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a children's sci-fi about not fearing death
A planet with no sun. A slave girl who wants to see the stars. An archangel who is Death.Ellis is a slave girl trapped in a colony underground. When her beloved aunt mysteriously disappears, Ellis risks a daring escape from her slavery, aided by a strange being lurking in the shadows. She hopes to find answers to the secrets of her colony; what she finds is salvation beyond her wildest imagination: an archangel, sent directly from God, has given their planet a new sun.There’s just one problem. The archangel calls himself the “dog of death”. And Ellis’ people, the astra, are supposed to be immortal.The breakout novel of a Protestant monk, Twin Suns Burning is a symbolic fantasy about the core truth of the Christian faith: that death has been conquered forever. Shot through with Biblical imagery and holding zero punches, this book is perfect for the kid who loves the unique and strange worlds of Narnia or A Wrinkle in Time.
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About Me
Biography
Matt Krell is a modern-day Protestant monk writing children's sci/fi & fantasy. Drawing from the Biblical and Western Tradition, he creates stories that explore the depths of symbolism and theology, while still being actually fun.As a teenager, he fell in love with chivalry after reading Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and has been on his Crusader-bro arc ever since.A programmer by profession, he lives & works in a monastic order in southern New Jersey.
My inspiration
-> My Faith
-> My world travels
-> My growing sword collection
Background
What is a Protestant Monk?Monks are people who dedicate their entire lives to Christ and live according to a special "rule", or guidelines, usually inspired by St. Benedicts Rule. While it is more common in Catholic circles, Protestantism does indeed have its own tradition.The latest iteration of this tradition is Rod Dreher's Benedict Option. The book explains how Christians can renew the Western Church by following the examples of the medieval monks who bore witness in Christianity's darkest hours.If you want to know more, Matt runs a podcast for his Church, co-hosted with his brother, where they talk about giving everything you got for God.
Soli Deo gloria
Twin Suns Burning
Chapter 1
Ellis had never seen the stars. She had, however, a rough idea of what they looked like, for her master had stars painted on the ceiling of his cells. She had a book about the stars that she kept under her hammock and read every night before she slept. She had been told that, somewhere far away, someone had a magic box that could put pictures of the stars on the ceiling of a great chamber—the closest one could get to seeing the stars in person. But she had never actually seen them. None of the astra had.More than anyone she knew, however, Ellis very much wanted to see the stars. She thought that they must be very beautiful. Other children never seemed interested in the stars at all. The other girl her age, the master’s daughter, was more interested in cute boys or clothes. She liked all those things too, but the stars were a far more exciting topic. One day when she was dressing her, she said that the stars must be very beautiful and would look at them all day if she ever could. The daughter only wrinkled her nose at Ellis and spat, “Why should a slave like you care about something like that?”The only other person she trusted with her desire to see the stars was her Amma, her “aunt”. Amma was a special slave in the Master’s house because she managed the stores of food, and so she could read. She taught Ellis how to read, too, with the book of the stars that Ellis kept under her hammock. White Stars, Red Stars, Giant Stars, Binary Stars, Moons, Planets, Suns, Comets—her starved mind ate it all up. Once, after her Amma read to her how moons around a planet tend to synchronize their orbits over time, Ellis blurted, “Amma, I wish I could see the stars in person! They must be so beautiful.” Her Amma only smiled warmly and said, “But you know that is impossible, Little Sun.”It was impossible for one simple reason; no one had been to the surface of the planet for thousands of years.The star book told Ellis the reason. The astra’s planet, Gebbis, once orbited around a bright golden star called Rea that kept the surface very warm. The astra—tall, graceful, beautiful humanoids whose eyes sparked with the light of the stars—lived on the warm surface along with all sorts of plants and animals, like trees and birds and fish. They wore sumptuous clothing and jewelry that reflected the light of the moon and sun, and danced under the starry tapestry of heaven. They built a huge city called Atlantis that pulsed with the magic of the stars. And what magic! The astra’s magic was so powerful that they built astral mirrors that could peer into other worlds. Through those mirrors they discovered other beings on other planets, such as the frail, primitive humans of Earth. Some of their magi even traveled to Earth and taught them their language, their gods, and their power.But, one day, all of that wonder came to an end. A rogue star from deep within space flew into their system and flung Gebbis away from its star, Rea. Asteroids fell from the sky and caused a great flood that destroyed Atlantis. Then Rea grew smaller and smaller as Gebbis drifted away. The oceans froze; huge banks of snow filled the planet, and, one by one, the creatures and plants and many of the lovely astra froze and died.But not all was lost. Some