Kaspar's Box

by Jack L. Chalker

Published 1 May 2003

The secret of the three kings - revealed at last

For centuries, interstellar prospectors had searched for the fabled Worlds of the Three Kings, the lost El Dorado of the galaxy. But if any found it, they were never heard from again. The mad cyborg Prophet, Ishmael Hand, discovered the mysterious system, with artefacts indicating a superhuman technology, and he had refused to reveal its location before vanishing forever in history.

Two more recent expeditions have found the Three Kings. A starfaring evangelist - Doctor Karl Woodward, preacher and leader of the starship The Mountain - followed a clue and found it, but never returned. Then a spacegoing salvage team followed Woodward's trail, and also vanished.

Now a chance encounter between what's left of the once-mighty human military with an inexplicable alien force has brought an armed expedition to the third planet of the Three Kings, Kaspar. They will join forces with the survivors of the first two expeditions, who have been marooned both by alien powers and by human treachery, as they at last encounter the alien minds behind the mysterious triple planetary system - and face a decision that may determine the fate of the entire human race!


Melchior's Fire

by Jack L. Chalker

Published 30 December 2002

For centuries, interstellar prospectors had searched for the fabled worlds of the Three Kings, the lost El Dorado of the galaxy. But none had succeeded. Only the mad cyborg Prophet, Ishmael Hand, had ever seen the mysterious system, and he had refused to reveal its location before vanishing forever into history. Then a starfaring evangelist - Doctor Karl Woodward - found it, only to disappear in turn.

Now a new group of explorers must follow the trail that Woodward blazed. A spacegoing salvage team, desperately in debt after a violent alien menace ruins a lucrative assignment and decimates the group, is hired to follow the clues Woodward left behind.

Fearing pursuit by their former backers, the group heads off for the ultimate salvage operation. By hook or by crook, they will find the Three Kings- if the galactic underworld's repo men don't get them first!