Dark Age Recap and Book Guide

The Sovereign

Virginia, better known as Mustang, gives a public speech after Atalantia destroys much of the Republic's fleet at Mercury. The Senate believed the enemy's peace offer and ordered ships back because it feared Darrow, leaving Orion's fleet too weak to withstand the attack. Millions of Republic soldiers are now stranded on the planet.

Virginia asks the public to demand that the Senate send a rescue fleet. Meanwhile, concealed supply capsules are already heading toward Mercury with medicine, military equipment and a message for Darrow. If he is still alive, she wants him to know she hasn't abandoned him.

Prologue: Blood Red

Two months earlier, Darrow is hiding among the wrecked ships above Mercury. While he was on Venus killing the Ash Lord, Atalantia ambushed Orion's fleet. He returned too late to stop her, and his army is trapped on the surface.

Before joining his soldiers, Darrow needs to rescue Orion from Atlas au Raa, the Fear Knight. Atlas has tortured her and is sending her to Atalantia, who could use her technology to search Orion's mind for the Republic's defense secrets. If the rescue fails, Darrow's team must kill Orion to protect those secrets.

Darrow is also afraid he will never see his family again. His son, Pax, is still missing. He trusts Virginia to find their son, but doubts she can persuade the Senate to save his army.

His team attacks the ship taking Orion to Atalantia. Darrow draws its guards into a fight while his niece Rhonna cuts through the hull to reach Orion. Ajax, Aja's son and the new Storm Knight, kills Tongueless, the Obsidian freed from Deepgrave. Darrow kills the Death Knight, but Ajax proves a dangerous opponent.

Rhonna gets Orion out, and the bomb she planted tears open the transport, allowing the others to escape. Colloway, their pilot, collects the survivors, then uses explosions Darrow prepared in the surrounding wreckage to shake off pursuit. They head down to Mercury with Orion badly injured but alive.

Chapter 1 — Till the Vale

Darrow visits soldiers maimed by the Fear Knight and recognizes Dago, a fellow Helldiver from Lykos. Dago gives him some soil from home, which Martian soldiers carry in case they die far from Mars. Despite their suffering, the wounded still believe in Darrow, and their support helps him face the coming battle.

His army is preparing to defend Tyche, its northern headquarters. The damaged flagship Morning Star protects the city, and an underground transport line provides a possible retreat to Heliopolis in the south. Thraxa, one of his commanders, and his young officer Alexandar are hunting Atlas, hoping to drive him into a trap.

Rhonna wants to fight with her own unit, but Darrow intends to send her to safety. With Pax missing, he can't bear to risk his brother's daughter too. She argues that joining the war was her choice and that she's fighting to protect their family.

Rhonna has also been watching Orion for him. Orion passed a psychological evaluation, but her nightmares and isolation haven't improved since returning to duty. She blames Harnassus, Darrow's deputy, for obeying the Senate's fleet recall, and Virginia for allowing it. She even questions whether ordinary people deserve to govern themselves. Darrow defends them both and insists he needs her ready to fight, though he privately shares some of her doubts about the Republic.

Chapter 2 — Annihilo

Lysander, Octavia's grandson and heir, arrives at Mercury with Diomedes and Seraphina, the children of Romulus au Raa. They have come to negotiate an alliance between the Rim and Atalantia's Core Golds against the Republic. Lysander believes Cassius died trying to prevent that alliance.

Diomedes hopes Lysander can keep Atalantia under control, but warns that the Rim won't help him claim the throne. Lysander says he wants to unite Gold and restore peace, not rule. He had hoped to negotiate with the Ash Lord, his godfather, before Darrow killed him.

Lysander remembers how fond Atalantia was of him as a child and hopes she still cares for him. Diomedes points out that his return threatens her: as Octavia's heir, he could reclaim soldiers and ships now serving her family. First, though, he would need to earn the scar of a Peerless. Lysander also hopes Atalantia can explain the strange gaps in his childhood memories.

Chapter 3 — Storm God

Darrow visits Harnassus in Mercury's polar ice, where engineers are digging out an ancient weather machine called a Storm God. Darrow and Orion are preparing seven of them to defend against Atalantia. Several are already heating the sea, though they hope the enemy will mistake that for natural activity.

Harnassus resents being kept out of the plan. The Senate appointed him to replace Darrow, but Darrow has returned and taken command. Orion still blames Harnassus for the fleet's destruction, leaving Darrow to keep them working together.

Glirastes, the engineer restoring the machines, helped Darrow invade Mercury because Darrow promised not to bomb its cities. He wants the same protection for civilians now. Darrow promises to keep the Storm Gods within a limit called primary horizon; Glirastes warns that going past that limit could cause genocide.

Virginia found the machines' secrets in Octavia's vault. Darrow hopes Atalantia doesn't know about them. At first, the machine doesn't respond, and Orion claims someone sabotaged it. Then it rises out of the ice.

Chapter 4 — Ajax, Son of Aja

Atalantia's soldiers make it clear that Lysander and the Rim visitors aren't welcome aboard her flagship. Kalindora, the Love Knight, meets them with Ajax, Lysander's childhood friend. Ajax is the son of both Aja and Atlas, making him Diomedes's cousin.

Ajax demands a blood test and asks about a childhood memory before believing it's really Lysander. Ajax finally embraces him, believing Lysander spent the missing years as Cassius's prisoner. Lysander is afraid to tell him otherwise.

Ajax then challenges Diomedes for wearing the Storm Knight's emblem. Diomedes holds the Rim's version of the title, but removes his cloak to avoid a duel. Ajax urinates on it and watches Lysander's reaction. Lysander understands that this is a test of loyalty and keeps quiet rather than make an enemy of Ajax. Seraphina steps forward, but Diomedes stops her, keeping the insults from turning into a fight.

Chapter 5 — Voyager Cloak

Darrow explains his plan to lure Atalantia's army through a gap in Mercury's shields. His elite Howler troops have planted information for Atlas to find about a vulnerable generator. If Atlas destroys it, the opening will lead the invading army onto ground prepared with nuclear mines and hidden troops. The Storm Gods are a fallback if that ambush fails.

Harnassus argues that their exhausted army can't defeat fresh enemy legions. He wants Darrow to find out whether help is coming and keep their soldiers alive. Darrow summons his Howlers to force Harnassus to accept his command. Harnassus asks him to promise that, if he has to choose, he will save their army rather than destroy the enemy. Darrow refuses, and Harnassus gives in, though he still disagrees.

Alexandar then reports that Atlas hasn't attacked the generator. Instead, a distress call has come from Angelia, a city holding evacuated civilians. Darrow sends Thraxa to investigate and prepares to join her. Harnassus is sent to Heliopolis to arrange reinforcements and take command if Darrow and Orion die.

Before Orion leaves to command the Storm Gods, Darrow makes her promise not to exceed primary horizon. Rhonna still doubts that Orion is ready to be back in command. Darrow shows her the master switch Glirastes built as a safeguard. When she asks where to find it if Darrow dies, he realizes she understands the responsibility and lets her stay beside him.

Chapter 6 — Carnivores

Lysander meets Atalantia and the leading Core Golds. They suspect he wants the throne, and he admits that he spent the last ten years as Cassius's ward, not his prisoner. Ajax is furious but initially keeps quiet.

Diomedes and Seraphina explain that Romulus died because he hid the fact that Darrow destroyed the Ganymede dockyards. The Core rulers mock his death and reject the Rim's offer of help. Lysander points out that Atalantia's damaged ships haven't returned home for repairs. He guesses that Apollonius, the warlord Darrow freed, has seized the Venusian dockyards. A ruler's angry response confirms it. Without those docks and reinforcements, Atalantia could use the Rim's fresh forces to attack the Republic while she finishes fighting on Mercury.

Atalantia agrees to negotiate, but demands that Diomedes join her invasion of Mercury as proof of loyalty. He refuses because he came as an ambassador. Seraphina volunteers instead, allowing her brother to continue the talks.

After they leave, Ajax attacks Lysander for staying with Cassius, who helped kill Aja. Atalantia lets it happen. Lysander explains that he feared returning to a court full of betrayal. He now believes Gold can defeat the Rising and change the way it rules. Ajax relents, but Atalantia says Lysander's return must remain secret until he proves himself.

Lysander understands that surviving the invasion could earn his scar and restore his inheritance. Even though it could be a trap, he chooses to trust Atalantia and volunteers to fight beside Ajax. She agrees, then kisses him in a way that makes him uncomfortable.

Chapter 7 — The Calm

Darrow reaches Thraxa and Alexandar outside Angelia. They lost Atlas after he crossed a gap in the shields, where enemy ships could fire on anyone following him. Thraxa sent Alexandar after him alone, but he fell asleep and crashed. After almost six days without rest, they were barely functioning. Darrow realizes he pushed them too hard.

Atlas has left torture victims outside the city, but Darrow thinks Atlas came for more than that. He sends the Howlers to investigate and orders Orion to start building the storm. The timing is a gamble: start too early and Atalantia may cancel her invasion; wait too long and the storm won't arrive in time to help.

Chapter 8 — The Machine

Pytha, the pilot who traveled with Lysander and Cassius, discovers that Lysander volunteered for the invasion. She says Cassius would never have wanted this for him. Lysander believes a Republic victory would lead to smaller kingdoms and centuries of war. He hopes earning his scar will make the other Golds listen to him so he can change how they rule. Pytha warns that Gold rulers respond to fear, not the respect he hopes to earn.

Kalindora is assigned to protect him. They join Seraphina and Ajax's legion, where Ajax announces a change of plan. Instead of supporting House Votum's attack on Tyche, they will seize Heliopolis and cut off the Republic army's retreat. Atalantia will also gain the city's factories and mines, even though she promised to give them back to House Votum.

Ajax dismisses warnings about the weather and tells Lysander to stay close. He still resents Lysander's years with Cassius, but wants them to avenge their families together. Seraphina is eager to fight, and Lysander begins to see her desire for war as the reason she helped bring down her father.

Chapter 9 — Angelia

Darrow finds hundreds of impaled people outside Angelia, many still alive. Alexandar wants to help, but Darrow fears Atlas has left traps around them. Inside the city, the Howlers find civilians whose bodies have been damaged by a disease and who appear to have killed one another.

At the refinery, their computer specialist discovers an old network connecting several mining cities. Atlas has used it to send encrypted commands. Darrow realizes Atlas plans to overload their reactors and cut power to the shields. They escape just before Angelia explodes, killing the people they had to leave behind.

Other reactors fail across the north. Instead of the small opening Darrow planned, almost the entire northern shield network falls, exposing millions of soldiers to bombardment. He decides an immediate retreat would leave them surrounded, so he orders a counterattack to open a route back to Tyche.

Darrow sends the Morning Star to protect the exposed First Army, leaving Tyche without his flagship. He also sends for reinforcements from Heliopolis, wrongly assuming the enemy isn't targeting the southern city. Orion's storm is about to cut off communications, so he sends his revised orders while he can. Then the nuclear bombardment begins.

Chapter 10 — The Ash Rain

Waiting to launch, Lysander is terrified. He has avoided the Mind's Eye because it makes him feel controlled by Octavia, but now uses the mental discipline she taught him to manage his fear. Another unexplained childhood memory surfaces: a black door with music and laughter behind it.

He drops toward Mercury beside Ajax in a starShell, a flying suit of heavy armor. Atalantia's fleet is already bombarding the planet. Since Heliopolis remains shielded, they must pass through the northern opening and fly south underneath the remaining defenses.

