Story: DawnbreakDawnbreak

A young woman who can use aspirant power. Aspirants fight in pairs.

First seenCh 1

The power of a heart that is whole and holds on to one thing. Two partners together make it stronger. How strongly two hearts link is called coupling.

First seenCh 1

How strongly two partners' power links. In a good pair the output is not doubled. It is squared.

First seenCh 7

A green hill above Terrinia. Guinevere grew up there, in a house with two hundred and forty windows.

First seenCh 22

The planet of the Aspirants. Its last great city is Terrinia.

First seenCh 1

Oro's capital, under a huge glass dome. Every morning at six, amber lamps make a false sunrise.

First seenCh 10

The few lives the Cycle spares on purpose, so that a broken world can grow again.

First seenCh 18

A small gold star that glows when two partners' powers are in sync.

Living weapons. They come to destroy.

First seenCh 1

A festival of Dawnbreak. At dusk, people set paper lanterns on the water and make a wish.

First seenCh 18

The place where Lesley and Chang'e first fought the Enders together. The histories call it the Engagement at Gantry Square.

First seenCh 28

Terrinia's quays and sea-wall, with an old wooden roller-coaster called the Star Chaser.

First seenCh 23

A small river town. Some years before 978, a strange storm scorched its north end into black glass.

First seenPrologue

Enders shaped like long black darts, with one amber eye. They hang in the sky and fire.

First seenCh 35

An old word from a dead language: a woman who commands armies. The Will gave the title to Obsidia.

First seenCh 18

An old golden planet, ruled by cold, clever people.

First seenCh 31

The school in Terrinia where young women learn to fight the Enders.

First seenCh 1

The Shield's research post by the harbour, in an old weather observatory. A dormant Ender lay there under glass.

First seenCh 22

A poor street in the lower terraces of Terrinia. Layla's mother keeps a stall of cloth, buttons and thread there.

First seenCh 1

The training team of Layla, Fanny and Roger in the Virtual Battlefield.

First seenCh 7

The last great city of Dawnbreak, built around a lake that opens into the sea. The Defence Sphere covers it.

First seenCh 1

The Academy's weapon workshop in the basement. It built Layla's cannon and the first mecha.

First seenCh 1

A dome made from the power of many Aspirants joined together.

First seenCh 34

The oldest and richest families of Oro. They own its land and its treasure.

First seenCh 10

An old sandstone tower at the east end of the Academy quad. Its one bell rings once a year, on the first day of winter.

First seenCh 4

The army's school on the cliffs across the harbour. It trains children who lost their parents as soldiers of the Shield.

First seenCh 1

The place where Obsidia grew humanoid Enders in vats.

First seenPrologue

The Academy room where new pairs say their promise aloud. Small blue four-pointed stars hang from the beams.

First seenCh 22

The Academy's fighting contest, held in the first week of spring in the great glass hall.

First seenCh 22

The Will's law. A world grows too advanced. A catastrophe comes. Most is destroyed, and a few people, called embers, are spared. Then the survivors rebuild, and it all starts again.

First seenCh 18

The day Oro's army came to Terrinia through a breach in the Defence Sphere.

First seenCh 21

Nine rulers of Oro whose office passes from parent to child. When the others cannot agree, a Decision Maker decides.

First seenCh 10

The web of light that covers Terrinia.

First seenCh 1

The glass dome over Dorado. Nine million people live under it, and almost none have seen the real sun.

First seenCh 10

A device that lets its holder control ordinary Enders.

Layla's secret base: a narrow steel walkway seventy metres up the Academy's central tower, with a view of the sea.

First seenCh 1

A café and shop in the lower terraces, full of ribbons, glass animals and cats.

First seenCh 23

A giant gold-and-black Ender made by the Will long ago. While his golden halo burns, he obeys the voice that holds him.

First seenCh 29

A vast dark hall inside the Storm Citadel, where Obsidia's fleet sleeps in tall glass cells.

First seenCh 31

Oro's government of three seats: the Institute, the Beaumont and the Decision Makers.

First seenCh 10

Chang'e's name for the barrier around the Will's void. Beyond it the pull is so strong that nothing can cross.

First seenCh 24

An hour in which an Aspirant talks to the whole city on camera, as herself rather than as a weapon. Chang'e began it.

First seenCh 48

Oro's Institute of Technology. It builds the machines, the weapons and the Domes.

First seenCh 24

The android soldiers of Oro.

First seenCh 24

The Will's body. It makes Enders and sends them orders.

First seenCh 31

The Academy rule that each Aspirant chooses a partner to train, study and fight with. A partnership must be chosen.

First seenCh 7

The test for aspirant power. A candidate puts a hand on a crystal core and holds the thing she most wants to protect.

First seenCh 1

A club of Academy students devoted to Selena. Its banner has a small stitched dragon in the middle.

First seenCh 42

Dawnbreak's army, founded after 978 by the desperate: police, rescue workers, old soldiers, hunters and engineers.

First seenCh 1

An old wooden roller-coaster on the harbour front. Guinevere and Vexana rode it eleven times.

First seenCh 23

Obsidia's giant flying fortress.

First seenCh 18

A huge Academy hall where ten thousand tiny lights make a ruined city. Trainees fight copies of Enders there.

First seenCh 3

A huge mind that keeps the worlds in balance. It sends the Enders.

First seenCh 18

A ruined lane in Terrinia with a dry fountain. Ruby and Angela rebuilt it during their sentence.

First seenCh 17

The biggest Enders, taller than houses. At the neck the plates cannot overlap, so each one has a seam.

First seenCh 28

A black market in old, forgotten cellars under the lower terraces of Terrinia.

First seenCh 29

A small town in the green hills of Dawnbreak, where Lesley grew up.

First seenCh 18

Special Enders that carry a device in the chest and pass down orders from far away.

First seenCh 12