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The Second installment of the Voice of the Universe Series is now available in paper and Kindle formats.

Star of Sound

Within days of Jaiah Sufford’s arrival at the Heelith Homeworld, anti-human forces try to kill him.

After Jaiah bonded with a Heelith crystal, thanks to his extraordinary hearing, he accepted an invitation to visit the Heelith capital, Gaalan.

Jaiah soon feels like he poked into a hornet’s nest, confronted with a sub-species of Heelith who can manipulate others with the power of their voices. He also encounters a group of human prisoners-of-war that no one in the Human Unity knows about.

As he discovers new abilities of his crystal every day, Jaiah tries to safely navigate the Heelith jungle of deadly intrigues. What is his crystal trying to tell him? And how does he stay alive?



Out Now!

Star of Sound - Book Two of the Voice of the Universe Series

Artwork by Naoyuki Katoh

Star of Sound - Excerpt

Chapter 1

I DON’T TRUST my eyes and ears anymore. They see and hear too many strange things and too many Rels. We moved down to the Heelith Homeworld three days ago.

Sina, Priar and I are constantly tired. We shuffle behind Kinlan, guards, and Hriff as though in a trance. They put us into guest rooms in their parliament house, called the Assembly. Our rooms have human furniture, brand new, copies of what the Heelith learned from the Human Unity news web, and the human cruisers they captured during the Long War.

Although they’re good imitations, they feel false. The materials are all slightly different: the wood smells strange, the plastic feels too cold, the cloth is too soft or too hard. Everything is slightly “off”, adding to our general exhaustion and input overload. Our rooms also feel alien due to their egg-shaped nature. The floor is flat, but the walls and ceiling form a dome.

I have to ask for a second and maybe a third tour of the Assembly, since I cannot process what I’m seeing and hearing. I’m still better off than Sina or Priar--at least I have Flinx to help me. His humming is mostly sedate and soothing these past few days. He’s happy to be back on a planet, and it’s his home planet. He sounds much more content and happy than on Shuslam, for example.

We haven’t left the Assembly yet. A part of me wants to go out and take a look at the city, but another part isn’t ready yet. It’s too much, too weird, too alien.

I envy Sina and Priar; for them the Assembly is wonderfully quiet. I, though, hear all the Heelith around, all the time. Their skittering steps stand my neck hairs straight. Their voices are intensely beautiful, yes, and yet... more and more I wish they’d be quiet and leave me alone.

I’m not sure whether it’s a good idea to go to this concert, but then, curiosity beats the fatigue. Heelith singing. Yes, I want to hear them sing. Heelith song is a candidate for the most beautiful sound in the universe. I’m shuffling along behind Hriff as she leads me through the endless corridors of the Assembly to its concert hall. I believe they have arranged this concert explicitly for me, though I can’t remember a hundred percent. If I ever possessed such knowledge, it has slipped through the holes in my brain, which seem to be getting bigger every day. I’d have liked to stay in my room and just sleep. But I suspect that they arranged the concert for me and of course it would be horribly impolite if I refused to go. Lucky Priar and Sina, they wouldn’t hear anything anyway and are allowed to stay in their rooms.

I stagger at the sight and size of the concert hall. At least five hundred Rel-seats fill the auditorium. There are several galleries with separate booths. The hall is a half-sphere. So many of the Heelith designs are spherical; human designs are much more angular. Is it the influence of the crystals, which are round too? Possibly not, the Heelith have cut and polished them into round balls, so it’s their own esthetics after all, not the crystals’. The galleries reach to the ceiling. The highest gallery is hanging almost vertically above the auditorium. I’d get a fear of heights up there, but since the Heelith can crawl along the walls and ceiling, they probably don’t even know what fear of heights is. The stage is in the middle of the hall. Rel-seats group around it in concentric rings.

I must assume that the Heelith on stage are the performers. They nod their fly heads at the guests in the front rows and chat with them. A low hum from all the Heelith talk hangs in the air, increasing my dizziness. It’s so beautiful, it makes me drunk. The strange sweet and sour smell of the masses of Heelith, concentrated in one room, intensifies the dizziness.