Republic guns tear into the descending army. Seraphina spots a charging railgun and warns them to scatter, while Kalindora directs orbital fire to destroy it. Lysander survives the passage through the shields, struggling to keep up with the experienced soldiers around him.

Chapter 11 — Red Reach

Darrow reaches a supply platform near Red Reach, where the Second Army is sheltering under its own shield. While his Howlers collect armor, the Helldiver Legion prepares its Drachenjägers, enormous piloted combat machines.

A nuclear bomb is heading toward Red Reach while Rhonna is still outside helping a wounded soldier. Alexandar shields her with his armor while Darrow and the others brace around them. Darrow contacts the officers at Red Reach and asks them to think of their families and Mars. Their signal disappears as the bomb destroys the base and roughly a million soldiers. Rhonna survives at the more distant platform, but many exposed workers die.

Without the Second Army, Thraxa's counterattack can't succeed. Long-range communications are down, so Darrow sends Colloway to tell her to withdraw toward Tyche. He then rallies the surviving Helldiver Legion to keep Tyche from falling, or the retreating soldiers will have nowhere to go. He finally lets Rhonna take a combat machine of her own and leads the column into the storm.

Chapter 12 — White Golems

On the way to the landing site, a town fires on Lysander's unit. He uses precision guns to avoid hitting civilians, but Ajax uses his targeting information to destroy the entire town from orbit. Lysander is already losing hope that he can change these people.

At the landing site, nearly a thousand former Praetorian guards kneel to him. Their commander, Rhone, was his childhood shooting instructor. Kalindora called them back, and Cassius's mother let the men working for her return to House Lune. Rhone calls Lysander Sovereign. Lysander rejects the title, but Ajax is furious, and Seraphina sees a betrayal of his promise to stay out of the struggle for power.

Lysander urges Ajax to stop the landings when enormous storms appear, but Ajax dismisses him. A wall of sand kills exposed troops and sends transports crashing. Lysander takes shelter beside a tank, where Ajax joins him, terrified. For a moment, Lysander forgets their rivalry and helps his old friend recover.

When the officers regroup, Lysander explains that Darrow is using Storm Gods his family secretly left on Mercury to suppress rebellions. The storms can trap the invaders and cut off reinforcements. Ajax decides to continue toward Heliopolis while Lysander's Praetorians destroy a nearby machine. Seraphina and Kalindora join Lysander for the mission.

Chapter 13 — Plains of Caduceus

With the storm disrupting enemy reinforcements, Darrow attacks the Votum legions between him and Tyche before they can organize their defenses. His troops destroy their strongest machines with nuclear weapons, then charge through the landing site.

Darrow and Alexandar reach the machine carrying Scorpio au Votum, Mercury's former ruler. Alexandar pulls him out, and Darrow kills him for murdering and enslaving people. When Alexandar offers Darrow the captured battle flag, Darrow tells him to build his own collection. Alexandar plants it on Rhonna's machine, sharing their victory.

The counterattack costs Darrow hundreds of combat machines, but his army breaks through the enemy forces and continues toward Tyche.

Chapter 14 — Into the Storm

Lysander's party struggles through the sandstorm, losing soldiers and draining its armor's power. They meet Cicero au Votum, Scorpio's son, whose troops were sent to stop Atalantia taking Heliopolis for herself.

Kalindora prepares to fight Cicero's troops, but Lysander makes a deal with him. Cicero will help destroy the Storm God, and Lysander will support House Votum's claim to Heliopolis. Cicero's soldiers join them, even though Lysander's promise goes against Atalantia's plans.

They reach the eye of the storm and see the enormous machine above the desert. Lysander fears its storms will drown the northern cities and becomes more convinced that Darrow must be stopped. As they prepare to attack, a railgun shot kills Seraphina while she is mocking Lysander for ducking.

Chapter 15 — Tyche

Darrow reaches Tyche to find giant waves drowning the city. Orion has gone beyond the limit he set and wants to destroy Mercury's surface. She thinks keeping the planet out of enemy hands is worth killing nearly a billion people. When she refuses to stop, Darrow uses his override to disconnect her from the machines, knowing it will kill her.

He turns the machines down to zero, but that doesn't stop the storm they've already created. Darrow blames himself for returning Orion to command before she was ready.

Alexandar asks to protect civilians escaping Tyche through the underground line to Heliopolis. Darrow initially refuses to risk him. Then a captured enemy scout turns out to be Screwface, an original Howler who has spent almost three years undercover. He reports that Ajax is attacking Heliopolis. If it falls, Darrow's soldiers will have nowhere left to go.

Atalantia's army is nearby, and Darrow believes he might destroy it with reinforcements. But that would mean abandoning his own army. After hearing Orion justify mass murder, he chooses to save his soldiers. He sends Rhonna to find Thraxa and the Morning Star, with orders to cross the desert using the ship as shelter from the wind. Darrow will take his own force south through the mountains.

He also lets Alexandar enter Tyche, recognizing that the young man wants to save people because he believes in the Rising. Alexandar turns down Darrow's offer of a Peerless scar, so Darrow gives him his own wolfcloak and makes him a Howler. Alexandar and his knights enter the flooding city with orders to protect the evacuation and then destroy the tunnel before Atalantia can use it.

Chapter 16 — Rider of the Storm

Lysander wakes buried in sand after his missile destroyed the Storm God. Most of his soldiers have used up their armor's power in the attack, leaving them stranded and waiting for Ajax's promised rescue.

When Rhone finally contacts Ajax, Ajax refuses to come. He sees Lysander as a threat to his own future and says abandoning him is his choice, not Atalantia's. Lysander could escape, but refuses to leave the guards who returned to serve him. Kalindora stays too, while Cicero flies away with the few followers able to go.

Darrow's army arrives, having used the storm's winds to travel south. Lysander's survivors defend the wrecked Storm God, but Darrow tricks them into leaving cover and overwhelms them. Lysander tries to attack him directly and can't land a blow. Darrow severs Kalindora's left arm, wounds Lysander and destroys his flying boots before moving on.

Falling armor pins Lysander to the ground beside a damaged thruster. Its flames burn through his helmet and into his face and eye, leaving him unable to get free.

Chapter 17 — Heliopolis

Avalanches force Darrow's army out of the mountains and across the desert. By the time it reaches Heliopolis, fewer than a third of the soldiers who left Tyche remain with him. They are nearly out of power and suffering from radiation sickness, while the city's defenders are still fighting where the enemy has broken through its walls.

Before Darrow can help, Atlas's troops ambush his exhausted escort and capture him. Atlas orders his men to sexually assault and kill Darrow on camera as a message to Virginia. The Morning Star arrives before they can carry out the order. Its gravity field lifts the attackers, allowing Darrow to fight free, and Thraxa rescues him as missiles hit the ambush site. Atlas disappears in the missile strike.

Rhonna found the First Army and delivered Darrow's orders. The Morning Star sheltered its march through the desert, and those reinforcements now turn the battle. Darrow gets fresh equipment and joins the fighting, using stimulants to keep going for hours. Ajax eventually escapes, but his army is defeated.

Darrow still wants to help soldiers stranded outside the city even as his body begins to fail. Harnassus tells him to let the others finish. The Howlers hide how badly he is hurt and help him inside, where he collapses and receives medical care. That night, his officers return with the captured enemy standards and confirm that Heliopolis has held.

Chapter 18 — Sovereign

The story returns to Virginia's opening broadcast from above Luna. Darrow's soldiers survived the battle at Heliopolis, but they're still surrounded and running short of supplies. She blames the Senate for believing the Society's peace offer and recalling ships that could have defended Mercury.

Virginia will send her own battle group and the Seventh Legion, but they cannot defeat Atalantia alone. She needs ships from the fleets defending the Republic's worlds, and only the Senate can release them. The Vox Populi has blocked her requests because its members fear the rescue would leave their own homes open to attack. Virginia asks the public to pressure their senators to support it. She also accuses the Syndicate, which kidnapped Pax, of supplying fuel to the enemy.

Privately, she worries about her missing son and the husband she cannot even be certain is alive. The response to her speech is divided: some cheer for Darrow, while others remain silent.

While she seeks those votes, help is already leaving Earth. Experimental railguns launch concealed supply containers toward Mercury, carrying equipment, radiation medicine and a message promising Darrow that Virginia will come for him.

Chapter 19 — Stiletto

Returning to Luna with Holiday, the commander of her personal guard, Virginia takes a call from Dancer. Her speech has made him look like a traitor, though she thinks he's afraid rather than trying to betray the Republic.

Dancer argues that the Senate's ability to slow her down protects the Republic from dictatorship. Even if Virginia can be trusted with more power, whoever comes after her might not be. He also fears Atalantia is using Darrow's army as bait. A rescue fleet could be destroyed away from its defenses, leaving the Republic's worlds open to invasion.

Virginia believes abandoning the army could be just as destructive. Mars might leave the alliance, allowing Atalantia to conquer the worlds separately. She offers ships from her own house and her allies, asking for a hundred more from the defense fleets. Dancer still refuses.

He also fears Virginia's supporters will kill him to stop him blocking the rescue. Darrow's followers are devoted enough to act without orders, and the Vox would retaliate if Dancer died.

Afterward, Virginia asks whether Holiday would kill him if ordered. Holiday refuses, arguing that the Republic needs both its leaders. Virginia approves and orders her people to protect Dancer. Holiday warns that Sevro could still rally the nearby Seventh Legion against the Senate, which the soldiers blame for abandoning Darrow.

Chapter 20 — Politicos

Virginia joins Daxo, her close friend and political ally, at his headquarters to organize the rescue vote. Many Lunese want their fleet kept at home, while Martians want their army saved. The Copper and Obsidian senators could decide the result, but Sefi has quietly gathered her forces on Mars, leaving Virginia uncertain of her support.

Daxo has persuaded Publius, the leader of the Copper senators, to meet them. Publius wants the army rescued but refuses to support more favors for Quicksilver. He accuses the industrialist of taking the Reds' mines and replacing workers with machines. Virginia offers to win over the Silver senators without giving Quicksilver anything more, then use her new powers to take back some of the favors he already received. Publius is interested, though he doesn't want to know how she plans to do it.

After he leaves, Daxo admits he invented a message from Darrow calling Publius the Republic's last hope to get him there. He also suggests dissolving the Senate, which Virginia refuses. She trusts his loyalty but will not give him the ruthless solution he wants.

The Vox previously stopped the fleet proposal from reaching a vote. Darrow's victory has brought enough senators around to let the vote happen, but Virginia still needs seventy-one votes to pass it. Her team has three days to get them.

Chapter 21 — Mauler, Brawler, Legacy Hauler

Ephraim survives the crash of the shuttle he used to rescue Pax and Sevro's daughter Electra from the Syndicate. Scavengers free him by cutting off his trapped leg, and he drifts in and out of consciousness while doctors rebuild it. He is also going through withdrawal from zoladone, the drug he uses to numb his feelings.

Pax visits and tells him they are on Mars. He has kept Ephraim's engagement ring safe but refuses to bring him more zoladone. Instead, Pax tells him what the Society made Trigg, Ephraim's dead fiancé, do. The Society secretly gave Trigg's squad the drug before ordering them to murder captives. When it wore off, his guilt drove him toward Ares and the Rising, hoping to make amends.

