SOLVED. sword and planet novel where the human colonist willingly give up their advanced technology in order to survive on a death world /d [s]

[Gage]

ok so read this book around 2005 and i loved it. i'm almost positive its the second book in a series, and the cover of the book has a colored drawing of pale man wearing a dark purple or black cloak and with black hair sitting on a throne in a forest.

the book begins a prologue set shortly after the colonist reach the planet. the two characters introduced are discussing how to survive against the native creatures that feed on the humans by appearing to them as the people they left behind. the prologue ends after one the two, i think he was the captain or the pilot of their ship, reveals that he has activated the self destruct on their ship believing that the only way to survive is by adapting to the planet instead of attempting to Terra form it. the story then begins hundreds of years later when humanity has regressed into pseudo medieval culture. the main character is a priest who is tasked with traveling to a distant kingdom across the sea to discover how they have succeeded in advancing their technology while also thriving on the planet. the aliens that fed on the original colonists have evolved at a high rate and are now at peace with humans to a degree and have also taken on the appearance of humanoid cats. the priest travels with a female alien and a human whose name may be rohan or roland; roland sold his soul for immortality and lives in a forest where he is like a god with the ability to control the evolutionary paths of the flora and fauna, but he must also feed on humans the same way the original aliens did in the prologue. the group travels through a desert filled with white trees that cause people to falls asleep so that the trees can feed on them, it affects both the humans and the alien. they also encounter a tribe of humanoid aliens that look like children, i believe at the beginning of the book or in the back cover there is an excerpt from the chapter in which they have been captured by the children, who also have the ability to control the evolutionary paths of their forest but lack the skill of rohan/roland and it is mentioned by the travelers that they seemed to have created one type of animal or plant and then realized it was breeding to quickly or growing too fast thus destroying it's successors until they create another predator to control it. once the travelers arrive at the kingdom across the sea they are introduced to a nun wrapped in sheets that leaves only her face uncovered and are told that her order of nuns are the leaders of the kingdom, but the alien traveler discovers that the "human" nuns are in fact aliens like her and are controlling the humans so as to protect their people from destruction by causing a war between all of the humans on the planet.

[Daffodil]

Elements of this remind me of C. S. Friedman's coldfire trilogy. Human thoughts, dreams and nightmares shape the world around them. Vampire-like character is Gerald Tarrant, priest is Damien Vryce. There is a trip across the sea.

[Gage]

Daffodil wrote: "Elements of this remind me of C. S. Friedman's coldfire trilogy. Human thoughts, dreams and nightmares shape the world around them. Vampire-like character is Gerald Tarrant, priest is Damien Vryc..."

Yes!!!!!!!!
thank you so much i loved this book when i was in school and really want to read it again.

[Ann aka Iftcan]

Congrats on finding it so fast Gage. I'll move this down to Solved for you.