Template

Introduction by Jay Lake.

Conn Labro is one of the top-ranked duelists in all the Ten Thousand Worlds. He's also an indentured-for-life player in Ovam Horder's sporting house on Thrais, a planet whose vast gaming industry draws players from all over The Spray, even from as far away as Old Earth.

Mystery surrounds Conn: he was sold to Horder's Gaming Emporium as an anonymous infant, a circumstance that guaranteed he would never escape debt slavery. Now the mystery has caught up with him: he finds an old man with whom he plays a weekly game of strategy dead of torture. And an orbiting space ship fires an energy weapon at the roof-top dueling ground where Conn is scheduled to meet an offworld opponent.

The old man, though apparently poor, has left him not only enough wealth to buy himself out of indenture but an encrypted "bearer deed" to an unnamed property somewhere down The Spray. Together with Jenore Mordene, an Old Earth showgirl stranded on Thrais when her traveling show broke up, Conn embarks on a quest to discover who he is, and who is trying to kill him.

His quest will lead him into the grip of a sinister cult dedicated to depraved lust, and a final, deadly confrontation on a lost world where the only law is the point of a duelist's blade.

"Matthew Hughes's Template is many things – including a template others should follow to produce outstanding writing. Hughes has been the best-kept secret in SF for far too long: he's a towering talent, and Template is his best work to date. Bravo!" – Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo Award-winning author of Hominids.