Ephraim is furious that Pax brings up Trigg. But Pax points out that Ephraim asked for drugs before asking whether Volga survived, even though he risked his life to save her. Pax keeps the ring until Ephraim begins taking responsibility for himself. Left alone, Ephraim has to face the grief he has been trying to numb.

Chapter 22 — Unshorn

As Ephraim recovers, he recognizes Olympia, the ruined Martian city where he is being held. An Obsidian shaman tells him that Syndicate men came to claim his bounty, but Sefi's warriors killed them. Now her warlord and lover, Valdir the Unshorn, is coming to see him.

Ephraim tries to escape down the fortress walls, nearly falling because his new leg is stronger than he expects. Valdir catches him. Ephraim says he made a deal with Virginia and helped rescue the children, then asks Valdir not to hand him over to Sevro. But Valdir blames him for kidnapping them in the first place and takes him back to the fortress.

Chapter 23 — Queen

On the way to meet Sefi, Ephraim and the shaman, Ozgard, watch Pax and Electra train. The exercise teaches the children how to respond to different enemies: those fighting for pride, those trying to take something, and those trying to destroy them. Pax deliberately breaks its rules and badly injures his opponents. When Sefi tells him off, he argues that the Society will not respect such limits either. It intends to enslave them again, and Sefi has weakened their resistance by abandoning Darrow. He also knows that she is keeping him and Electra as hostages, even if she treats them well.

Sefi then shows Ephraim what she wants for her people. Obsidians are learning medicine, engineering and other skills once forbidden to them. She wants an independent homeland, because she thinks the Republic still expects them to fight and die while giving them little in return.

She needs Ephraim to train her elite warriors, the skuggi, to gather information, make allies and work undercover. Valdir thinks leaving Darrow was a mistake and doesn't want his people learning to lie and trick others. Ephraim is reluctant too, until Sefi's adviser Xenophon shows him that Volga is alive. He says Sevro's wife, Victra, hired a freelancer called the Figment to kidnap Volga and Lyria so she could use them to pressure Ephraim.

Sefi offers to arrange their release if he works for her. Ephraim accepts a paid contract rather than swearing loyalty. The women will be freed in six weeks, but he has to work for Sefi for three years and stop taking zoladone. If he runs away, the skuggi will hunt him down. He also agrees to help Sefi win Pax's trust, hoping the bargain will bring Volga back.

Chapter 24 — Skuggi

Ephraim begins teaching the skuggi, led by Freihild. They already know how to fight, but he wants them to complete missions without killing everyone in their way. That means learning about security systems, keeping up with new technology and understanding people well enough to deceive them. His first lesson runs into a more basic problem when Ozgard admits that only half the trainees speak Common.

Chapter 25 — Virginia: Oligarchs

Virginia meets Quicksilver and the industrialists whose money influences the Silver senators. In exchange for supporting her, they want weaker protections for workers and more freedom to replace them with machines. She remembers giving her family's mines to the Reds, only for Quicksilver to buy them and promise the miners a share of the profits that they never received.

She refuses to give them anything more. Taking Holiday's rifle, she destroys Quicksilver's expensive sculpture and orders the industrialists to support her. Quicksilver remains unmoved and insists that the Republic needs them. Virginia answers that other Silvers can take their place and leaves without accepting their demands.

She believes the confrontation won some of them over and expects Sefi's coming move to make the others more dependent on her. But Sefi probably will not act before the vote, so Virginia still has to get enough votes without that help.

Chapter 26 — Virginia: The Goblin’s Prey

Sevro is killing his way through the Syndicate and will not speak to Virginia until he finds its Queen. Sevro has already lost three Howlers, and Virginia fears he will kill the people who could reveal who ordered the kidnappings.

Theodora captures the Duke of Hands, who arranged the kidnapping, giving Virginia a chance to question him first. Meanwhile, Publius has publicly supported the rescue, but Virginia is losing the Silver support she expected as rival crowds gather in Hyperion.

Virginia uses a psychoSpike on the Duke, a device she developed from Octavia's memory-altering technology. She questions him, erases his memory of the conversation and repeats it to test the results. He thinks she can predict his answers because he cannot remember giving them before.

She deliberately leaks where the Duke is being held to draw Sevro to her, hoping to bring him back under control.

Chapter 27 — Virginia: Pack

Sevro confronts Virginia over the Duke of Hands. He wants to torture the prisoner for the Queen's location, while Virginia wants him to stop endangering himself and the investigation. He resents Darrow for staying on Mercury, but she reminds him that millions of soldiers depend on Darrow and that she agreed he should remain.

Sevro will not explain Victra's plan to get the children back, so Virginia tells him what she thinks is happening. Sefi has them and wants Victra's ore vessels to seize Quicksilver's helium mines. Sevro confirms that Sefi threatened to kill Pax and Electra unless Victra supplied the ships.

Virginia plans to let Sefi take the mines. Fighting the Obsidians would weaken the Republic, while a homeland could give them a reason to defend Mars. She plans to move her troops aside, then negotiate fuel supplies and an alliance. Sefi could also restore the miners' income and reduce Quicksilver's political power.

Sevro agrees to follow her orders again, along with the Howlers. Virginia lets him use the psychoSpike to read the Duke's memories. They see Syndicate locations, its masked Queen and repeated images of Dancer. The program then erases the Duke's identity, though Virginia does not know whether the effect is permanent.

Sevro considers Dancer a traitor. Virginia wants to hear his explanation before acting.

Chapter 28 — Ephraim: Karachi

Over the following weeks, Ephraim's trainees learn the physical skills quickly but have a harder time fooling people. He and Pax are getting along better too. He asks the boy to keep Trigg's ring because he needs someone to answer to, and arranges for him to repair a gravBike in Sefi's garage.

Pax suggests turning the lessons into games, so Ephraim teaches the skuggi Karachi. He beats Xenophon at cards despite losing most of the hands, showing Freihild that he is reading and manipulating the players rather than relying on his cards. The lesson earns the skuggi's respect.

Freihild wants her people to recognize when others are taking advantage of them, though she still does not fully trust Ephraim. She also admits that she does not believe in spirits or prophecy herself, but keeps up the rituals because they help hold her people together.

Afterward, Pax tells Ephraim he believes Freihild and Valdir are lovers. Ephraim agrees but chooses not to interfere. Instead, he offers to help Pax prepare equipment in the garage for an escape if they need one.

Chapter 29 — Virginia: The Dust of Reverie

Darrow's mother, Deanna, brings Dancer to dinner with Virginia and Sevro so they can settle their differences. Virginia tells him the children were kidnapped, then shows him the Duke's memories. They reveal that Dancer and the Duke were lovers.

Dancer thinks she intends to blackmail him over his sexuality. He has spent his life hiding it from the prejudice of his own people. Sevro explains that their concern is the man's role in the Syndicate. Dancer knew him as Faustus, a painter, and had no idea who he really was. Sevro apologizes for assuming Dancer was involved in the kidnapping. Virginia believes the relationship was meant to make him a suspect.

She explains her plan for Sefi's mines and asks Dancer to negotiate a share of the profits for the Reds. Abandoning Darrow's army would destroy his influence on Mars, while supporting the rescue could let him help the miners.

They also consider who benefits if people stop trusting both Virginia and Dancer. Publius could win over enough people from both sides to replace her. Virginia suspects he is working with the Syndicate Queen, but still needs evidence.

Sevro destroys the device holding the intimate memories. Dancer tells them how his clan mutilated him and left him to die because of his sexuality. Fitchner, the original Ares, rescued him and helped him believe he mattered. Dancer did not learn for years that his rescuer was Gold. He eventually accepted that Fitchner deserved to be judged by his actions. He decides to trust Virginia too and promises his votes for the rescue.

Chapter 30 — Virginia: Ocular Sphere

As crowds gather for the vote, Virginia uses the Citadel's surveillance systems to try to see what is happening on Mercury. Damage and interference prevent her from seeing Darrow, but Dancer's support gives her hope of sending help.

She sends Sevro on a separate mission. From the Duke's memories, they have learned that the Syndicate Queen is in Old Tokyo. While the Senate meets, Virginia plans strikes against the organization across the Republic, with Sevro leading the attack on the Queen. The area belongs to the Wardens, who still want him arrested, so she warns him to be careful.

Daxo and his father, Kavax, visit before she leaves. Kavax has been struggling since Pax's abduction and still blames himself, but he reassures Virginia. She brought Sevro and Dancer back through patience and trust, and he believes she deserves to feel hopeful. She is moved by his confidence and the love he shows her as one of his own children. He plans a family dinner for that evening, while Daxo reflects that Kavax has shown him how to be a good father himself.

Chapter 31 — Virginia: Day of Red Doves

On her way to the vote, Virginia sees Lyria's nephew Liam. Mickey has restored his sight, fulfilling her promise. She enters the Senate expecting Dancer's support to secure the rescue fleet.

Then Sevro calls from Old Tokyo. The Queen's refuge was a trap, and the Boneriders are there despite supposedly being imprisoned. An explosion cuts off the call. Virginia calls for reinforcements but stays for the vote.

As Dancer urges the senators to work together, he and other moderate senators collapse and die. The chamber's detectors identify no cause. Publius accuses Virginia of murdering him while reports arrive of Republic forces attacking her soldiers and ships. She realizes a coup is underway.

Daxo and her allies try to get her out while Holiday fights through hostile Wardens outside. Daxo reaches the closing door and could escape, but stays with Virginia when she cannot reach him. The door closes, trapping them inside. An explosion destroys the barrier holding back the crowd at another entrance, and Publius tells the mob to attack them.

The senators defend one another, including the Obsidians who had opposed Virginia. They are overwhelmed. Virginia is beaten, stripped and sexually assaulted. She sees a woman disguised as a Red worker kill Daxo and recognizes Lilath, her brother's follower, who was believed dead. Lilath is the Syndicate Queen. Virginia is carried away by the mob, still alive, without the rescue vote ever taking place.

Chapter 32 — Darrow: In Wake

Darrow's army shelters in Heliopolis, with four million soldiers dead or missing. Only about a third of the survivors can still fight, and Atalantia has settled into a siege.

Colloway recovers Orion's body. Darrow helps carry her, but Harnassus refuses because he cannot forgive the civilians she killed. Refugees also reach the city through the tunnels from Tyche, reporting that Alexandar's knights protected their escape. Alexandar has not returned, and Darrow believes he drowned. Rhonna struggles to accept the loss. Darrow reminds her that Alexandar chose the risk and saved more than eighty-three thousand people.

Radiation poisoning now threatens soldiers and civilians alike. Most of the medicine was lost or destroyed, and Thraxa wants to save what is left for their troops. Harnassus argues that they cannot abandon the civilians suffering because of their war.

Their damaged ships offer little hope of escape. Harnassus thinks they should surrender. He expects the commanders to be executed, but some soldiers could survive as slaves. Darrow refuses and orders them to share the medicine. He still trusts Virginia to come, even though their supplies will not last a week. Atalantia then requests a conversation about his wife.

Chapter 33 — Darrow: The Devil’s Deal

Atalantia shows Darrow the recording from Luna. He watches Dancer and Daxo die and the crowd attack Virginia, without learning whether she survived. Atalantia admits she helped with the coup but implies that someone closer to him was behind it.

She offers to spare his soldiers as slaves rebuilding Mercury if he and his commanders surrender for execution. Otherwise, she threatens to destroy Heliopolis with atomic weapons. Darrow believes she is bluffing. Destroying an ally's city could threaten her coalition, and he thinks she needs his surrender to free her fleet for attacks elsewhere.

