Most of the Normans ruled England from Normandy. My little branch of the family actually did move to England, but many of us stayed. We continued to speak our own little version of French, and to rule the island as we thought best. The irony is that the greatest of Norman kings, forever known as Richard the Lionheart, never did learn to speak English. You see, England was a secondary holding at the time, truly only important in that it gave us a claim to kingship.
There’s an old saying, from back before Contact. You can be full of wisdom or full of youth. You can’t have both. That’s still true of the lower classes in places like China and India, where population and cultural pressures keep the treatments more rare. But in most of the Western Alliance, and even in Russian and non-aligned territories, most people can learn wisdom through experience, and still be healthy enough to take advantage of it. That’s changed everything.
The Chinese colonized Xin Shi in 2115. It is the closest planet to Alpha Centauri B, tide-locked with one side perpetually facing her sun. That side is far too hot for us to live normally, and even Africans prefer to avoid it. The far (dark) side of the planet is too cold for anyone but a Tibetan. Most people live within one hundred kilometers of the edge of the world, the ring where sunlight and starlight meet. They call it the Great Wall of Xin Shi.
The betrayals we suffered after The War caught us by surprise. Even most of those in Charles’ family did not see them coming. Perhaps we should have. We knew they did not like us. Even those nominally on Charles’ side were uncomfortable with the…side effects of the Peloran Treatments. They simply did not like the idea of anybody being better than they were, at anything. But we should have foreseen what the real hardliners would do. Somehow.
The Norman branch of my family helped to conquer England long ago, after a disagreement over who would be the new king. There were very few of us of course, and many locals. Like the original Norsemen in Normandy, we intermarried with the Anglo-Saxons, and from that patronage absorbed the stories of King Arthur and Merlin into our blood. That they were famous for defending England against invaders was not lost on us.
The Martian Affair on Amazon
Forge of War on Amazon
The Audacious Affair on Amazon
Angel Flight on Amazon
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Angel War on Amazon
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Wolfenheim Rising on Amazon
Wolfenheim Emergent on Amazon
The Gemini Affair on Amazon