Ashes of Man (Sun Eater, #5)

by Christopher Ruocchio

Writing this, I have no way of knowing who you are, Reader—or in what age you are reading these words. I do not know what you must think of me, or of all us sad Sollans. Nor do I truly care. Wherever you are, whenever you may be, you have not faced the Pale in battle, you have not seen the ashes of war covering world after world, or witnessed the horrors of Dharan-Tun. You have been spared. We have spared you. Whatever you may think of me, know this: seldom has man known a ruler like William Caesar. They say it was in me that the likeness and power of the God Emperor returned. There are those who write or whisper now that I was the conclusion of the High College’s dream, the culmination of all their careful breeding, their delicate gene sequencing. I tell you I am not. Whatever I am, whatever power I have obtained—however briefly I ruled—I say it was in William the Great, the Sun of the Millennium, that the likeness and greatness of the God Emperor returned.