Back with his commanders, he admits they can no longer count on rescue from Luna. They have twenty-four hours to answer Atalantia. He is too overwhelmed by grief and fear for his family to judge the offer fairly, so he lets the officers decide and promises to accept their choice. Alone afterward, he holds the key Pax made him.

Chapter 34 — Lysander: Shadows of War

Lysander crosses Mercury's desert with Kalindora and other survivors. His face is badly burned and he has lost an eye; she escaped despite losing an arm. Rhone returned to rescue more soldiers and was captured by Republic troops while Lysander's group watched, unable to help.

The survivors run out of water, and many die in the heat. Lysander remembers how harshly Octavia trained him to use the Mind's Eye and notice everything around him. In his fever, he also sees a mysterious chair and a white door he cannot place. Kalindora keeps them moving until they find food and water in a crashed aircraft.

Cicero, who has joined the group, warns that they do not have enough supplies for everyone. He proposes abandoning the Grays so he can return to defend Mercury, which he believes Atalantia has sacrificed for her war. Lysander refuses. Cicero reminds him that he already let Rhone's men be captured, but Lysander will not accept that as a reason to sacrifice more soldiers. He threatens to fight Cicero if necessary, and Cicero backs down.

Chapter 35 — Darrow: Endure

Screwface takes Darrow to the beach, where wounded Martian soldiers are finding comfort in song and a shared baptism. Darrow cannot join them. He feels responsible for their suffering and regrets the time war has taken from his family.

Supply pods arrive carrying food, equipment and radiation medicine, along with a message Virginia recorded before the coup. She says Pax is with Sefi and promises to come for Darrow herself if necessary. Although the recording cannot tell him whether she is safe now, her faith in him helps him continue.

Harnassus brings the officers' decision. Publius and the Senate have ordered him to arrest Darrow and surrender. Harnassus belongs to the Vox, but he refuses to obey the people who have seized power. He says Virginia is being held prisoner. The officers reject Atalantia's offer and fire on an enemy dreadnought to make their answer clear.

They want Darrow to remain in command and bring them home. He accepts, strengthened by their trust, and calls for Glirastes.

Chapter 36 — Lyria: Victim

Lyria is alive in Victra's prison, where changing gravity, noise and light prevent her from sleeping. Victra does not believe Lyria planned the kidnapping, but punishes her for bringing Ephraim's device onto the children's shuttle. She has left Liam alone, giving Lyria some reassurance about her nephew.

Lyria stops eating and begins hallucinating. Remembering how Darrow endured captivity helps her decide to keep herself alive. She starts eating again and finds ways to block the light and noise so she can rest.

A message then arrives through the vent from Volga, who is also a prisoner. Lyria resents her for working with Ephraim and shooting Kavax, but remembers her shame after the kidnapping. She wonders whether Ephraim used them both and chooses to write back.

Chapter 37 — Ephraim: Heart of Venus

After cutting off their access to news, Sefi has Ephraim and the children brought to the Heart of Venus, a former luxury liner now carrying her soldiers. During the journey, Pax tells them about reports that the distant Obsidian tribes known as the Ascomanni have united under a leader called Volsung Fá. Atlas spent years fighting them, and Pax wonders whether his return is connected to their new leadership.

Aboard the ship, Sefi has her servant Amel killed in front of the court. She says Xenophon discovered he was spying for Golds and preparing to poison her. Amel denies it, and Valdir protests, but she trusts her adviser's evidence.

Sefi then announces Virginia's death in the coup. Xenophon corrects her: they do not know whether Virginia survived. They have reports that Publius seized power and Sevro was captured. Electra is furious that Sefi kept this from them for three days and accuses her of weakening Virginia. Pax leaves in distress, and Electra follows.

Sefi tells Ephraim that Victra has supplied the ore ships needed to move her troops in exchange for Electra's release. She plans to seize Cimmeria's helium mines and give her people a homeland of their own. Valdir wants to attack directly, but Sefi does not want to destroy the place she hopes to rule. She asks Ephraim whether his skuggi can disable its defenses first. Frightened by Amel's execution but encouraged by Freihild, he agrees they can.

Chapter 38 — Lysander: The Horizon

Lysander's infected wound is making him too weak to keep up. Kalindora helps him walk and shares water while they talk about the Mind's Eye. He explains that the training lets him focus so deeply he can act without having to think through each movement. He can sometimes reach that state when he wants to; Octavia could do it whenever she chose.

When another sandstorm approaches, the group runs toward a wrecked bomber. Kalindora tries to carry Lysander with her remaining arm, but he tells her to leave before they both lose their chance of reaching shelter. Unable to make it to the aircraft, he shelters in the burrow of a hydra, one of Mercury's large predators.

Chapter 39 — Lysander: The Mind’s Eye

The hydra has already eaten and leaves Lysander alone through the storm. At the bomber afterward, he finds evidence that his companions reached it and that Republic troops followed. He concludes Kalindora has been captured. Exhausted and alone, he questions the ambition that led him to betray Cassius and return to war.

A man he cannot see warns him that assassins are coming. The stranger wants to see the Mind's Eye in action and refuses to rescue him. Seven Golds arrive, led by Ajax's bodyguard Seneca, who confirms that Ajax ordered his death. They followed his tracking implant.

Lysander tricks them into uncovering their faces, then sets off a blinding flash from the bomber's munitions. Blinded himself, he uses the Mind's Eye to combine his memory of their positions with sound and other senses. He defeats the other attackers with help from the observer, who stops one trying to escape. Seneca badly wounds Lysander before Lysander kills him.

The observer reveals himself as Apollonius. He wants Lysander to teach him the Mind's Eye and join him against Ajax, Atalantia and Atlas. Lysander refuses. He has no proof that Atalantia or Atlas helped Ajax plot against him, and he still thinks the Golds need to stick together.

He removes the tracker and gives it to Apollonius, who lets him gather supplies and leave. Lysander continues north with his sight badly impaired, having rejected the alliance.

Chapter 40 — Ephraim: Kjrdakan

Ephraim fears that attacking the mines directly will kill the people Sefi wants to rule. Pax argues that she could still become a useful ally if she treats the Reds well and trades with the Republic. Ephraim also tries to comfort him after the news from Luna. He wants Pax to survive and grow old. Sefi told him to earn the boy's trust, but he realizes he now cares about Pax himself.

Sefi chooses Ephraim's plan to sneak into the mines and invites him to a ceremony where commanders bet on whether they will win. They can risk their honor or their lives; those who stake their lives will be executed if the campaign fails.

Valdir and other officers show little confidence in the plan. Insulted, Ephraim abandons his cautious wager and stakes his life, then regrets letting his pride decide for him. Sefi matches him, putting her own life behind his methods. The skuggi will carry out the infiltration without him.

Chapter 41 — Ephraim: Obsidian Rising

Approaching Mars in one of Victra's ore haulers, Ephraim accidentally eats Ozgard's spirit berries, mistaking them for walnuts. He begins hallucinating as Sefi's troops prepare to land.

Below them, the mine defenses fall silent. Freihild and the skuggi have succeeded, allowing the army to approach. Ephraim feels relief and pride. He thinks about how the Republic has used the Obsidians without giving them a home, and how he has taken advantage of Volga himself. He wants Sefi's people to succeed.

Still intoxicated, he ignores Ozgard's instruction to stay aboard. He takes gravboots and what he thinks is a rifle, then jumps after the troops. He lands among security robots and discovers he is holding a mop. Sefi and Valdir land behind him as the fighting begins.

Chapter 42 — Lysander: A Chorus upon the Pale

Lysander reaches greener country and rests at an abandoned farm. He briefly considers staying, but feels responsible for his soldiers held in Heliopolis. He still wants to believe he was right to return, and that he can change the Golds and bring them together.

Continuing toward Erebos, he finds the city flooded after its dam broke. Outside it, Atlas's Gorgons have impaled hundreds of Martian prisoners. Their cruelty horrifies him. This is not the Atlas he remembers as his father's friend.

Lysander gives a dying Red water and kills him at his request. Another prisoner draws him toward a hidden trap, and his attempt to escape leaves him caught in a net. The Gorgons arrive and mistake him for an unscarred Republic Gold. The unusual quality of Cassius's razor makes them suspicious enough to take him to Atlas rather than leave him there.

Chapter 43 — Lysander: The Enemy

Lysander wakes chained in a mountain cave with the Gorgons' prisoners. Alexandar is among them, alive but badly tortured after the rescue at Tyche. Lysander recognizes his cousin, but Alexandar does not recognize him.

Using an old alias, Lysander introduces himself as Cato au Vitruvius and pretends to be a Mercurian engineer. Alexandar protects him from the suspicions of the other prisoners. Lysander then tells them that Heliopolis still stands and Darrow's army is defending it, pretending he heard the news from someone else. Alexandar takes the news as a reason to keep trusting Darrow to rescue them.

Chapter 44 — Ephraim: Hunt of the Last Light

Sefi has captured the mines, though thirty-five thousand Obsidians died fighting their security robots. Ephraim survived because the machines did not consider a Gray holding a mop a threat. He also receives a ship as part of his contract and names it Snowball for Volga. It has a tracker, and the children are forbidden to approach it.

He takes guests to Sefi's ceremonial ice-drake hunt. When it is her turn to kill the drake, she cannot draw her bow. The animal threatens her and Pax, who is riding behind her on a griffin. Freihild distracts it while Valdir helps Ephraim get a rifle, even though guns are forbidden on the hunt. Ephraim kills the drake, and he and Freihild are celebrated for saving the queen.

Pax claims he failed to keep the bowstring warm, but Ephraim doubts that explanation. Neither Pax nor Ozgard will help him understand what happened.

At the feast, Ephraim feels accepted and wishes Volga could share it. The mines are providing jobs and profits for Reds, and Sefi's troops are driving back the Red Hand. He begins to see a future there, though he warns Valdir that his interest in Freihild is obvious and could damage his relationship with Sefi.

Chapter 45 — Ephraim: Nightgaze

Ephraim takes Ozgard and Freihild to the ruined Valkyrie Spires for a ceremony. Freihild admits she and Valdir are lovers. She wants Sefi to release him, but Ephraim warns that losing him would weaken the queen after her failure at the hunt. Freihild decides their people must come before her own wishes, then goes to gather nightgaze flowers.

Ozgard admits that the stories about his sacred powers and most of his prophecies are inventions. Abandoned as a child, he was raised by a hermit who taught him to use people's religious beliefs to control them. He used those skills against rival shamans before coming to believe Sefi could end the constant wars between Obsidian tribes.

Even so, Ozgard insists he had a true vision of a red-stained griffin and a gray fox on Mercury. He believes Sefi will unite Obsidians and Reds, with Ephraim protecting their kingdom. Ephraim remains skeptical and says he will leave when Volga is freed, but he envies Ozgard's sense of purpose.

When Freihild fails to return, they find her mutilated body. An enormous pale Obsidian ambushes Ephraim, while his followers capture Ozgard. The giant crushes one of the shaman's hands and destroys an eye, then gives Ephraim Freihild's partially eaten heart to carry to Sefi. He says Freihild's strength is now his and announces that he has come to challenge Sefi's rule over all the Obsidians. His followers call him Fá.