The performers wear elaborate costumes with long trains behind them made out of iridescent material akin to the wings of dragonflies. I still haven’t seen the Heelith’s real wings unfolded. Well, I haven’t been outside yet.

Hriff leads me to the first row. Kinlan is already there, I recognize him by his blue tunic with white symbols that resemble graphs of the annual sales of Ginlam chocolate trees. Next to his seat is one lone chair for a human. I’m the only human in this hall. Holy crap. There’ll be a thousand or so Heelith around me, 500 in the auditorium and 500 in the galleries. They are a thousand different Heelith, all speaker units of their swarms. Where are all their units? At home? I try not to shiver.

“Ah, Jaiah,” Kinlan says in his sleek politician’s voice, “Please meet Saluso, she is one of the greatest singers of the Heelith.”

He points with one of his antennae at the Rel on stage who he just talked to.

“Hello Jaiah,” Saluso says, “It’s a great honor to be singing for you tonight.”

I have to hold onto the back of my chair. The translation of the little machine around her throat is mechanical and the same as the voice of any other translator. But her real voice behind it, oh my! Alto in pitch, smooth, soft, like a siren.

“The honor is mine. Your spoken voice sounds so incredible, I can’t wait to hear you singing.”

Saluso, Kinlan and Hriff all chuckle and my dizziness increases another notch. I wonder if I’ll be able to bear this concert.

“That’s so amazing that you can hear our voices, Jaiah, so amazing,” Saluso says. “I hope you’ll enjoy the concert.”

“I’m very sure I will.”

She bows her head to me and turns to talk to Kinlan, switching off her translator. I understand none of it, but I don’t care what she says, her spoken tones sound better than the best solo of any opera singer of human design.

Hriff urges me to sit down, and I’m grateful for the seat under my butt. I close my eyes for a moment and try to shut out all Rel singsong. I concentrate on Flinx and his endless hum. He sounds tired, like I am, overwhelmed and half sedated.

“Are you all right?” Hriff asks me.

“Yes, but it’s just too much sensory input. I’m tired. I think I should stay in my room tomorrow. Can we go into town the day after?”

“Sure, Jaiah, no rush.”

“Thank you.”

Hriff sits down next to me and I smile at her. She has exchanged her usual black torso gown for something fancy: a white glittering one. Fancy dress for the opera, no matter in which part of the universe, seems to be a common phenomenon.

I found out meantime how the Heelith switch their translators on and off without touching them: by a low frequency sound that even my ears cannot hear.

I bow over to Hriff. “Hriff, sorry, I forgot, but was this concert especially arranged for me?”

“Yes and no. It was supposed to happen last week, but Saluso insisted on postponing it so that you could participate. It’s a part of her current tour. She’ll leave tomorrow for another planet. Various concerts had to be rearranged so that she could stay here longer.”

“Wow... thank her from me, will you?”

“Oh, you can thank her yourself after the concert.”

I nod and relax on my chair. It’s a new one again, the same make as the ones in our guest rooms. It’s plastic, but oddly cold. I don’t mind, since the climate in the capital is hot and humid. It’s between 30 and 40 Celsius each day, with high humidity, adding to my general exhaustion.

Behind me, the hall is filling with shuffling Rels. The shuffling of their insect feet makes me want to run screaming.

Saluso turns to me again, and I get up.

“I just heard you are bonded in blood, Jaiah. It’s awfully rude, but I’m dying to look at your crystal.”

“No problem, Saluso.” I swing the bag with Flinx off my shoulder, open it and its black leather box and reveal Flinx. Flinx was once pretty, a ten centimeter-diameter milky-white, half-transparent crystal with red and green streaks inside it. Now Flinx’s funnels and cavities are filled with my dried, blackened blood. It looks rather scary.

“Oh,” Saluso sighs. Her real voice behind it--dark, full of pleasure and wonder--sends a tingle down my spine.

“May I touch it?” she asks.