astra built a huge vessel of glass that flew away into the heavens, hoping to find a new planet they could colonize. A few powerful magi made one last, enormous portal and escaped to Earth. Those are the great magicians that you and I know of: Thoth, Archimedes, Merlin, Circe, and the like. But most of the astra, the ordinary folk like Ellis’ ancestors, dug holes deep underground, grew food, and survived. These colonies together formed the underground kingdom of Duat, and that was how it had been for millenia: the astra, like Ellis, lived in colonies underground in Duat, waiting for the day that their planet would warm up again.That was why it was impossible to see the stars; miles of snow and ice lay between her and the sky above.It seemed to Ellis, however, that it was theoretically possible. The ancient Atlanteans were able to travel to other planets around Rea in glass ships, using magic to levitate and fly through the sky. That meant they knew how to breathe and stay warm even in the cold emptiness of space. It should be possible, then, to build such a vessel underground and go to the surface. But her Amma only laughed at the idea. “But how would you get all the magic to do that, love?” she soothed. “And where would you get the materials? The tools? And even if you could get those things, you would have to be very, very rich!” So, Ellis thought it would be a good idea to get rich.But that, too, was impossible. She and Amma were slaves. Slaves don’t really “own” anything, because they themselves are property, and Ellis’ master was certainly not going to make her a magic vessel any time soon, even if he could. For her to get rich, she would need to be set free.And that, too, was impossible. The only time she knew that a slave had been set free was when a young master was killed in a horrible accident where rocks from a tunnel fell down and killed him. Having no heir, his slaves were set free. Ellis’ master and mistress were not going to be killed in an accident any time soon and they had a son and daughter who would inherit her and Amma if they did. Sometimes, in her darker moments, she wished the whole lot of them would be crushed by rocks; the mistress was very mean to her, the master never really liked her, and the daughter, Aila, was a spoiled brat who yelled at her when she didn’t do her hair just perfectly. The only person she did like was Anton, the master's son; he, unlike them, was kind to her.Getting rich, then, was out of the question. That left only one possibility. She would just have to wait until their planet warmed up again.It would happen eventually, of course. And she would live to see it, eventually. For unlike plants and animals, unlike the frail humans of Earth, unlike any other living being they saw in their magic mirrors, the astra live forever. They, alone of all living things, never grow old and die; they always stay young and beautiful, even if they live a million years. All Ellis had to do was just keep on living, and, one day, she would see the stars.She just had to be patient.But how long did she have to wait? One evening, she sat on her hammock and paged through her book to figure it out. One chapter she never quite understood explained the math behind their planet’s journey, and when she finally puzzled through it, her heart sank. The book said that they were headed in the general direction of a giant white star that might capture them in its gravity well. But the author didn’t know for sure if it would, or even if they would get to that star at all. And the closest estimate for how long it would take was 3 million years!Three million years. They had only been traveling for fourteen thousand years. And she was only twelve. In Ellis’ mind, she would have to wait an eternity. And eternity was, to her, the same thing as “never.”The more she thought about it, the more unlikely it seemed she would ever be able to see the stars. As her planet plodded along in its snail’s crawl across the vast emptiness between the stars, and time stretched out into an endless infinity, Ellis’ dream slowly faded into bitter despair.But she never lost her love for the stars. And that love was about to prove very useful.
Something woke Ellis early.There wasn’t an obvious reason. The room was still cave-dark, and the soft snoring of the other female slaves hadn’t gotten any louder. No one had gotten up to use the chamberpot in the center of the room. Nothing hurt. For some reason, she was just awake.Well, if nothing was wrong, then the reason didn’t matter. Ellis closed her eyes in the utter black to try to relax again. That’s when she heard a whisper.“Hey… are you awake?”It came from Tana, one of the younger astral females that didn’t talk with Ellis very often. The girl was fifty or so years: quite marriageable if she wasn’t a slave.Ellis wasn’t sure if the question was directed to her, so she hesitated. Just as she was about to reply, another slave grunted and muttered, “I am now.” That female, about five-hundred years, rarely spoke; Ellis had forgotten her name.“Something’s been bothering me,” Tana whispered. “I can’t sleep.”Ellis exhaled in frustration. Obviously, that didn’t mean you had to keep others up.The older one groaned: “This is no time for a conversation, girl.”“I know, but… you know those old boxes? In the colony vestibule? Someone’s moved them around.”“…So?”“No one’s ever done that before. I don’t remember anyone even touching them once in my life. It got me thinking: why do we have so much junk in there? Who blocks their vestibule with a bunch of old boxes? That doesn’t make sense.”Ellis' ears pricked. The older one sighed.