Chapter 46 — Ephraim: Whirlpool

At Freihild’s funeral, Valdir accuses Sefi of having her killed out of jealousy. He refuses to believe Ephraim and Ozgard’s account of Fá. Pax also wonders how raiders from the outer system reached Mars without anyone noticing, though he does not know who helped them.

Valdir then attacks Sefi’s griffin aerie, killing guards and mortally wounding her griffin. Sefi has him imprisoned. When a test reveals drugs in his drink, she blames Ozgard and removes him from her council, despite his denial. Xenophon is the only one of her closest advisers still in favor.

During the confrontation, Valdir accuses Sefi of clearing the way for Volga to become queen. Ephraim demands an explanation, and Sefi reveals that she is dying from a poison she says came from Atalantia. Xenophon’s medicine slows it, but she has no cure. Missing a dose during the hunt left her too weak to draw her bow. She says the poison is contagious, which is why she kept Valdir at a distance and allowed his relationship with Freihild.

Volga is the daughter of Sefi’s brother Ragnar. She was born in a Grimmus breeding facility, and Victra’s DNA test revealed who her father was. Sefi wants her to inherit the kingdom, hoping loyalty to Ragnar will hold the tribes together after her death.

Ephraim realizes Sefi never intended to give Volga her freedom. She wanted him to persuade Volga to stay. He refuses to help put the woman he considers family at the center of another struggle for power.

Chapter 47 — Lyria: They Are Sleeping

Lyria is beginning to enjoy Volga’s letters, even though she still resents her part in the kidnapping. Volga writes about her childhood in a laboratory and the life she hopes to have when they get out.

Then the woman who captured Lyria arrives with Julii guards. She calls herself Fig, though Volga knows her as the freelancer Figment. Fig tells them Ephraim has arranged their release and one of Sefi’s ships is coming for them. As they leave their cells, Lyria discovers they have been held aboard Victra’s warship, the Pandora.

Fig catches Volga trying to escape her restraints and binds her more securely. While the prisoners are taken to wash, a guard blames Lyria’s supposed political allies for Virginia’s death. Lyria knew nothing about the coup and is horrified by the report.

In the shower room, she hears something cutting through the wall. A section opens, sealed by a membrane that keeps the air inside. Lyria calls Fig as strange bodies begin dropping through the opening. They appear to be asleep.

Chapter 48 — Lyria: Monsters

The intruders have crossed space without suits. Fig shoots the first one to wake, but before the guards can deal with the others, the lights and gravity fail. The creatures attack, moving easily through the darkness and slaughtering the guards.

Lyria reaches Volga and cuts the cable binding her. Fig realizes the attackers’ bodies can survive in the vacuum of space and that drugs are driving their frenzy. They begin chanting Fá’s name.

Fig blows open the hull to throw the attackers into space, then crawls away without helping the prisoners. Clinging to the edge of the breach, Lyria catches Volga before she is lost in space. Volga climbs up Lyria’s body toward the opening, then catches her when Lyria loses her grip. Outside, hundreds more creatures are cutting into the ship.

Volga pulls them inside before the Pandora’s armor seals the opening, but the room has almost no air. She points toward a dead captain and passes out. Lyria pushes herself toward his body.

Chapter 49 — Lyria: Run

Volga wakes with Lyria holding an oxygen mask to her face. Lyria remembers little of how she kept them alive, but air has returned to the room. They arm themselves and follow Fig’s blood trail, hoping she knows a way off the ship.

They reach a group of defenders just as Fá arrives. He recognizes Volga, calls her by name, and kills the soldiers in her honor. Volga has no idea why he knows her. She identifies his followers as the Ascomanni from the outer dark.

Lyria and Volga escape when the gravity suddenly increases, weighing Fá down. Victra has retaken the gravity controls, but she cannot hold the ship. She orders everyone to evacuate before it is flooded with nerve agent.

Volga finds Fig hiding nearby and drags her out. Fig fights back, but Lyria forces her to stop at gunpoint. They still need her help, and she still needs to deliver them to Sefi to collect her payment.

Fig knows of a hidden escape craft beneath the bridge. When she hears that Fá recognized Volga, she says Xenophon’s name without explaining the connection. She agrees to lead them out after collecting her belongings.

Chapter 50 — Lyria: Parasite

Fig collects her pack and a black orb, then leads Lyria and Volga to Victra’s private escape craft. Victra is already aboard with her guards and punches Lyria unconscious when she arrives.

Lyria wakes during an attack on the fleeing ship. Victra is pulled through a hole in the hull, while Lyria’s seat seals around her to protect her from the crash.

The wreck lands beside a fjord in the northern Martian highlands. Lyria finds Volga alive and helps her out before their section falls into the water. They search the remaining wreckage for supplies and other survivors.

Lyria discovers Fig dying from her injuries and tries to comfort her. Fig grabs her wrists, and a tiny metallic creature emerges from Fig’s nose and forces its way into Lyria’s. Pain spreads through Lyria’s head and spine, and her vision changes so she can see heat and the organs inside Fig’s body.

A voice inside Lyria’s head tells her she is now Figment, then warns her not to report for duty. Fig dies without explaining what she has passed on.

Chapter 51 — Lyria: Jade Witch

Lyria keeps the creature in her head secret. When Volga takes Fig’s eyes to prove she is dead and collect Quicksilver’s bounty, Lyria worries what her friend might do if she knew.

A strange sound leads Lyria to Victra, trapped beneath a fallen tree. Still angry about her imprisonment, Lyria picks up Victra’s dropped weapon and fires beside Victra’s head. Volga takes it from Lyria, refusing to let her hurt a pregnant woman.

Victra confirms she had arranged to return them to Ephraim. Lyria refuses another bargain with him and leaves alone, while Volga stays to free Victra from the tree. But Lyria soon recognizes an approaching Red Hand ship from the attack on her family’s camp. She goes back to warn them, and the three hide in the forest.

Among the attackers, Lyria spots the woman who killed her brother. Victra identifies her as Harmony, the Red Hand’s leader and the woman who betrayed Fitchner. Volga offers to shoot her, but the shot could reveal their hiding place and bring the ships down on them. Lyria refuses to risk Volga and Victra’s unborn child for revenge.

Victra admits her rescuers will not find them in time. The Ascomanni seized the Pandora’s guns and attacked the escaping ships, forcing her to turn off their beacon. They need to find another way to contact her people.

Chapter 52 — Ephraim: Pale Rain

Ephraim sees news of the Pandora’s capture by ships wearing Sefi’s colors. The attackers have dropped bodies over Agea, and the Republic blames Sefi. He suspects Fá is trying to start a war and fears Volga is dead.

The children are about to become even more valuable hostages, so Ephraim starts their escape. He causes a distraction, sends the Snowball toward them on autopilot, and disables their armored guards with a powerful magnet. But the magnet also tears hidden devices loose inside his own body.

Pax catches him before he collapses. The children have escape harnesses connected to a cable, which they lift with a balloon. The Snowball catches the cable and pulls them aboard, with Pax holding on to Ephraim.

Electra treats Ephraim while Pax flies. They discover that someone implanted a tracker in his leg and a heartspike that could kill him remotely. Ephraim blames Sefi for keeping that control over him the whole time he worked for her.

Pax refuses to return to another Republic fortress and wait for adults to act. He wants to search northern Mars for Victra, and promises they will look for Volga too.

Chapter 53 — Virginia: Pandemonium

Virginia is alive, but she is a prisoner. Her interrogators use Octavia’s Pandemonium Chair to search her memories for military secrets and the locations of her allies. She resists with false memories Daxo’s specialists planted before her capture, but knows her defenses will eventually fail.

Her captors bring her into a courtroom, where a psychoSpike prevents her from moving or speaking. It also forces her to smile while she watches a broadcast of her supporters being executed. Theodora is crushed beneath the Obelisk of Ares, followed by Alexandar’s mother and other prisoners. Virginia cannot even show her grief.

Publius admits he arranged to have Pax kidnapped so he could force Virginia to step down. He claims he would have returned the boy afterward. He now plans to use terror to force people into the equal society he says Virginia failed to build.

Publius thinks he has used the Syndicate and can get rid of it. Virginia believes Lilath is still controlling him. Publius tells her she will be found guilty that day and executed the next.

Chapter 54 — Virginia: Justice of the Meek

Publius and the Vox judges begin Virginia’s trial, accusing her of treason and Dancer’s murder while the psychoSpike keeps her from answering.

The broadcast cuts out as Lilath and the Boneriders attack the courtroom. They kill the guards, and Lilath removes her disguise. Publius is stunned to discover the woman who helped him take power is Gold.

Lilath accuses him of trying to have her killed. After she murders a defiant senator, Publius gives in and lets her put a collar on him. The other surviving judges are forced to do the same.

Then the Boneriders bow to a boy of about ten, whom Lilath calls her Emperor. He makes the judges eat the murdered senator’s brains, promising them power if they obey him. Virginia recognizes his face and voice, and he greets her as his sister.

Chapter 55 — Virginia: The Wolf and the Mother

Sevro, Pebble and Clown are brought in as prisoners. Virginia can speak again and tells them the boy is a clone of Adrius, her brother, the Jackal.

Before his death, Adrius left Lilath DNA and instructions for a replacement. She carried the child herself and raised him using Adrius’s recordings. He has learned to act like the Jackal, but he does not share the original man’s memories.

The boy says he planned the coup and will rule through Publius. He intended to kill Pax to earn his Peerless Scar and sell Electra to Julia au Bellona. Sefi stopped that plan when she took the children. He says Atlas and Atalantia have been working with Lilath without knowing he exists. He also reveals that the birds around the Citadel have been spying for him, explaining how Virginia’s private conversations reached her enemies.

When Sevro threatens him, the clone has captured Howlers burned alive inside an iron wolf while their friends watch. He then threatens to erase Sevro’s memories of Victra and their daughters. Sevro keeps trying to reach him until the Boneriders beat him unconscious and drag him away.

Virginia tells the child he is only copying Adrius and demands that he kill her and the other prisoners, but he refuses. He wants her beside him and offers her a chance to rule with him.

Chapter 56 — Virginia: A Maze with No Center

Niobe’s fleet reaches Luna and begins fighting the Vox ships. Virginia knows her allies are losing ships the Republic needs against the Society, so she looks for a way to escape.

The clone wants someone who can match his intelligence. Virginia gets his attention by solving puzzles, then talks him into taking her to her old office to see ones Adrius made. Lilath has taken them, but the boy orders her to put them back.

Alone with Virginia, he explains that Lilath told him the coup was the only way he could safely meet her. He wants her approval, yet casually plans to kill Lilath just to experience something new. When Virginia compares his need for her approval to Adrius’s need for their father’s, he decides Virginia will eventually have to die too.

Virginia thinks she could win enough trust to save Sevro and the other prisoners, but it would take time her fleet does not have. She offers to share her memory research instead. From his answers, she thinks he has not yet learned how to erase a mind.

As he comes closer, she offers him a night lily from the table. He takes it in his hand.

Chapter 57 — Virginia: Black Cathedral

Virginia designed the night lily as a hidden weapon. Its spines poison the clone’s hand, making him drop his datapad. She picks up the flower and his datapad, crawls toward the wall and switches off her psychoSpike. One of the puzzles she had returned lets her open a hidden door to an escape chute.

