Empire's Son: An Epic Science Fiction Novel Series

My heart thundered in my chest as I walked into the room. The first thing I noticed was the wall of light coming from the opposite side. From floor to ceiling was what looked like a glass wall. I could see the indigo of the sky beyond and I caught the distant brown structures of city far below and stretching into the horizon. In front of the glass, stood the tall form of a man as he looked outward.

“It is a wonderful sight, isn’t it? I do some of my best thinking here,” the baritone voice of the man said.

I stepped further into the room slowly walking toward the form still staring out toward the spectacular view. I moved past a colossal white desk, and then a comfortable looking lounging area to finally stop a few steps behind the other man. I wasn’t necessarily afraid of heights, but we were ridiculously high up and the glass wall made it look like there was no barrier between us and the hundreds of feet drop right below us.

My stomach twisted and I felt a little dizzy. I took a few steps back just to be on the safe side.

“It’s a long way down,” I managed to get out.

I then kicked myself. After weeks of thinking about what I would say to my birth father, and that was what I went with? I tried to think of something to follow that up, but I had nothing. My mind a complete wasteland in that moment.

The Emperor spoke as if he hadn’t even heard me. “You see that tree out there. The one standing at the border where the palace and the city meet?”

I looked toward where he pointed. The palace ate away a sizable portion of the space beneath us. Shorter white stone structures reached out beyond the towers, until the white touched the dark brown of the city beyond. It wasn’t hard to find the tree. There was a ring of greenery between the center tower and the outer ones, but beyond that, the tree was the only green thing that could be seen in all directions.

It looked massive even from this high up. A thick trunk held the weight of many large branches as they reached outward in all directions. It was a sight to behold, and I could only imagine how majestic it looked up close.

“That tree is over a thousand years old. My grandfather’s grandfather planted it, and he did it to replace the one that his grandfather’s grandfather planted. As long as the Zahn family has held the throne, there has always been a tree standing there.

“It also happens to be one of the first places I took you when you and your mother came to live at the White Palace. I remember your five-year old self being so persistent about reaching up for the nearest branch so you could try to climb it, but it was far above even my own head.

“Your mother explained that you and Markus had spent a lot of time in River Palace’s orchards climbing the trees there. I don’t think the Zahn tree had ever been climbed before, not that one, or any of the versions before it. Most people would know better to even consider it. But you were young, and all you could see was a tree that needed to be climbed.

“I often think about that moment, and all the others that I had with you before you were taken away from me. It wasn’t much. Only a few short seven months, but I remember it all like it happened yesterday.”

The Emperor then turned from the view and looked at me for the first time since I entered the room. I felt myself take an involuntary step back. The intensity of his stone blue eyes was like looking into the face of a force of nature. It was all I could do to just stand in the presence of this man.

Once my initial shock wore off, I then couldn’t help but notice the similarities between us. While his hair fell across his shoulders and cascaded down close to his hips, we both had almost the exact shade of chestnut brown, though his was streaked heavily with strands of gray. Our heights were almost equal, which felt strange because I tended to be on the tall side compared to pretty much everyone else. And the angled cut of our chins were like a mirror of one another.

I stood there with my heart thundering in my chest, trying to get a hold of my feelings. I had spent my whole life living another life, in another galaxy with a man I had considered the only father I ever needed or wanted. Even when he had revealed to me the truth, a part of me didn’t want to believe it.

I still denied it when I had been scooped up by Vang’s ship, and every day since. I thought maybe there had been some sort of galactic mistake, but between these man’s words and the undeniable features that matched my own, any doubts that had been lingering about my parentage dissolved completely. And I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.

“I gathered from Admiral Vang that you have had some questions,” he said.

I blinked at the other man trying to get my bearings. I wet my lips, trying for the life of me to remember the hundreds of questions I had been mulling over the last few weeks. There had been so many of them, and Vang certainly hadn’t been very helpful in answering them.

The memory of the look in my dad’s eyes as he made that first revelation about my brothers came to me. All of it still felt so fresh. Like it had happened only an hour ago instead of a little over two weeks. We were both in dad’s BMW. The sounds of the city muffled behind the glass of the vehicle as he sat in the passenger seat with an undeniable expression of anger and fear. A combination of emotions that I had never seen from him until that moment.

