No other kingdom holds such great light as we. Outsiders refer to our capital as the city of the sun, but we know it as Ashtium.

Mother approaches me. Today her hair hangs low in ringlets of shining black. Her skin is a beautiful pale, a sharp contrast from my olive tone I earned after standing outside watching over our construction plans. The empress does not venture outside the palace as often as I.

With father away, always visiting other kingdoms, she is in charge of governing our city and overseeing domestic affairs. Mainly, that involves answering the questions of our people and making sure my father's plans for our city are followed.

It is unusual to see her descend the giant marble staircase leading down to our city streets where I work with Urdmin, father's advisor.

Good morning, Enoch. Urdmin, Mother greets politely.

Urdmin slings his whip in its holster as he mounts a newly imported stead. The animal was one of many brought from a kingdom to the west that my father's soldiers recently pillaged. It's a brown warhorse built for battle.

It was not raised for the elderly man who trains it to walk our streets with the sharp nudge of his heeled boot.

Good morning, mother. What news have you brought?

Urdmin dismounts his horse landing heavily between us. The act is deeply disrespectful. We are the royal family, and he, nothing but a sly rich man my father plucked off from the wealthier of our population here. If the advisor were to have stepped so close to my father, his head would have been sliced open by now.

I have my father's height and stamina, but those are the only two things I am grateful we have in common. I am lucky to be born in the safety of our city's haven, but I refuse to let my family's cruelty continue.

Mother takes the whip from Urdmin without answering me and paces down the line of slaves chipping away at the marble rocks. Their hammers clink loudly, drawing the attention of aggravated market vendors lining the streets they are working on.

They would be spitting on the slaves and cursing them, Urdmin too. However, with mother and myself present, their acts of displeasure are reduced to glares as they whisper words to one another with their sharp tongues.

The slaves are chained together with metal cuffs in one long line. Most of them are prisoners or peasants who couldn't afford to pay taxes to our family. Both are considered equal scum. Even I must pay taxes to my family. I do not work in the palace, but outside it, as an architect.

It is the only reason I willingly stand out here with Urdmin and watch as the slaves go away at constructing my planned-out road.

You should not strike them. They are already tortured enough. It could be you there one day, I tell the old man.

Urdmin pats me on the back hard. You speak of yourself, lad! You should be at war with your father now – not hiding here like a little man lost in your sketches and books. That is a far greater crime than any I know!

I flinch watching mother whip a middle-aged woman at the further end of the line. She returns after the slave gets back on their feet and continues to work after her three lashings. I'm ashamed to say I have struck slaves, but never with the whip. A sword is built to kill and that is all I have done, put an end to their misery. Mother only hits them if she is in a foul mood which usually is when the emporer's travels are extended.

She hands me the whip, not dripping a bead of sweat. Her hands are not calloused like mine and Urdmin's are. She does not whip often. The device looks unnatural in her soft hands. Her warm brown eyes find Urdmin's before mine.

He scratches his neck looking at me from the corner of his eye.

Father has been gone for over three weeks now. I know Urdmin is visiting my mother in the hours of the night, but it is not my place to speak of such things. Father only took mother as his wife to ease some doubts about his coming to power. Mother has always been a sickly woman, both in body and mind. She is no angel herself, despite her looks.

I would not be surprised if the emperor has physically attacked her before with her sneered words and wit against his behavior. He is not home often, so I cannot blame mother for seeking comfort in others. I will keep her secret even though I am against it. I know she is still in love with him and I suppose I will never understand why. That's the way things have always been. I do not truly know if my father is as aggressive as I suspect so I try to keep my mind open, but only by a crack.

Even if she loves him, one thing has always been for certain. The very thing that has driven mother to stoop to his level and hurt such defenseless people...

She takes my arm, pulling me out of my thoughts. We walk down the line of workers together. Your father is returning tomorrow. Please go meet up with him. It would put my mind at ease knowing he's coming from where he claims to be.

Of course, I smile, happy for the chance to escape these walls. And her, Urdmin included, even if just for a short time.

It's not the first time I've been asked to check up on the emperor though. He certainly isn't a fan of me leaving the city to do such a thing either, but the less she knows the better.

Urdmin guides his horse to my side. You should leave now.

Now? I need to pack rations –

No time for that. On the horse you go! Urdmin commands while stepping back near my mother.

I scoff and jump up. It is true I have memorized the geography of the desert about twenty miles out surrounding our domed city. I've been traveling in it alone since I could walk. My father probably ordered me to and hoped I'd never return, but I learned to backtrack. I also picked up a few tricks such as leaving markers behind. All I need is a torch and my brain, assuming I am only going on a day trip.

I've never left longer.

Mother is too afraid to count on me meeting up with father further out. With my maps though it'd be a piece of cake. Nevertheless, I won't complain.

I could use some time away from this all. The darkness outside is sort of comforting in my solitude. There's less to worry about out there. Well, really, there's only one thing to worry about.

