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Zane took a breath. ‘Ready for this?’

Xion, who’d been playing cards with Killen and Ki’Remi at the far end of the room, called out. ‘Hell yeah. It’s killing me to know more.’

The three men joined Zane, Riv, and Élisa on the long couch, settling in for what Zane had to share.

He faced them with an evident heaviness. ‘It’s a wild tear. Remember when we thought he’d died from his injuries on the crats’ ship and they took away his body? Well, the crats reanimated him and continued their tests on him in secret. Meanwhile, we escaped without him, unaware he was still alive.’

‘He was tortured for a few more years, where they played with entity absorption experiments on his body. They hooked him up to the psi-rene creatures and unknown souls. They utilized immense psionic power to render his body into a single biological vessel for other entities. He was caught in a psionic vice with mortals and a series of unknown entities, where the wills and whims of these dark deities and lords battled to control his mind.’

Xion cursed. ‘How did he leave the crats?’

Zane shook his head. ‘Not sure why they let him go. He may have become too powerful for them to risk his enmity. The Technocracy released him, but only after feeding him lies that his friends had abandoned him. He fled to Rhesia, where he reinvented himself and started plotting his revenge on us. Every attack on us from the Klastsch was his design. He was using them. To accomplish his goals. The rest, you know.’

Riv leaned forward. ‘Talk to me about the evil demi-urges he was infected with? Where are they now?’

Zane jerked his chin at him. ‘The Shard guide claims it eliminated and absorbed them all. They’re gone.’

Xion clucked his tongue. ‘They’d better be. The last thing we need is unleashing more darkness across Pegasi.’

‘Too right, Riv growled.

‘One more thing,’ Zane added. ‘He’s shared that Sax is still alive.

‘What thefokk?’ Ki’Remi exclaimed. It was unusual for him to swear, but then again, Sax had been his closest friend in the Squad.

When Élisa gave Riv a questioning look, he explained. ‘Sax is the last Rider, whom we thought lost to the crats. We’ve never spoken of him again because of how much pain it was to admit he’d passed, or so we thought.’

‘According to Kisan, he was released with him. But they parted ways soon after, unable to handle the trauma between them,’ Zane continued. ‘He’s also the only one who knew that Kisan was alive and was going by the name Ankis. Many years later, Kisan found Sax on Prism XII, where he believes the Rider still resides in a monastery. He tried to get Sax to join his crusade to exact revenge on the Sable Group. Sax refused, and Ankis almost killed him before the Prism cannons drove him away.’

‘What a freakin’ tragedy,’ Élisa whispered.

‘We all got had our shit kicked by the crats in a series of devastation,’ Xion drawled. Yet rage laced his casual tone.

‘The crats are the nightmare that keeps giving,’ Ki’Remi added.

A long silence fell over the party as they absorbed the tragic account.

Killen stirred. While Zane had been speaking, he’d risen from his chair and stood at the viewscreen.

He focused outside, his eyes reaching into the expanse, racing past stars and streaking celestial bodies. ‘You’ll hear no more of them.’

The group stared at him, jolted by his quiet, prescient words. Although spoken in a low timbre, they reverberated with a powerful rage.

‘They’re gone.’ He turned around, his silver eyes glittering and his hawkstone glowing brighter. ‘Never to return.’

With that, he stalked to the door of the quarters. ‘Good night, family.’

As he exited, Xion rasped, his face screwed up in confusion. ‘Did he foresee the end of the crats or just make it happen?’

Zane gazed outside and pursed his lips. ‘Not sure. I’d need to send a psi-probe to check, but not tonight. I’mfokkin’ exhausted after my earlier efforts. That said, Riv, Élisa, your son is a perplexity. I don’t think we have any clue just how potent or seismic his abilities are.’

Élisa nodded. ‘He’s got a calling on him that we do not yet understand.’

She tracked her son’s departure with a rueful smile, her heart caught between pride and worry. He was becoming the embodiment of a trueKírígaand a King worthy of his hawkstone. Even his shoulders looked much broader as if he was filling out into the intricate mantle they’d been purposed for.

She held back tears as she thought of how she’d soon have to let him go to follow his path.

Riv must have sensed her distress because he reached for her hand and pressed it against his lips. Giving her instant calm as only he could. ‘Time will reveal all, but right now, all time says is that we all need some good night’s sleep.’