Lilath catches Virginia before she can get away, breaking bones and cutting off an ear. Virginia throws the flower into Lilath’s face and escapes while Lilath cuts away her poisoned nose. The flower also pricked Virginia’s finger, poisoning her too. In the bunker below, she removes parts of three fingers to stop it spreading.

She contacts Kavax through the emergency network and tells him where Sevro and the others are held. She is too badly hurt to go back for them. She leaves through an escape tunnel, where Holiday’s troops rescue her and get her aboard the Reynard.

During her recovery, Virginia learns that her allies do not know where Pax, Electra or Victra are. Darrow’s army is still holding Heliopolis, but their fleet cannot get his soldiers off Mercury safely. The Rim’s secret alliance with the Core also leaves them vulnerable to attack on the way to Mercury.

The teams sent to rescue Sevro are no longer answering, and attacking directly could get the prisoners killed. Virginia accepts that they must retreat to Mars, where they can still defend themselves. She cannot keep her promise to come for Darrow. Kavax tells her he has already sent someone else to bring him home if Heliopolis falls.

Chapter 58 — Darrow: Sevro’s Palace

Glirastes is building a weapon aboard the Morning Star that will send out an electromagnetic pulse, or EMP, to disable Atalantia’s ships long enough for Darrow’s army to escape. He resents Darrow for the destruction of Tyche, but wants the army off Mercury before another city is lost.

To keep Glirastes working, Darrow also has to give him what he wants. When he insists on sardines, Darrow goes looking in Sevro’s quarters. He gets past the traps and finds Sevro’s collection of weapons and trophies, including Octavia’s bloodstained cloak and the slingBlade Darrow carried at the Institute.

Sevro has arranged pictures of his daughters and gifts from Victra where he can see them while preparing for battle. Darrow begins to understand why his friend left for Luna. Sevro grew up with a father whose war kept him away, and refuses to do the same to his children.

Darrow still disagrees with Sevro’s decision, but regrets forcing him to choose between the war and his family. If they meet again, Darrow wants to ask Sevro to forgive him. He also wants to stop shutting Virginia and Pax out of his own life.

Chapter 59 — Lysander: The Impaler

Lysander endures the Gorgons’ torture without giving up his identity, afraid Ajax will find him if word gets out. When Atlas finally returns, he recognizes Lysander and takes him aside.

Atlas also recognizes his use of the Mind’s Eye and threatens to use it against him. Lysander thought Octavia had taught no one else. Atlas then explains Ajax’s jealousy: Atalantia began a sexual relationship with him before he was sixteen and has made him dependent on her. Atlas doubts she ordered the attempts on Lysander’s life, but cannot be certain.

Atalantia now plans to kill Heliopolis’s population with a chemical weapon that will leave its buildings intact. Atlas opposes destroying a city whose people never chose to join the Republic. Lysander wants to save them and his own companions imprisoned there.

Their plan is to get Lysander into Heliopolis by having him free Alexandar’s group and bring Atlas to Darrow as a prisoner. From there, Lysander plans to turn Glirastes against the Republic and prevent the chemical attack.

Atlas agrees to risk his life, but keeps the plan from his soldiers so the escape will look real. He lets Lysander knock him unconscious. Lysander then kills the prison guards and frees Alexandar and the other knights. Still pretending to be Cato, he lets Alexandar lead them out.

Chapter 60 — Lysander: Pup One

Alexandar leads the prisoners through the caves with Atlas unconscious. The Gorgons pursue them, unaware their commander arranged his own capture. Lysander has to fight for his life alongside the men he is deceiving.

They reach a cache of gravBikes and head toward Heliopolis. Alexandar calls Darrow and reports that they have the Fear Knight. Enemy forces hear the call too and send more troops and orbital fire after them.

Darrow answers and sends artillery and aircraft to clear a route to a rescue shuttle. Alexandar rides aboard, but another prisoner, Drusilla, is hit while carrying Atlas on her bike. Her bike collides with Lysander’s and locks against it. Lysander drags both bikes into the shuttle, bringing Drusilla and Atlas aboard with him.

Darrow is there himself as the shuttle takes off. He has rescued Alexandar and captured Atlas, while unknowingly bringing Lysander inside his defenses.

Chapter 61 — Darrow: Hero of Tyche

Back in Heliopolis, Alexandar returns Darrow’s wolfcloak before being rushed into surgery. Darrow and Rhonna wait to find out whether he will survive the torture and his new wounds.

Darrow visits Atlas’s cell intending to cut off his hands. Atlas admits mutilating Alexandar. Darrow wants revenge, but stops because he fears becoming like the people he is fighting. He orders his soldiers to keep Atlas alive and follow the Republic’s rules when questioning him, hoping Virginia can eventually get the answers they need.

Alexandar survives the operation. But Darrow remains suspicious of Cato, the supposed civilian who captured Atlas and escaped with him. He keeps Cato isolated while his people investigate.

Glirastes refuses to continue the EMP project unless Darrow releases his pupil. The investigators find no military record or physical signs of military service, though they can’t check the full census. Darrow still does not know whether Cato is telling the truth. He prepares to question Cato himself.

Chapter 62 — Lysander: The Warlord and the Libertine

Lysander has kept up his Cato identity throughout treatment and questioning. The lie detector uses his earlier behavior to judge whether he’s lying, but he was already pretending to be Cato then. The identity also has a real history: Octavia arranged it for his childhood visits to Mercury, when he studied with Glirastes.

During Darrow’s interview, Lysander plays an arrogant young civilian who wants credit for rescuing Alexandar. Darrow is grateful, but doubts an untrained man could capture the Fear Knight so easily.

He would rather keep Cato imprisoned, but needs Glirastes to finish the EMP. He lets Cato move to Glirastes’s estate under guard, but Cato has to stay on the grounds and allow inspections.

Glirastes is glad to see Lysander, but keeps calling him Cato. They leave together, giving Lysander the chance to win him over.

Chapter 63 — Darrow: Unremarkable

Darrow and Thraxa still doubt Cato’s story. Drusilla has died, leaving Alexandar as the only other escaped prisoner who can describe how Cato survived. Thraxa points out the skill it took to bring Drusilla’s bike aboard the shuttle.

Darrow has already taken a precaution. Screwface implanted a monitor in Cato during his medical treatment. They will listen to his conversations with Glirastes to find out whether either man can be trusted.

Chapter 64 — Lysander: To Master a Maker

At Glirastes’s estate, Lysander keeps playing Cato for the guards and the monitor he expects Darrow to have planted. Glirastes brings him into a cellar whose walls block the device so they can speak privately.

Glirastes is glad Lysander is alive, but refuses to help Atalantia. He supported Darrow because he wanted an end to Gold’s cruelty. Learning of the planned chemical attack gives him still more reason to oppose her.

Lysander lies that he watched Tyche’s citizens drown around Glirastes’s monument. He knows Glirastes cares more about the people using his buildings than how impressive the buildings look. He warns that Atalantia will leave Heliopolis just as empty unless they act.

That night, Glirastes freezes the monitor’s readings to make Lysander appear asleep, then shows him his work. Among the models is Oculus, a spherical city designed for space. Quicksilver commissioned it before the Fall, but Glirastes says it was never built.

Glirastes also admits he is helping Darrow escape. Lysander argues that the civilians left behind will face Atalantia’s revenge. If they help overthrow the Republic instead, he promises she will treat them as loyal subjects.

Glirastes and his household accept Lysander as their Sovereign. Lysander asks them to gather supporters throughout Heliopolis for an uprising against Darrow.

Chapter 65 — Lyria: Ulysses

After two weeks in the wilderness, Lyria, Volga and Victra reach a fishing village with a transmitter they can use to call for rescue. Victra goes into labor before they can use the transmitter, forcing them to take shelter in a local man’s house.

Their host, Cormac, introduces a boy and a frightened girl called Brea as his children. Cormac is friendly, but Lyria distrusts him.

Victra initially refuses Lyria’s help with the birth. Lyria has helped deliver babies in the mines and tells Victra that needing help doesn’t make her weak. As they talk, Victra admits how her mother used a radiation leak in Harmony’s mine to turn the Reds against one another. Victra’s mother gave medicine to the Gammas first. When they kept it to themselves, the other Reds blamed them. Then she arrived with more medicine and made herself look like their savior.

Lyria explains why she stopped Volga from shooting Harmony. She wants revenge, but will not make Victra’s baby suffer for it. Victra lets her stay for the birth and accepts her warning about their hosts, ordering Volga to tie up the men.

Victra delivers a boy and gathers him into her arms. Lyria welcomes him as she once welcomed her sister’s children, seeing how much they share in this moment. Victra names her son Ulysses.

Chapter 66 — Lyria: The Julii’s Bill

Volga goes to the old base to use the transmitter while Lyria watches over Victra and Ulysses. Before leaving, Volga tells her she was made without a womb and would need an enormous amount of money to change that. This helps Lyria understand why Volga wanted the money from Figment’s bounty.

When Lyria steps outside, Brea appears at a window and cuts her hand. She holds up the blood as a warning of the Red Hand. Someone smashes the girl’s head through the window before Lyria can reach her.

Cormac and the boy have escaped their bonds. Lyria kills the boy when he attacks, while Victra forces Cormac to admit that Red Hand fighters are waiting at the base where Volga has gone. Victra kills him and flees with Ulysses as the house burns.

Lyria realizes Brea was Cormac’s young wife, not his daughter. She carries the girl out, but cannot save her. Lyria follows Victra’s tracks into the storm but eventually loses the trail.

In the morning, she turns back to look for Volga. On the way, she finds signs of a fight and a shuttle landing where Victra’s tracks end. Nearby, Ulysses is nailed upside down to a tree.

Chapter 67 — Lyria: Numb

Lyria takes Ulysses’s body down and tries to bury him, but cannot dig through the frozen ground. She carries him back toward the village, where she sees the Red Hand taking Victra and Volga away by ship.

Brea’s mother, Maeve, gives Lyria shelter. The Red Hand has been taking village girls as wives, and now holds Brea’s younger sister, Mora, with another group due to be sent to its mine. Maeve thinks the Red Hand will kill the rest of her family if she fights back. Lyria decides to try to reach the girls and her friends herself.

She retrieves Figment’s black orb from the burned house. Blood from her injured hands opens it, revealing equipment and a system that identifies the implant in her head as Figment. The implant is damaged and needs repair at a place called the Womb, but the system cannot tell her where it is.

Among the supplies, Lyria finds false teeth that give her an idea for getting into the mine. She asks Maeve to help her pose as another woman the Red Hand would want to take.

Chapter 68 — Lyria: Shh

Lyria leaves Ulysses with Maeve and lets the Red Hand bring her into the base. A fighter named Duncan persuades the man choosing wives to accept her in place of the youngest captive, whom Duncan promises to send home.

Among the other captives, Lyria reveals the false teeth from Figment’s orb. She has already put one in her mouth and tested it as a weapon. Now she pulls another molar and replaces it with a second device to show the others what to do. Most agree to take them, including eleven-year-old Mora and a woman Lyria calls Freckles. Once they are alone with the men they are forced to marry, they can attack and take their weapons.

At the mine, inspectors mistake the damaged gums for disease and miss the devices. But Freckles fears a captive Lyria calls Tails will expose the plan. Although Tails has not betrayed them, Lyria breaks her jaw to stop her speaking. She tells herself it is necessary to save the others.

The women are given drugged wine and brought before Harmony. Harmony calls forced marriage an honor and tells them they will bear the next generation of Red fighters. Lyria begins to fear that even if their attacks succeed, she cannot get them out without Victra and Volga.

