Book six in The Gates of Heaven series plunges
straight
into a detailed world. I had not read any of the previous
fantasy volumes, so suffered from lack of understanding of
what was going on, initially. THE SANDS OF ETHYRN conceal a
ruined tower complex in a drought-stricken land where an
altar and scroll are uncovered, with a talisman jewel which
puts the elderly king into a trance when he touches it.
There is an earlier chapter, but it is hard to get into and
about a different character in a different age, so new or
young readers may like to skip to a more accessible part of
the tale.
Ra'daf is a young scribe who isn't pretty enough to be a
court lady, so she's allowed to use her wits and sit among
scrolls all day. She has a gift for translation so is asked
to decipher the venerable scroll found at the altar, in the
hope that it can save the king.
Meanwhile, in a past time, order is breaking down, with
village men conscripted so not enough are left to protect
homes and farms from raiders. A young man called Lael is
grabbed by a slaver who needs countless men to work on a
giant tower, planned to reach heaven itself. Raban the
builder has discovered how to crush fossilised shells to
make lime mortar to bind sand into bricks, and the tower is
already awe-inspiring. His quarries are running short of
sand, and a wizard named Sha'kath shows him that plenty is
to be had in a place called Ethryn, far off but the wizard
can arrange transport. The wizard knows that the sand
dropping through the hole he creates is coming from the
future. In that future, young Ra'daf sees the sinkhole
develop at the ruins and wonders exactly where the sand is
going.... Power-hungry Sha'kath has his own reasons for
wanting the sand in Ethyrn desert used; this uncovers stone
gryphons which, by travelling between times, he means to
awaken and put to his bidding. Peril arrives on swift
wings.
This interesting premise reminded me of Shelley's
poem 'Ozymandias' in which the boastful ruler's giant
statue is a wreck in the desert. The landscapes of both
times are well described and there are several sacred sites
around the world, one of which is addressed in each book.
THE SANDS OF ETHYRN will be better for those who have
followed the series by C.S. Lakin, but once you get to know
the characters, you can read it as a standalone. At that
point I started to like this clever fantasy quite a lot.
The ancient and acclaimed land of Ethryn is dying from
pervasive drought, and while the king searches to find
water, a mighty tower is uncovered in the desert. King Kael
hopes the scroll found near the altar will tell of water
sources, but when he touches the gemstone set in the altar,
he falls into a coma that transports him back five thousand
years where he is a slave building the tower.
Sha’kath, the wizard who oversaw the building of the tower
all those centuries ago, had cast a spell that brings sand
bubbling up from the ground so the workers can make bricks
and complete the tower’s construction.
In the past, the king, whose is a young villager named Lael,
is pursued relentlessly by God, given visions and
declarations that he has been chosen to be a deliverer and a
prophet , but Lael keeps fleeing. Then, when the tower is
completed, heaven appoints him as deliverer, and he and his
companions escape and head to their villages. God directs
Lael to the sacred site and makes him the Keeper, then
reveals his great power as he brings down judgment upon the
world, confusing languages and scattering all in rebellion
and defiance. Lael is shown the beginnings of Ethryn—a
fertile and prosperous land that will become a great kingdom
—and then he returns home to his family, where he fully
embraces his destiny and delivers those who will listen. God
then destroys his village with fire, but Lael leads his
contingent to the sacred site and a new beginning.
At the end of his life, Lael—who has watched Ethryn grow and
prosper and who has been a gifted healer—returns to the
tower to place his poem in the chest and put the gemstone on
the altar. Before he takes his last breath, he turns and
sees a girl—who is Ra’daf of the future—and when he dies,
King Kael in the future wakes from his long sleep. Upon
awakening he finds Ra’daf nearly dead by his bed—for the
vizier had tried to stop her from waking the king with the
amaranth in the vase. Lael heals her, and the vizier flees,
unable to locate his secret chamber, but intent on
discovering the locations of all seven sites and destroying
them all. Kael, upon reviving, now knows where the site is
buried under sand and takes his people there, where he again
is set up as Keeper, and now, with heaven’s blessing, water
erupts from the ground and ends the drought.
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