Fire Dancer — A.E. Maxwell

FIRE DANCER is a fantastic science fiction novel of slavery and rebellion and the acts that are tolerated by polite society and culture. Until those acts prove so terrible that revolt is the only answer.An Elizabeth Lowell classic. First time in e-book.Rheba and Kirtin are the last survivors of their homeworld, at the edges of the Concord, forgotten but rich in history and traditions. Rheba is a fire dancer, able to focus and manipulate vast amounts of energy through discipline and motion and form. Kirtin is her protector and mentor, training her in these skills and knowing that one day these energies may grow to consume her unless she masters her own emotions and the power she derives from them.In search of rumored other survivors like themselves, they set out amongst the worlds of the civilized Concord, finding that the presented superior and enlightened cultures they encounter conceal hypocrisies that assist even greater crimes. Entire civilizations built upon slavery and degradation are tolerated so long as they play the proper games of power and civility.Led by the promise of knowledge regarding one of her kin, Rheba and Kirtin are brought to Loo, a planet ruled by a hereditary empire of slavers and decadents. There, both of them are consigned to slave pits beneath the gleaming cities and palaces of the surface. Amongst the forgotten and cast-off, Rheba and Kirtin find others like themselves, stolen or abandoned by their homeworlds and left to languish here, subject to labors and appetites and whims of the planet's rulers.But not everyone wants to remain a slave...