Chapter 69 — Lyria: The Childwives

Harmony lets her fighters choose wives from the captives. Duncan takes Lyria, while Mora is given to a man around fifty.

Lyria needs to reach Victra and Volga before the girls begin attacking. By flattering Duncan, she persuades him to take her down to the mine’s enslaved workers with drinks for their guards. On the way, she crushes her poisonous wedding flower into the guards’ drinks.

The overseer takes the drinks and brings out a group of exhausted Obsidian prisoners, including Volga. Lyria quietly warns Volga about the drinks so she can act when the poison starts working. Neither woman reveals that they know each other.

Back in Duncan’s room, he forces himself on Lyria. She breaks a false tooth and spits its acid onto him. The liquid leaves her mouth unharmed but burns through his body. She claims she can stop it if he reveals where Victra is held. Once he gives her the jail’s location, she admits there is no antidote and muffles his screams until he dies.

Lyria takes his guns and prepares to find Victra. Outside, Red Hand fighters are waiting with Tails, who points her out.

Chapter 70 — Lyria: Thunder Bottle

Harmony has Lyria tied down and breaks her fingers, demanding to know how Duncan died. Lyria lies about hiding acid in her shoe, protecting the one false tooth she has left. Harmony recognizes her as a Gamma and dismisses the deaths of Lyria’s family in the camp massacre.

The interrogation stops when a man arrives with acid burning through him. The other captives have begun their attacks. Harmony leaves to put down the revolt, and Freckles arrives to shoot Lyria’s remaining captor and free her. She gives her real name, Vanna.

Lyria and Vanna head toward Victra’s prison because the escaping girls still need help against the armed men. Lyria’s implant lets her sense people nearby, helping them avoid patrols, though she cannot make it work whenever she wants.

In Harmony’s quarters, they find razors, Gold armor, a map to Victra’s cell and a radio. A broken transmission suggests Volga and the other prisoners are fighting back too. Vanna gets the radio working, but can’t send the message to a specific person.

Lyria considers how to ask for help without revealing Victra’s location.

Chapter 71 — Ephraim: From the Static

After two weeks searching the wreckage, Ephraim has almost given up on finding Volga. Pax keeps the search going until they pick up Lyria’s broadcast. She gives the location of the Red Hand’s headquarters and asks anyone who opposes them to help. Hearing her voice gives Ephraim reason to hope Volga survived too.

Pax wants to go immediately, but Ephraim points out that three people cannot take on the Red Hand. The Obsidians would capture the children again, and the Republic has not answered their earlier calls. With both armies close to war, Ephraim doubts either would trust the message. Pax suggests asking the people of Mars directly. They can boost Lyria’s signal so more people hear it.

Chapter 72 — Lyria: One Last Tooth

Inside the mine, Lyria sees Volga leading freed prisoners on a security feed. The poisoned drinks worked, but guards have discovered Lyria’s broadcast. She hides Vanna with Victra’s armor and weapons, then gives herself up and claims she knows something about Victra’s daughters.

The lie gets her into Victra’s cell. Harmony arrives, but gets distracted examining a dead girl’s body. Lyria uses the chance to break her last false tooth and dissolve Victra’s restraints and the lock with its acid. Victra fights through the guards and reaches the control room. She closes the mine’s roof on Harmony’s escaping shuttle, bringing it down, but Harmony survives.

Victra wants to pursue her. Lyria insists that Volga and the other captives need help first. Lyria reminds her of the girls still in danger and of Ulysses. That finally persuades Victra to help them before going after Harmony. Vanna brings the armor and razors, and Victra leads the attack.

They free the recaptured girls, including Mora, who shoots a fleeing man and keeps firing without any sign of joy. Vanna takes the girls into hiding while Victra attacks the Red Hands blocking Volga’s escape. The freed prisoners break through, with Lyria fighting beside Victra. Harmony abandons her men again, and Victra follows her into the tunnels.

Chapter 73 — Lyria: At Last, She Screams

Lyria catches up as Victra corners Harmony. Victra accuses her of betraying Ares and murdering the people he fought to free. Harmony dismisses him as a Gold. When Lyria confronts her about Ulysses, Harmony points to her own children’s deaths from a disease those in power could have cured. Lyria recognizes her grief, but cannot excuse what she has done with it.

Harmony offers a bargain. A warship has orders to bury the mine unless she calls off the attack. Victra intends to kill her anyway, but Lyria points out a pit full of pitvipers. Victra throws Harmony in, leaving her to die as the creatures attack her.

Back in the main chamber, the captives have won control and Volga is looking for a way out. She and Lyria finally embrace. Then the cameras show Harmony’s warship rising from the sea. The threat was real, and everyone in the mine is still in danger. Before the bombardment begins, ships start appearing on the scanner, answering Lyria’s call.

Chapter 74 — Ephraim: Son of the Rising

More than three hundred ships answer the broadcast. Miners, fishermen, militia fighters and other volunteers join Ephraim’s rescue fleet, with Pax piloting the Snowball. Ephraim sends the armed ships against Harmony’s warship while civilian transports approach the mine behind the mountains. The volunteers take heavy losses, but two gunboats give Pax an opening. He flies beneath the damaged warship and attacks its exposed hull, bringing it down.

The volunteers overwhelm the remaining Red Hands and free the mine. When the crowd discovers that Pax piloted the Snowball, people raise their fists and chant Darrow’s name. Ephraim sees how much they are already expecting from the boy. Victra is reunited with Pax and Electra, while Volga embraces Ephraim. This time, he holds her without pulling away. When Victra approaches him with a rifle, Volga stops her.

Later, at Victra’s estate, Ephraim apologizes for trying to make Volga as bitter as he was. She reminds him that he also taught her to survive and calls him her father. He still hides the fact that Ragnar was her biological father because he fears Fá will use that family connection to take her away.

Pax brings Ephraim a pass allowing him to leave Mars. Victra has forgiven him because Trigg once saved her. But Pax also has a recording showing Xenophon arranging the shuttle that disabled the Pandora’s sensors before the Ascomanni boarded. Pax believes Xenophon framed Ozgard and Amel. He asks Ephraim to warn Sefi in person because Xenophon controls which messages reach her. He gives Ephraim Trigg’s ring back and leaves him to decide whether to go.

Ephraim takes Volga to Trigg’s memorial. Her respect for Trigg helps him accept that the man he lost also gave other people something to believe in. Ephraim decides to return to Sefi because he believes in what she is trying to build. He won’t let Volga come with him because it’s too dangerous. He calls her his tribe and promises to be back for breakfast. Before leaving, he puts on Trigg’s ring and asks Pax to alter the heartspike they removed from his chest.

Chapter 75 — Ephraim: Grarnir

Ephraim returns to Olympia and shows Ozgard the recording exposing Xenophon. They need Valdir’s help to get past Sefi’s guards, so Ozgard gathers Freihild’s surviving warriors to free him. Ephraim goes after Xenophon himself.

He finds Xenophon watching a recorded message from Atlas. Xenophon admits he is one of the Fear Knight’s Gorgons and was sent to spy on Sefi before she became queen. Fá serves Atlas too. He was sent into the outer dark to rise within the Ascomanni and eventually lead them.

Xenophon also corrects Pax’s theory. Ozgard was framed, but Amel really was Atalantia’s assassin. Xenophon exposed him because killing Sefi too early could have sent the Obsidians back to Darrow. Atlas needed them isolated on Mars first. He expected Valdir’s assault on the mines to cause a massacre and turn the Reds against Sefi. Ephraim’s less bloody plan prevented that, so Fá will now take power through terror instead of arriving as a savior.

Xenophon offers Ephraim a place among the Gorgons. Ephraim refuses because he believes Sefi can build a better life for her people. Ascomanni enter, and Xenophon activates the heartspike he believes is still inside Ephraim. Ephraim pretends to be in pain, but a kick to the head knocks him unconscious.

He wakes beside Ozgard in front of Sefi. Xenophon accuses them of serving Atlas and plotting to replace her with Valdir. Sefi believes him and condemns them to death. Most of the warriors sent to free Valdir have been killed, and their bodies are displayed as proof of the plot. Valdir broke through the ambush, but Ozgard does not know whether he escaped.

Before the executions, Sefi addresses her war leaders and prepares to welcome a Republic delegation. Instead, Xenophon publicly turns against her. He tells them Fá is Ragnar’s father and uses their respect for Ragnar to argue that Fá should rule them. The supposed diplomatic shuttle opens, and Fá arrives.

Chapter 76 — Ephraim: He Who Walks the Void

Sefi calls Fá an impostor and orders her guards to kill him. He quickly defeats the first attackers, while male war leaders step between him and the guards raising rifles. The challenge has support within Sefi’s own court.

Fá claims to be Vagnar, the father Sefi believed dead. He produces a broken amulet that he says belonged to Alia and describes the slavery he endured. He tells the men that Obsidian queens sent them away to die, then promises to lead them into new conquests. Ephraim can see how Fá is turning their anger against Sefi. The dead male warriors she put on display make his argument easier.

Realizing Xenophon betrayed her, Sefi gestures an apology to Ephraim and Ozgard, then steps forward to face Fá in a duel. He defeats her within a minute. When the Valkyrie fight back, his supporters slaughter them. Fá tortures Sefi before the assembly, but she refuses to scream and warns that Darrow will kill him. Fá kills her, eats her heart, and takes her throne.

Ephraim manages to use a fallen guard’s blade to retrieve the altered heartspike from his prosthetic leg. Fá taunts Ozgard that Sefi’s mutilated body fulfills his prophecy of a red griffin. Ozgard destroys his remaining eye and collapses, while Fá orders his followers to sack Olympia.

Chapter 77 — Ephraim: Worthy

Obsidians are burning Olympia, attacking its people and taking prisoners. Xenophon argues that the Obsidians turned on the city because its people cheated and mocked them. Ephraim rejects the excuse. Sefi cared about people and had kept this from happening.

Ephraim switches on the altered heartspike, asks to speak with Fá, and slips it into Xenophon’s pocket on the way. Fá wants Volga as his heir. Ephraim says she drowned, but Fá smells her on him and realizes they have recently been together. He orders Xenophon to stop Ephraim’s heart without leaving a mark. They will tell Volga he died naturally, allowing Fá to replace him in her life.

Ephraim taunts Fá and demands that he watch him die. When Xenophon presses the kill switch, it triggers the explosives Pax put around the heartspike. Xenophon dies in the blast, and Ephraim is thrown across the plaza with a broken spine. Feeling Trigg’s ring on his finger, he imagines being with him again and believes he has saved Volga by killing Fá.

But Fá survives. Badly burned, he reaches Ephraim, tears out his heart, and calls him worthy before biting into it.

Chapter 78 — Lysander: A Visitor

In Heliopolis, Lysander is ready to begin the uprising. Exeter, Glirastes’s valet, has gathered loyalists while Lysander has kept up his disguise as Cato. Glirastes leaves for the spaceport and gives him the Horn of Helios, used to start the races at the Hippodrome.

Loyalist Greens replace Lysander’s surveillance feed with a recording that shows him reading. He removes his tracking implant and prepares to leave with the weapons they supplied, only to learn that Alexandar and Rhonna have come to visit before the evacuation. Turning them away would make them suspicious, but he needs to be at the Hippodrome in minutes. Lysander hides a razor and greets them, trying to keep the visit from ruining the timing of his plan.

