In The Beginning by Gail Daley (top 100 books of all time checklist .TXT) 📕

boys on the planet who didn’t die outright from the virus were rendered sterile. The Karamines customarily used conquered native populations as slaves. Since they planned on harvesting ova from conquored females and cloning more women slaves, the virus was engineered not to affect the female reproductive system.

Happily, the virus had a short life span and died off after a few months.

Although no more bio-genetic attacks came once the truce was declared, Vensoog was still in deep trouble. The reserves of viable sperm from the lower mammals brought along for colonization and periodically replenished by the colonists, had been protected in the sealed freezers at the original landing site and the native Vensoog mammals appeared to be immune to it. In the years after making landing all the frozen human eggs and sperm they had brought with them had been used up. With no prospect of new children being born, the colony faced extinction. Unless something could be done to re-introduce new viable human sperm, the colony would die out within three generations. Each of the Clans worked frantically to come up with a solution.

After studying the political and physical mess left by the war, Lady Katherine O’Teague came up with a plan to restore biological diversity among Vensoog’s human population. Concluding new male colonists were needed, she decided the best candidates for new male colonists would be found among soldiers returning from the wars.

In theory, the Confederated Worlds military force was composed equally of men and women, but most of those choosing careers as soldiers were still male, and those soldiers whose planets had been destroyed were now homeless. While Vensoog wasn’t the only planet to suffer from the bio-bomb virus, thousands of people, those who had been evacuated from their own colony when it was attacked by Karamine ground forces or destroyed needed new homes as well.

The Clans agreed to present proposals to adopt displaced soldiers in their sector of space to Confederation officials. Vensoog would accept the new immigrants providing those who applied could pass the immigration screening and were willing to either take part in a temporary Handfasting agreement with suitable Vensoog woman or provide genetic material. Clan representatives traveled to Fenris, Camelot, and Avalon where many of the returning soldiers were to be decommissioned to find their new Clan members.

After the first wave of new colonists left for Vensoog, the screening program remained went on automatic for potential new immigrants to use. The Confederated Worlds had many more displaced people than could be absorbed by Vensoog and the other undamaged planets. The Clans agreed to accept more relocated refugees providing the Confederated Worlds agreed to use Lady Katherine's screening program. A system of villages under joint Clan jurisdiction was built to handle the enormous numbers of homeless Confederation citizens.

UPDATE

Several years have passed since the Kitingzen Incident, and the O'Teague family children are growing up. Jayla and Jake are married. Drusilla and Lucas have a five-month-old girl named Caroline who promises to be as gifted as her parents. Due to her ill health because of the damage she suffered during the Kitingzen Incident, Reverend Mother Liana Caldwalder retired from the Dragon Talkers, naming Drusilla as her replacement. Lucinda is realizing her dream of becoming a police officer, and she and Juliette are sharing an apartment in Port Recovery City. Juliette is spending the summer with one of the Kitingzen exploration teams this year. Rupert and Roderick have started a company that builds security programs and Rupert is gaining a reputation as a creator of new medicines and cosmetics. The four of them are eagerly looking forward to the next Harvest Festival when they will receive their first Match Lists and become recognized as full adults in Vensoog society. Violet is immersed in the affairs on Talker's Isle, and although she has not formally been named as the First Daughter to the Reverend Mother Drusilla, she serves as Drusilla's right-hand woman.

St. Antoni—The Forbidden Colony

Book 1

Warriors of St. Antoni

by

Gail Daley

Copyright

Warriors of St. Antoni – Portal Worlds – St. Antoni The Forbidden Colony 1 - Gail Daley—1st ed. Copyright © 2017 by Gail Daley dba Gail Daley's Fine Art

2nd edition copyright © 2018 by Gail Daley dba Gail Daley's Fine Art Cover Art Copyright © 2017 by Gail Daley dba Gail Daley's Fine Art. Used with permission

3rd edition copyright © 2020. New Cover Art Copyright © 2020. by Gail Daley dba Gail Daley's Fine Art. Used with permission

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

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Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction, and any resemblance to any persons living or dead is unintentional and accidental.

Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

Book Layout ©2017 BookDesignTemplates.com

Cover Art © by Gail Daley's Fine Art 2017

ISBN: 1537485202

e-book: ISBN: 9781386691846

Print book: ISBN:9781393003458

ASIN: B07528VH1G

About This Book

BOOK 1—ST. ANTONI THE Forbidden Colony Series

A combination of Victorian Steampunk and shoot-'em-up western. On the frontier world of St. Antoni, you're born tough—or you die young.

After a sniper cripples their father, sisters Bethany, Jeanne and Iris struggle to survive and hang on to their ranch and mine.

Bethany marries a mercenary gunfighter to shield her family from a predatory neighbor. To her surprise, the marriage of convenience turns into a love