Overview
Calinitia Dreaming is a novel by Cairo Smith. It follows Adon Halicar, a Calinitian Dimatian and former Military Investigator, after the disappearance of Heather Grace Faltina pulls him into a conspiracy involving tainted amogen drops, Azalite financiers, corrupted Arborist authority, and the attempted release of Macix. His alliance with Guinevere Hail becomes one of the story’s main ties between private investigation and divine intervention.
The story is set in Provisional Calinitia, especially Calinitia City, a coastal city shaped by Loratian military power, the Loratian Arborist Church, Dimatian memory, Suatu unrest, Azalite finance, Celestialism, the Vitorian current Arboraeternum, and pressure from Nataia. Major settings include the Malaanine Dream, Zaj Perfectly Fish House, the Calinitia cathedral, the Den of the Mother, the Liminal Zone, and the Bank of Achora.
Calinitia Dreaming is available through the Askari Productions store page.
Plot
Part One: The Alabaster Crescent
Heather Grace Faltina, a performer at the Malaanine Dream known as Elucia, is abducted after an orange-horned patron contaminates her wine and compels her away from the club. Harry Benedict hires Adon Halicar, known on the Masquerade Strip as Leorex, to find her without bringing the Office of Perpetual Sanctification down on the club. Adon’s first inquiries reconnect him with Emilia Magnalanti, a childhood friend and MI tertiate, and lead him to Guinevere Hail, an associate Arborist priestess whose ritual senses reveal that the case is touched by dark magic.
Guinevere’s detection ritual in Heather’s room points Adon toward tainted amogen and a shipboard supply route. Adon traces the drops through Audrey Murrell, Bud Prodaja, and Zansled imports to Karz Kystarlik, an Azalite real estate developer tied to Achora politics. Along the way he sees the first outlines of Calinitia’s unstable world: OPS raids, Suatu anger, Azalite public ceremony, records at Seaside Precinct, and the brittle authority of the MIs under Eric Vitorius.
Adon uses Guinevere’s robes, old MI instincts, and a willingness to bluff his way into danger to enter elite Azalite spaces. Through Hera Kystarlik he gains access to the Peak House and learns the name Beni Teskennen. His affair with Hera gives him information but also places her in mortal danger. By the end of the first movement, Adon has seen that the amogen case, the Society to Build Achora, Karz’s household, and Heather’s abduction are parts of the same hidden machine.
Part Two: A Tear in the Heart of Mankind
Adon infiltrates Beni Teskennen’s southern estate and finds Aurora, called Rori, a fifteen-year-old Belardi girl showing amogen withdrawal. Rori tells him Heather was held there briefly before the Aksakanit took her. The escape from the estate turns violent, and Adon brings Rori to Mrs. Kev-Hla’s Fish House for shelter, making his home base part of the conspiracy’s human aftermath.
Sephret, an Azalite bartender and friend of Timo Mitzura, explains the Aksakanit, the Rites of Ikhir, kazmat lines, and a suspected lodge in the Zone. Adon then finds the buried Temple of Ba’at beneath the Bank of Achora construction site, where Ba’at demands restoration and later withdraws when Adon says he cannot save the temple alone. The middle of the novel turns from investigation into open spiritual war as Adon survives the southern highway ambush, reaches Fort Carmac, and becomes involved with Daphne and Francis Lukolna on Shatterjaw Island.
At Shatterjaw Island, Francis’s Scalpel of Rokrian draws an Azalite sorcerer who attacks the Lukolnas and curses Adon. Guinevere heals him and confesses her fear that Arborist ritual and realignment have been corrupted. After Adon renews his patronage with Ba’at, a vision reveals Heather alive and changed, directing Karz and describing the true plan: Achora is not merely a city but a transformed world. Adon warns Vitorius, but OPS arrives first and compels him into custody.
Part Three: Arboraeternum
Adon wakes in the Den of the Mother, an Arborist realignment facility where he reunites with Sephret, Francis, Daphne, and Audrey Murrell. Sephret explains that the true Rites of Ikhir are meant to tear the veil and let Macix enter the world through sacrifices arranged across the Malaan. An earthquake interrupts the prisoners’ escape attempt, and the damaged Den becomes a battlefield during the Night of Rage, where Suatu militia attack, a Golu saves Adon, and an OPS Cataphract patrol kills the Golu and recaptures him.
Vitorian-aligned Marines at FOB Zarathor bring Adon into Colonel Halbar Dopf’s operation against the suspected Aksakanit lodge in the Liminal Zone. The mission crosses the Southern Wall and leads through a colioptrium and beetle hatchery into an underground complex controlled by Talmin Rafinnet, a seventh order Aksakan who has been possessing Heather. Rafinnet drains decades of Adon’s vitality before Timo, Mandi Plinkain, and Sephret interrupt him by crashing Mandi’s Cammenere Ranchero into Rafinnet’s West Nataian country house. The rescue returns Adon and Heather to Calinitia just as Tuvaku’s Nataian invasion begins.
Guinevere discovers in the cathedral art warehouse that modern blank-eyed Arborist effigies have opened prayer to a false voice, while an older statue with circular pupils lets her reach the true Netra. Guided by Ba’at, Adon finds the final ritual beneath the Bank of Achora and calls artillery onto the building, destroying the bank and collapsing the defiled temple. The Macix manifestation rises from the chasm, kills Rafinnet, and is then burned apart when Guinevere channels Netra’s godfire. Adon and Guinevere find Emilia Magnalanti at CLBC Calinitia and free her from cathedral propaganda work before boarding the Pan-Oceanic liner Aurorandia with Timo and Mandi. Adon considers returning to the war, but Ba’at tells him to stay, and the novel closes at sea as Arbordom begins to wake from Macix’s corruption.
Publication
Calinitia Dreaming was published by Askari and released on March 15, 2025. The Askari listing gives the length as 493 pages.