Our guest today is Icy Snow Blackstone, multi-pubbed author. She's talking about her novel. So, welcome, Icy Snow!
Earthman’s Bride started out as a short story which
ran away with my imagination. I knew
what I wanted to say, but the story had been told many times before with many
variations: a young woman given to a
conqueror as part of a peace agreement...he desires her...she fears
him,...eventually they fall in love... Okay, so far so good, but how to make it
different? How to keep it from being a
rehash of every book ever written with the same theme? Would changing the setting help? Making it medieval...paranormal...futuristic? And the conqueror? Would he be a warrior...a beast...a
supernatural entity? An older man,
inured to the cruelty of war...or a much younger one, still able to find some
tenderness in his life?
There are too many science fiction stories of invaders from
other planets coming to Earth a la War of the Worlds, but all of them
are told from the Earth’s point of view.
That settled it for me.
I wasn’t going that route. Not this little writer. I’d make my story tell the other side of the
coin. I’d make the Earthmen the
conquerors, barging into another a galaxy like barbarians, attacking and
conquering.
My Earthmen aren’t very nice people. Having depleted their own natural resources,
they head to the stars looking for planets having the elements they lack. Using force, they “accept” these worlds into
the Federation, placing them under their “protection” and then haul their
natural resources back to Terra. Since
most of the planets are less developed than theirs, it’s easy to subdue them
with superior firepower and take what they want.
The planet Tusteya is different.
They received the Terrans in peace but within 30 minutes of
their meeting, peaceful intentions go flying out the window. Though not as technologically advanced, the
Tusteyans knew of space travel and traded with other planets and weren’t about
to allow themselves to be enslaved by aliens.
The resulting war, one in which the Tusteyans put up steady but futile
resistance, ended in only one small tribe, the Elius, remaining free while all
others were enslaved by the Federation’s representative, now called the
Governor of Tusteya, Lieutenant Philip Hamilcar. Ordered to stay behind with his men to keep
the natives under control, Hamilcar was, in fact stranded on the planet as
punishment for voicing his disapproval of the way the Tusteyans were
treated.
At the opening of the story, thirty years have passed,
Hamilcar has died, and his son, another Philip—a young man barely twenty—has
taken his place. Alcin Spearman, leader
of the Elius, asks for a truce, and to show the sincerity of his intentions,
offers his 17-year-old daughter Rebeka to the new Governor to cement the peace. Alcin is certain the young Earthman will want
Rebeka, and once he meets her, Philip—being young and male—definitely
does. What he doesn’t know is that his
bride-to-be has an agenda other than simply being a peace offering.
Once Rebeka has gained his trust, she’s to kill him, and
during the chaos of his death, her father and his men will storm the palace and
end the Terran tyranny once and for all.
Rebeka goes into the marriage willingly, hoping against hope
that some miracle will occur to prevent her from killing her new husband. Nevertheless, everything appears to be going
just as her father wishes...Philip is fascinated by Rebeka, eagerly agreeing to
the peace. The wedding takes place, and
Rebeka is left in the palace her father used to rule, married to an alien whom
she’s expected to bed and then kill. She
is completely alone except for the presence of Darius, a Terran android who has
been re-programmed to protect her.
Unknown even to Rebeka, however, Darius has his own agenda. He is capable of human emotion and has fallen
in love with the woman whom he has been ordered to protect while she kills his
former pupil.
And then...Rebeka discovers Philip isn’t the cruel monster
she has been told but simply a young man caught in a fate he didn’t ask
for—much the same as she—and everything changes...
BLURB:
For thirty years, Rebeka’s people have fought the Earthmen who invaded their
planet.
Now, Rebeka’s father has devised a plan to bring about peace: offer the
Earthmen a cease-fire, and cement it by giving his daughter as their leader’s
bride. At first skeptical, Governor Philip Hamilcar is swept away by lust but
he soon finds he has a rival for his wife’s affections in Darius Marx. An
android possessing the ability to experience human emotion, Darius has also
fallen in love with the Earthman’s bride.
Rebeka doesn’t want an alien husband and she certainly doesn’t want to kill
anyone, but she’s given no choice. Once married to Philip, she discovers her
husband more than empathetic to her people’s plight. Soon the two are in love,
and Rebeka has to make a choice…
Will she make herself a widow or give up her own happiness for her people’s
freedom?
EXCERPT:
Dressing in the wedding gown that
had been packed in the little trunk the guard
brought from the gate, Rebeka had put on her makeup and done her hair and
laid out the wedding veils on the bed so they would be nearby when she was
called. Her father had said he would see
her married before he returned to the village with the treaty.
“Do you
think I look all right?” she asked suddenly, and her voice sounded so loud she
almost jumped. “Will the Governor like
it?”
Darius
studied her a moment, those blue eyes critical and serious. Then, for the first time, he smiled.
“She
walks in beauty, like the night of cloudless climes and starry skies; And all
that’s best of dark and bright meet in her aspect and her eyes.” He spoiled the compliment by adding, “Hamilcar will go to his death willingly!”
She turned
away, closing her eyes.
“A mind
at peace with all below, a heart whose love is innocent,” he went on,
cruelly.
“Don’t say
that!” she ordered, angry that there were tears in her voice.
“How long
will your mind be at peace or your love innocent if you use it to kill?” he
asked.
“Why are
you doing this?” Rebeka flung at
him. “You know it has to be done. It’s the only way. Why didn’t you say something sooner if you
disagreed?”
“Because I
can’t actually disagree. Because your
father and Master Martin were set on this course. I’m only an android, Rebeka, a machine, and I
may hold more intelligence than all the men on this planet in my databanks, but
if they don’t want to listen to it, they won’t.
So I’ve kept silent.”
“But you
think I’ll listen?”
He nodded.
“Then
you’re mistaken, Darius. Because I agree
with my father. Philip Hamilcar must
die, and I plan to kill him.”
There was
silence for a few moments.
“He could
actually love you, you know,” Darius persisted.
“I turned him away from your door three times today.”
“Yes, I
heard,” she retorted, and now her smile was sardonic. “And your excuses were a little lame. Really, Darius, sleeping all night and
all day? It’s a wonder he didn’t think
me ill and call a physician! You should
have thought that out a little more.”
“It worked,
didn’t it?” His smile matched hers in
its cruelty. “Kept him from seeing you,
whetted his appetite. I thought you were
going to be the lamb who was slaughtered, Rebeka, but after the way the
Governor’s acting, I realize that he’s the lamb in this story!”