“…Sweetie… the last time Mehen had a visitor was centuries ago, long before you were born. Our colony is so tiny that the Emperor doesn’t need to check up on us. The reason we have so many boxes in there is because the engineers ran out of room some years ago, so they moved them in there temporarily, and no one has needed or bothered to clean it up since. They got moved around because one of them was probably looking for something they had forgotten about. It doesn’t mean something strange is going on.”“…Right. Ok. That makes sense.”“Believe me, girl. I was born and raised and served in this house my whole life. Nothing ever ‘happens’ in this little hole, and nothing ever will. Go back to sleep.”The younger one sighed, “Ok. Sorry. Good night,” and Ellis heard the rustle of her hammock.Ellis rotated her shoulders a little, letting the hammock swing ever so slightly. She closed her eyes again.Perhaps there is another explanation.She bolted awake.This time she knew what had woken her. She heard Amma hitting a pot with a wooden spoon, and the commotion of the other female slaves pulling themselves out of their hammocks. Light spilled into the short, curved hallway that was her room through the curtain that Amma had pushed aside.Ellis was groggy, but awake. She stretched and looked at the other females. Age is a funny thing among the astra; everyone except Ellis was at least fifty, most above 300, and yet a human would have a hard time believing any of them were older than 30 years. Amma was the oldest, and she didn’t look a day older than 60 in human terms.Tana had just gotten out of her hammock and changed her loin- and breast-cloth, combing her disheveled mop of blond hair with her fingers.“Good morning,” Ellis croaked as the girl passed her on the way to the oval shaped doorway. She looked at Ellis with barely disguised irritation and walked past her.Ellis sighed as Amma held the curtain for the girl and then walked over to Ellis. She greeted her with a warm smile. “Awake yet?” she teased.“No,” Ellis groaned and flopped back into her hammock.“Today’s a special day,” Amma continued as she gently pulled Ellis’ feet over the edge of the hammock. “It’s Matching Day; both Anton and Aila are going to the meeting, and Aila needs to look her best.”“Can’t she do her own hair?” Ellis whined as she undressed.“It’s not a noble’s place to do her own hair.”“But she’s so mean to me, Amma.”“I know, Little Sun. But that is the life we have been given; we can’t change that.”Dressing was a quick and simple affair, since, being slaves, all they were allowed to wear was a loincloth and a strip for their breasts. It can be embarrassing to undress in a room full of people you don’t know that well, but the sheer necessity of it made the slaves get over it pretty quickly, even at Ellis’ age.Amma grabbed Ellis' hand and led the groggy little girl out into the central chamber. The main room was a giant oval paneled with ancient hardwood. Besides the stairwells that led to the floor above and below them, oval doorways opened to other rooms that curved around the center. All the doorways had curtains; the doors had been cannibalized for some other purpose long ago. The effect was that the layout looked like a seed, the central chamber making up the body and the edge rooms making a skin.This center room was plain and filled with wooden boxes that held food, cloth, dishes, and the other necessities the masters needed. The only interesting piece on the walls was a large ancient clock that a male slave was resetting. In the center lay a large cloth with threadbare cushions surrounding it, and on the cloth lay wooden bowls and one large hardwood pot with the hot morning gruel. The room was lit by a few glass lamps that each contained a dozen or so large, glowing fairy flies. The male slaves, who also only wore loincloths, had just finished breakfast and were dispersing to their duties. It was now the female slaves' turn.Ellis grabbed a bowl from the cloth, ladled some gruel out into it, sat and began to eat next to Amma as the other female slaves came and quickly did the same.Perhaps there is another explanation.Had she dreamed that? Tana hadn’t whispered that, had she?Amma interrupted her reverie with, “Alright, what are you grateful for today, Ellis?”“Nothing,” was the grumpy reply.“Ellis…” Amma warned.Ellis sighed and made something up.“I’m grateful that my clothing is not wearing out as quickly anymore.”“There you go, that’s a good one. I can tell you are getting better at not scrubbing it too hard. I am grateful that we had tomatoes to put in the food today.”“Oh it has tomatoes?” Ellis looked down. Yes, little red bits in the paste were smiling up at her.“Gallon figured it out?”“Yes! He was rather pleased with himself. He thinks he can get more of them to grow this year. There is always something to be grateful for, Ellis. Don’t you forget that. And now I think you need to be off.”Ellis finished her meal and stood. “Oh, isn’t it our turn in the sun-room today?”“Oh, you know, I don’t know.”“I’m quite sure of it, the Bycairns went yesterday, so it’s ours now.”“Well then, I guess it is,” Amma observed optimistically. “See, that’s another thing to be grateful for.”“I’ll see you in the afternoon, then, Amma.”“You too, Little Sun.”Ellis then plodded off toward the stairs and made her way up them into the living chambers of the masters rooms.Perhaps there is another explanation.No, that wasn’t a dream; she definitely had heard someone whisper that. Hadn’t she?
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