Day of Descent

It was the Ship.

It had no other name. It had thousands.

From Tencton legends, it was lesh, the hell where the flesh of those who turned their eyes from the three moons was seared in waves of salt water, only to be restored with each rising of the sun.

It was am dugas, the pit that tempted Celine from Andarko, from which only their love had saved him.

It was the wask'l reckwi, the knowing death of ancient times for those who died yet remained forever awake to the darkness that trapped them in an eternity of remembering the evil they had done.

And there were other names, their numbers legion, more ancient than any Tencton legend and not from any Tencton language. Words of hatred and fear and despair and helplessness that came from the languages of other races that had been cargo in its hull, now ghosts whose death cries still echoed from the bulkheads, whose terror still pulsed through the choking air like the fluttering heartsbeat of a hunted animal run to ground.

(opening passage)