You were brutality attacked by your brothers. That’s what happened.

I asked Vang about them, but he had given me precious little about my brothers. Only that the Emperor found them all lacking as a potential successor, so the honor (if you could call it that) had fallen onto me. And because of possible reprisals, my brothers had been banished from the White Palace.

“My brothers? I… well…” I found myself unable to continue. What could I say? How could I even say it? All of it still so surreal to me, too impossible.

The Emperor must have sensed my unease and began to speak. “I had already named your eldest brother Ascendant several years before you were born. Zorren wasn’t exactly what I envisioned for my successor, but he had far more capability to do so than your other two brothers. I thought with enough instruction from me, he could overcome some of his shortcomings. We were making quite a bit of progress, and then he instigated that attack against you.”

“I can honestly say, I never saw it coming. That says something for someone gifted with the Dome-ni of Perception who is usually good at predicting such things. I suppose I underestimated your brother’s feelings of inadequacy. When you came to live at the White Palace, he must have thought I would replace him with you eventually.”

The Emperor paused for a moment as if he was stuck in a memory. I could see the fury and the regret in his eyes. Another one of my memories from my last day on Earth filled my mind.

My mom in the kitchen of our brownstone in downtown New York. Her normally perfect auburn hair an absolute mess. Her cheeks flushed and streaked with tears. And Emmaline sitting off to the side with wide eyes and hanging on to every word like her life depended on it.

It’s a rather rare Dome-ni in Ethia. Your father has it, and when he found out you carried the same ability, he was eager to train you and have you follow in his footsteps. Michael, he wanted to make you his official Heir, his successor.

“Mom says that was what you intended. To make me your Heir, even back then.”

The Emperor returned from his memory and once again gave me the full force of his stony gaze. And then his eyes softened and for the first time, I saw a small upturn at the corner of his lips.

“I remember when I was informed of the results of your Dome-ni test. I was surprised that it was revealed you had two, and that one of them was Perception. For the first time, I had hope that maybe I would get the successor I truly wanted, but you were still so very young.

“Certainly, Dome-ni plays a large role in how I would choose my Heir, but it’s not the only one. You had a lot of growing up to do. I suppose it is true that I had a hope you might become the successor I wanted, but it was a mistake on Zorren’s part to act as he did, and very telling of his true nature.

“After his actions, I stripped him of the title. I had intended to give it back to him when he proved to be worthy of taking it up again, but he only became more and more difficult to deal with. And certainly, your other brothers were even more of a disappointment.

“I had come to a point where I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to find a satisfactory successor at all, and then after twenty of years of trying to find you, a lead to your whereabouts surfaced.” He paused and closed his eyes.

I could feel the turmoil reaching me. The man’s disappointment, frustration, and anger, but I also felt a warming sensation that was like a glimmering ray of sun in a dark storm of clouds. A lump became stuck in my throat, and I couldn’t have spoken if I wanted to.

He opened up his eyes and I saw all the fire that rested there. A fire of hope and determination.

“So you see, you are my last hope, Adar. I need a successor. The others proved unable or unworthy of the position, you are all I have left.”

It was like a vise had been wrapped around my lungs and squeezed all the air out of them. The pressure felt unbearable.

“I–I’m flattered that you think I can help you, but before a few weeks ago I didn’t even know Ethia existed. I just––I’m not sure I am the person you I think I am.”

I stopped speaking, not sure what else I could say, and not sure I truly explained myself, or expressed the thoughts running through my head.

What I told him wasn’t a lie, or an attempt to placate him. It did feel good to think this man I didn’t even really know could have such confidence in me. But I also wondered if it was really me he had that trust in, or an ability that I didn’t even know I had until a short while ago.

Again that upturn of the corner of his mouth came back. This time a little higher than before. It was almost like he was laughing at me, or at least that’s the way it made me feel. I shifted my feet, feeling like I was completely out of my league.

“When I first found out where Aragon and your mother had run off with you, I wasn’t sure you were the solution I needed. But I hoped you would be. I sent Admiral Vang to retrieve you just the same. The possibility of it was worth the effort to travel beyond of the borders of the Empire. I was glad to discover that it wasn’t a wasted trip.”