The Great Succession Crisis Read online

THE GREAT SUCCESSION CRISIS

  Laurel A. Rockefeller

  _______________

  Copyright © 2015 Laurel A. Rockefeller

  First Edition Copyright © 2012 Laurel A. Rockefeller

  The Great Succession Crisis is a work of fiction by Laurel A. Rockefeller set on the planet Beinan. All characters are works of fiction without direct reference to any real person, living or dead. While inspired in part by the real life challenges faced by historical persons, any names or characteristics similar to any person, past, present, or future, is purely coincidental.

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  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Epilogue

  Long Live the King

  Behind the Scenes

  A Matter of Faith

  Beinarian Astronomy

  Challenging Einstein

  From Middle Earth to Beinan

  Prologue

  “Your Majesty, are you sure you want to do this?” asked Lord Knight Elendir of house Ten-Ar protectively, his red-fielded heraldry barely visible among the steam and smoke of only recently extinguished fires.

  “What else can I do?” replied Queen Anyu. Against her will tears filled her eyes from more than just the toxic bilast in the air. At 58.67 cun寸tall and a mere forty yen-ars age, the fair skinned and grey eyed adolescent queen felt the weight of her journey heavily. How many died in this war of vengeance and why? Her mind struggled to find the answers as she carefully navigated the dangers of her half-destroyed royal office adjacent to the sovereign’s personal apartment. Against her will her hand caressed the remains of the same conference table her mother Queen Constance so often sat at and where the queen gave permission to her to study with the engineers of house Xing-li, training that saved her life even more than the countless shir-ors mastering fencing.

  At length, the noble Elendir whose own journey of loss and pain in this war exceeded hers managed to activate the interstellar communications system. Finding a single chair among the ruins, he dusted it off for her and helped her sit down, “Is there anything further I may do for you, Your Majesty?”

  “Wait a shir-or, then send for my husbands and children, please,” commanded Queen Anyu politely.

  “You do not need to send this message now, Your Majesty. There is so much that needs to be done. We do not even know how many are dead yet!”

  “We will mourn, Old Friend. But right now I owe those who preserved my life an explanation. Maybe I did not have a choice – or not much of one – but I still lied. Allow me to make amends. I will never see these people again; I do not wish to part without telling the story to them.”

  Lord Elendir nodded, his own heart heavy, “As you wish.” Bowing, he left the queen to attend to taming the chaos around them.

  Saying a small serenity prayer in her mind, Anyu steadied herself before raising her voice to the computer, “Computer, begin recording and transmit to coordinates 23978 by 29458 by 5492. This is Queen Anyu to my friends and loyal allies throughout the known universe. My greatest apologies for not writing sooner. Many of you know of some of my adventures during my exile. Few of you know what happened after I returned home nor of the history behind my story. Forgive me for my many deceits during my exile. If I had revealed my true identity my life most certainly would have been in greater peril than it ended up being.

  “Much has happened to me since my return home. Much remains to be done. But one thing is for certain: with hard work and determination we shall rebuild and restore the beauty of Beinan to its former glory. The road is long and hard. But now I have ascended to my mother’s throne, I have little doubt the lessons of my exile will serve my people well.

  “That is the future. The past still remains veiled. Forgive me for this and allow me to tell you the full story of my people. Understand that the deceit that kept this story from you before truly was necessary to preserve my life. Fault me not for wishing to neither perish from the differences in our biology nor from the threats from home that inevitably came to destroy me. Here, now, I shall tell you all.”