Eon Dream

About the Book

It was a dream...a dream of darkness...a dream of light. 'Tis a tale beyond any mere human histories. Yet, too, it whispers deep through the heart of all humanity.

Before the beginning of Creation there were two Spirit Tribes: the Zaan and the Aeyas. Like gods, they were the keepers of life and all Creation.Yet, in time, they began to think apart and quarrel over the meaning of existence. But, when it grew old, their quarrel broke into a series of terrible wars which theatened to tear apart all Creation.

Now, it came to pass from the ravages of these Primaeval Wars that one spirit, the Aeyan Father Audon Niyth, dreamt an awful dream. Perceiving only sorrow and suffering, he thought to save Creation from all its pain. His thought, grown dark with much time, was to extinguish all things and lull them to a final rest and peace.

Niyth's first attempt to "save" Creation was a million-year war of universal genocide. It failed. So, Niyth turned away to an ancient legend: A mystical entity known as the nylladiom. Anyone who possessed this could destroy not only all things but even existence itself.

However, Audon Niyth was kept from obtaining the nylladiom, and he was cast away into the very heart of Creation. From there --the hell his evil works had fashioned for him-- Niyth would dream to bring the nylladiom to the emptiness of his blackened spirit.

So ends the dark prelude to Eon Dream. But, where it is a nightmare born of profound sorrow, it becomes as well a hope of ultimate redemption. For, against the black designs of Audon Niyth, Creation brings forth a child whose heart's innocence will overcome all evil.

On one level, Eon Dream is the story of one small life --that of the Zaan man-child Au Syen. On a deeper level, it becomes an allegory for the human condition. The stages of Au Syen's individual life symbolize those formative experiences common to all lives. These experiences are embodied as the Seven Sojourns (of Au Syen).

The first four of these sojourns comprise life lived out day by day in the world. Au Syen enters the world a helpless infant, the son of the incarnate spirit Ne Ri. He grows from being a little boy deeply and innocently in love with the miracle and wonder of the world around him to an adolescent struggling to find who he is. As a man, he falls in love with a lovely girl with whom he makes a family and a home. Yet, sadly too, he loses to death his beloved mother Ne Ri.

With the death of Ne Ri, the Seven Sojourns turn to a new dimension: One more cosmic and supernatural. Beyond eveything safe and familiar, Au Syen embarks upon a perilous journey. Along the way, Au Syen the man learns to reshape himself to become Au Syen "The Light Shining Beyond The Darkness" whose destiny is to face evil and transform all reality.

Au Syen's journey is many dangers and hardships. It is a wandering through a dark forest, a climb over a bleak mountain and a trek across a burning desert. Cold, heat, hunger, thirst and loneliness all do their worst to break Au Syen's mind, body and spirit. But from his trials, Au Syen emerges with a renewed vision of who he is: A man deep of heart and soul, whose strength of spirit is the love that will forever triumph over all evil.

Thus aware of himself as never before, Au Syen enters the company of a weird and wondrous creature: Xinj, a sly and ancient being known as the Keeper of the Wisdom of the World. When this Xinj invites Au Syen to know better his wisdom, he grabs and swallows Au Syen alive!

Yet, beyond this descent into the bowels of death, Au Syen is reborn from the world of flesh and blood into the spirit realm wherein abides the Dark Spirit Audon Niyth. All around

About the Author

Rob Payne fondly recalls the days of a childhood lived amid the quaint, rural beauty of upstate New York. The charm of those days gave him a deep sense of the mystic and spiritual, and has inspired him to craft this vision of his most essential ethical belief: That one act of love, no matter how small, can shine beyond the darkest evil. Rob has travelled in Europe and Asia, and wants one day to take a road "quest" across the United States. He presently lives in Orlando, Florida, where he works as a Latin teacher