“Sure.” I hold the box higher. Saluso stretches an antenna, coils it around Flinx, and lifts him effortlessly out of the box.

Flinx doesn’t care that a great Heelith opera singer holds it. He hums sedately for me. No matter how beautiful her singing, it cannot compete with Flinx.

“Amazing,” she says, then puts the ball back into its velvet nest inside the leather box. “Thank you, Jaiah.”

“You’re most welcome.”

A loud and aggressive chime rings through the hall, making me yelp. Not the sound I’d expect to announce the beginning of a concert. A pang of fear suddenly reduces the dullness in my body: what if I can’t stand Heelith music? What if I hate it? Oh dear. No matter what, I’ll have to endure this concert. They won’t forgive me if I hate it.

The Heelith go to their seats, and silence spreads in the hall.

There are six singers on stage. They have no chairs, but stand in a circle, facing the audience. Saluso is facing me. They have no instruments. The six singers bow their heads and it turns so quiet, one could hear a needle dropping in the last row.

“Thank you for coming to our concert,” Saluso says. “We are dedicating it to our very special guest, Jaiah Sufford, the only human who can hear us.”

Saluso bows to me, then takes the translator off her neck and hands it to Hriff.

As Hriff sits down, the six Rels start singing. My fear eases with the first note. It’s beautiful. I don’t know what they’re singing but it sounds like... I have no words for it. It’s divine, it’s harmonies beyond harmonies. Not sirens, but gods are singing. Beauty itself is singing. The tones these Heelith produce are close to perfection. Every hair on my body tingles, every cell vibrates. They tug at every nerve that I have.

I’ve been looking my entire life for a place that sounds “right”. I’ve been looking for the most beautiful sound in the universe. Hearing these Heelith sing, I know and feel that the most beautiful sound ever must come from Flinx, not from them. Thanks to this performance, I understand so much better. The Heelith know that they cannot produce the most beautiful sound in the universe. They know, like I do, that true fulfillment will only be achieved at Neverworld, the place where all crystals want to go to; the Heelith call it the Origin. The trouble is, at the moment Flinx is journeying with me again, away from Neverworld to... I don’t know where, we haven’t arrived yet. I’m calling it Neverworld II, or Nev-II, for lack of a better idea.

These singing Heelith, they’re close, but not quite there. Their song is nearly perfection, 97 percent, but those last percentage points, what a difference they make. Yet they are blessed creatures to get so close. At best, any human song would only achieve 80 percent.

I’m crying as I listen to Saluso, not loudly, heaven forbid, I cannot disturb this incredible performance with my weeping, but tears stream down my face.

It gets worse. I’m having an erection. I’m squirming in my chair. The stimulus must go somewhere. I’m suffering an orgasm, and I say suffer because it’s too long, too good, and too intense. Hell, it’s better than having sex with Sina and that’s the best sex I’ve had so far in my life.

I don’t know what to do against that monstrous orgasm. A moan slips out and that helps a little, since it disturbs the near perfect harmonies I’m hearing.

I manage to sit upright again, but after a few moments it starts anew. This is too much for my poor, imperfect human body.

After a while it actually gets painful. I’m blacking out from time to time. I’m concentrating on Flinx. It doesn’t really help, since he’s singing in the most ecstatic fashion as well, triggered by my tidal waves of orgasm.

I’m falling into a state of half-consciousness. Only a weird clacking sound rips me awake. The concert seems to have ended, thank all gods that ever existed, and the Heelith clap by clicking with their fangs, which sends shudders of fear into the marrow of my bones. It sounds like they’ll rip me apart and have me for dinner.

I’m exhausted and unable to get up. I look down at myself and my face heats up. There is a large dark spot over my groin, fortunately not too prominent in black pants. I only pray that the Heelith have no idea what that means. How well do they know human anatomy?

Hriff leans over to me. “You look like you liked it.”

There is a lewd humor in her voice. Oh shit, she knows what happened.

“I did. Too much actually, this was too much.”

Want to read more?

The Star of Sound is now available in paper and Kindle formats.