I've lived in the light all my life and heard the horrors of travelers who have gotten lost in the black desert. Only foreigners get lost though. Our kingdom is well educated and knowledgeable about the harsh environment surrounding our city. Children are taught about the geography of our land and most of them would be able to find their way back alone if they ventured a few miles out. Our city emits light anyway. Most who come do not wish to leave. And most inside, unlike me, never dream of leaving the comfortable shelter our empire provides.

However, most people are not in the royal family. They do not know what really goes on to keep our city up and running.

I don't even know how our city runs on false light. I doubt my tyrant father ever plans on sharing it with anyone. I doubt if he even knows for sure himself. The light existed long before he took over.

I urge Urdmin's warhorse forward.

I will be back in the evening, I chide.

Mother hands me a lantern from Urdmin. It's a special spherical lantern said to never have gone out, but on my travels, I have seen the flame die. I simply re-light it with a match. Matches are more beneficial. I make them myself with my own secret chemical mixtures.

I may be an architect, but I am also a chemist and an artist among other things. It is only because of the family I was born into that I gained such talents as mother would call them.

Be careful!

Do be careful! Urdmin echoes after cracking his whip on a nearby slave.

My blood boils at the sound of the slave crying out. Soon, things will change though. I will drive a sword through the heart of the same man who marvels over their misery and my own.

---

Chapter 3-Krexbin

GRETA

I wake up, shivering in the morning cold. My stomach aches and I turn my head to the side feeling the cold wall of the cave rest against my face. Naturally, I look to the entrance of my cave seeing the usual black space expanding out. No bugs in sight, unfortunately. Rarely do they bother crawling to the surface. I don't blame them.

Suddenly, I hear a strange noise come from the other side of the cave wall I rest against. The sand hisses outside as the wind picks up, but something moves against it making the sand hiss louder than it normally does.

Clomp, clomp

An animal? I've never heard such a large creature wandering around out here. From the rhythm of the noise, it sounds like it has four feet. I pull out my stone knife from a crevice in the cave wall behind me and grip it tightly in my hand as I stand up with caution.

My fire pit is still glowing steadily, but if I run to diffuse it the creature may hear me. So I back into the shadows of my cave knowing the darkness will conceal me well. I quietly walk all the way back until my back hits the wall of the very back of the cave.

A giant silver beast trots out in front of my home. My heart races and I slump to the ground in terror seeing a human perched on top of it as if in control of the animal. I do not know how the animal obeys them. It remains still when the human hops off of it approaching my fire with a long dark grey item in their hand. It is sharp like my knife, but much bigger in size.

They carry it like it weighs nothing.

Hello? Come out. You are trespassing on empirical territory, a masculine voice echoes. A male? Is anyone here?

I soak in the noise, not having heard a human in over a decade. He sounds younger than my father did, but I cannot see his skin; only the shape of his silver body that my fractured vision allows me to see. My sight is too far gone to pick out age anymore. When I was younger, I could see the wrinkles forming at the corners of my parents' eyes even though back then I saw in silver as I do now. All I can see is the outline of his body. The rest is a smudged blur of silver and greys like the creature behind him.

The man carries a torch with him like my parents did when we traveled.

I keep silent preferring to watch them underestimate my intelligence and strength as they come close enough to make out my form.

I see his figure step back quickly when his torch lights up the area of the cave I'm in. I'm unable to form words having not spoken so long. I resort to snarling showing him my teeth while waving my stone knife at him in warning.

Y-you're teeth. They are...black! Are you a Krexbin?

Black? How should I have known? I can't see them. It must be from my diet. I don't know what he means by the word he uses for me krexbin. I just shake my head no hoping it will make him leave me alone. However, he steps even closer and I hold my blade out ready to jab him if he tries to get an inch nearer.

I have not forgotten his weapon in his hand.

Are you alone? I won't hurt you.

I keep shaking my head no not understanding why he cares. If he didn't plan on hurting me he wouldn't have come in here with such a big weapon and corner me.

In a panic, I swipe my blade at him. However, he catches it in his hand and manages to pry it from my weak grip. I have not eaten enough bugs to supplement my energy. I crawl away like my food tries to do from me, but I have already been spotted. Something yanks my hair and I scream seeing the man having caught up to me in my attempt to flee.

You are mute, defenseless. Do not run from me. I know what you are. It's a miracle you've survived out here. Where is the rest of your group? I know only one reason why you could be alone. You ate them.

I thrash in his hold. The unwanted warmth from his skin contact sends my mind reeling. I have already been outpowered.

Suddenly, he lets go of me and I stumble away landing against the cave wall. I can feel his gaze on me, even though I can't make out his face at all. I tremble seeing him return to the giant creature blocking my escape from the cave. While his back is turned, I dash to the firepit and kick sand in it shrouding the cave in darkness.

His reaction is almost immediate. He turns around with the torch and I smile knowing I have gained the advantage.

He abandons the beast and also his weapon as if ready to face the dark I have created alone. I hear a shrill high-pitched