Chapter 79 — Darrow: Bad Blood

Darrow still cannot get answers from Atlas. The evacuation is nearly ready, but Darrow is uneasy about the quiet outside Heliopolis and the gaps in the recordings of Cato. He returns to the recordings after learning Alexandar and Rhonna have gone to visit Cato.

He hears Cato speak in his sleep, repeating a phrase from Octavia’s truth test. Darrow has Cato’s DNA compared with Octavia’s blood on robes Sevro kept as a trophy. The test shows they are related, confirming that Cato is Lysander au Lune.

Darrow now understands that Glirastes has turned against him and the EMP is meant to disable his own army. He orders Harnassus to capture Glirastes, move support staff onto the ships, and have the device destroyed. He also gathers a Howler strike team. Rather than leave Alexandar and Rhonna unaware of the danger, Darrow warns them through their implants. They are to stay calm and wait for help, without confronting Lysander alone.

Chapter 80 — Lysander: Heir of Arcos

While showing Alexandar and Rhonna the estate, Lysander notices that both are suddenly trying too hard to act relaxed. When he criticizes the wealth Alexandar’s family held under the Society, Alexandar replies that Lysander’s family owned more. Lysander realizes his disguise has failed.

He grabs Rhonna, breaks her jaw, and takes her pistol. Alexandar starts to swing his razor, but stops because Lysander has the gun pointed at Rhonna’s head. Once Rhonna is unconscious, Lysander drops her and turns the weapon on his cousin.

Alexandar reminds him that Octavia had Lorn killed and recalls growing up in Lysander’s shadow. He refuses to kneel and challenges Lysander to a razor duel to decide which of them deserves to be Lorn’s heir. Lysander refuses. Saying he has no time, he shoots Alexandar in the head.

Chapter 81 — Darrow: Dark Age

Darrow reaches the estate to find Alexandar dead and Rhonna alive with a shattered jaw. He grieves for the man Alexandar had become and the future he has lost. He orders Rhonna taken to the Morning Star, then pursues Lysander with the Howlers.

Lysander escapes into the city on gravboots while Darrow tries to have the EMP destroyed. Lysander’s face appears on screens across Heliopolis, and explosions open the nearby prison camp. Darrow realizes the attack is already beginning from inside his lines.

Darrow fires missiles locked onto Lysander’s gravboots. Lysander kicks off the boots so the missiles follow them, then falls into a pool. Before Darrow can reach him, the EMP activates. Ships, weapons, armor and shields fail across the city. Aircraft fall from the sky, and Darrow and the Howlers drop with their dead gravboots.

Chapter 82 — Lysander: This Summons Legions

Lysander survives the falling wreckage, recovers the Horn of Helios and makes his way to the Hippodrome. He has ordinary boots and weapons that don’t need power, including the razor he took from Alexandar. Without functioning defenses, the Republic guards cannot hold the Gold and Obsidian prisoners. Rhone, Kalindora and the Praetorians are free.

The EMP has reached farther than Lysander expected, disabling Atalantia’s nearby forces too. He worries that Darrow will recover before they can attack. At the Hippodrome, his allies have armor, weapons and the huge sunblood racehorses waiting. Lysander reminds the Praetorians that they are trained riders who swore to serve House Lune, then asks them to help him restore the Society.

Kalindora questions his growing appetite for blood and suggests waiting for Atalantia. Lysander refuses to leave their fate in her hands. He wants a victory of his own that the Society can rally around. He offers Kalindora a razor and asks her to stand beside him. She accepts.

Chapter 83 — Darrow: Hazard Bedlam

Darrow survives his fall but is trapped by a mob in his powerless armor. When the crowd tries to crush him with a statue, he pulls his captors into its path as young local Reds rush to help. He kills his way free, thinking of the mob that attacked Virginia and Daxo even though these are different people. Seeing a terrified boy beside his dead father finally stops him.

Across Heliopolis, crowds are killing Republic soldiers and anyone thought to support them. Darrow gathers survivors and finds Thraxa burning inside her armor. Pilots he rescues put out the flames, and Darrow gives Thraxa mouth-to-mouth until she starts breathing again.

Rejoining the Howlers, Darrow realizes Atalantia’s nearby ships have also lost power. That gives him a little time before she brings in ships from beyond the EMP’s reach, but two million support staff are still trapped in the city. They cannot outrun the veterans released from the camps.

He orders his infantry to hold the southern roads while the support troops escape toward the mountain tunnels. Their few working guns go to rooftop snipers; the rest must fight with whatever they have. Darrow and Thraxa will hold the Via Triumphia. If their line breaks, they will fall back to their headquarters at the Mound, since the tunnels are too far away. The Howlers take their positions knowing they may not escape themselves.

Chapter 84 — Darrow: Meat Straw

Darrow’s soldiers build barricades and turn fences and signs into spears. Most have no weapons that work after the EMP. He places Thraxa and Red snipers above the Via Triumphia to kill Lysander if they get the chance.

Lysander arrives with hundreds of riders on the Hippodrome’s sunbloods. The snipers hit him but fail to stop him. He leads the charge around Darrow’s strongest soldiers and into the weaker troops beside them. Darrow orders his armored defenders to lie flat with their razors raised. Their armor protects them from the hooves while their blades cut down the horses passing over them, but the charge continues. Enemy infantry follows the riders into the street.

Without their technology, the Republic’s lowColors cannot match the Golds’ strength. Watching his soldiers die, Darrow thinks of the families and ordinary lives they are fighting for. Lysander’s promise to restore the Society would take that freedom away. Darrow regrets sparing him as a child, shapes his razor into a slingBlade, and charges back into the battle.

Chapter 85 — Lysander: Lune Invictus

As Darrow advances, Reds jump from the rooftops to keep the Praetorians from getting a clear shot at him. Thraxa knocks Lysander from his horse and nearly kills him. Lysander manages to get away and wound her, and Rhone shoots her too. Two Reds carry Thraxa away while Darrow breaks through the riders and badly wounds Kalindora.

The arriving Society infantry breaks the Republic line, and Darrow escapes on horseback with Thraxa. Kalindora warns Lysander that he cannot beat Darrow, but he takes her razor and leaves her with medics before riding after Darrow. Darrow ignores Lysander’s first challenge, but turns when Lysander calls him a slave.

Lysander knows Darrow is the better fighter, but believes he is the better horseman. He charges with Alexandar’s razor held out like a lance and Kalindora’s blade hidden beside his horse. As they meet, he throws the concealed weapon into Darrow’s chest. Their other blades collide and shatter, throwing Lysander to the ground with an injured arm.

Darrow remains mounted and escapes with the razor through his lung. The Praetorians think he must be dead, but Lysander knows the blade missed his heart. Lysander has failed to capture him, though he takes the hilt of the Reaper’s broken weapon as a trophy.

Chapter 86 — Darrow: Legion’s End

Darrow reaches the Mound badly wounded. The other defensive lines have fallen, and he does not know whether the delay saved the support troops. Harnassus gathers the survivors, including Thraxa and Screwface, who is carried in after losing part of a leg and being scalped. With Atalantia’s forces arriving, some of the defenders prepare to die rather than be captured.

Darrow climbs the tower after hearing what sounds like a ship. Harnassus follows and apologizes for failing to stop Glirastes. He admits he envied Darrow, but explains that he opposed him because Darrow had lost faith in the Republic and begun trying to solve everything alone.

When Harnassus asks why he still fights, Darrow imagines an ordinary morning at home, making breakfast for Virginia and Pax. That is the life he wants back. He thanks Harnassus for being his conscience before Harnassus returns to the men.

Alone, Darrow holds Pax’s key and the soil from Lykos, accepting that the people he loved still made his life worthwhile. Then Cassius appears. He is alive, and Kavax sent him to help.

Chapter 87 — Lysander: Ghost

Atalantia’s fresh troops arrive and slaughter the fleeing Republic soldiers. Lysander sees Kalindora carried away for treatment and feels guilty for leaving her to pursue Darrow. Ajax, meanwhile, finds his rescued soldiers cheering Lysander. Cicero has survived too and adds his support.

Lysander directs Ajax to the Mound but stays outside the assault, afraid Ajax’s men might use the fighting to kill him. Waiting for Darrow’s death feels strangely empty. Lysander knows he defeated a man whose army was already broken, and the victory does not prove he is the better fighter.

Then a ship blasts its way out of the Mound. Lysander recognizes the Archimedes and sees Cassius standing in its open bay. The ship disappears beneath an advanced cloak and escapes. Diomedes lied about Cassius’s death, and Darrow has survived. Lysander feels confused and relieved, and with Darrow still alive, he knows what he is fighting for again.

Chapter 88 — Lyria: Mercury Has Fallen

Victra buries Ulysses at her family’s home, then swims toward the setting sun. Electra explains the Julii mourning custom: a light on shore gives the swimmer a reason to return. She builds a fire, and hours later Victra comes back.

Volga has recovered Ephraim’s body from Olympia and wants revenge. Lyria hopes they can bury him and then find Liam. Victra points out that Lyria has already taken revenge on Harmony and should understand why Volga wants the same chance.

Darrow’s brother Kieran arrives with news that Heliopolis has fallen and reports that Darrow is dead. He says Mars cannot withstand both the Society and Fá’s forces. Fá offers to release Olympia’s prisoners and leave Republic territory in exchange for Volga. Victra reveals that Volga is Ragnar’s daughter, which would make her Fá’s granddaughter if his claim is true.

Victra refuses to surrender her, but Volga chooses to go after Kieran explains how many lives she could save. She asks Lyria to bury Ephraim and find Lyria’s family. Privately, she also hopes getting close to Fá will let her kill him.

After the Obsidian fleet leaves, Pax approaches Lyria about her implant. Victra’s doctors cannot safely remove it, but he thinks it could be repaired. Lyria still wants to find Liam. Pax offers to take over the search if she will go on a mission for him. He gives her a map of the asteroid belt and asks about a city called Oculus.

Chapter 89 — Lysander: Triumph of the Long Night

Heliopolis prepares to celebrate Lysander while surviving Republic soldiers are forced into labor camps. Darrow, Harnassus, Thraxa and a core of Howlers escaped with Cassius. Lysander keeps Cassius’s role from Atalantia, unsure where the ship went. Doctors have treated Kalindora’s injuries, but poison is killing her. Lysander believes it came from Darrow’s blade, but avoids visiting her because of the bargain he plans to make.

Glirastes turns the Triumph into a show of support for House Lune. Former Praetorians return to Lysander’s service, and he appoints Rhone his Dux, giving the Gray authority to act in his name. Atalantia gives him his Peerless scar, then privately tells him a sniper is about to kill him. She plans to use his death to win over his supporters and take the Sovereign’s throne.

Lysander offers marriage instead. Her military power and his family name could unite Gold behind them. He kneels and gives her the credit for defeating Darrow, promising he won’t try to take power from her. Atalantia agrees, and the ceremony ends without the sniper firing.

Afterward, Atalantia shows him rows of impaled prisoners. Lysander stays silent to avoid challenging her. She promises to give him back his wealth and put him and Glirastes in charge of rebuilding Tyche. She wants people to love him for repairing the city Darrow destroyed. He also begins sleeping with Atalantia.

Chapter 90 — Lysander: The Love Knight

Lysander finally visits Kalindora, who knows about his agreement to marry Atalantia. Before she dies, she wants him to understand what she actually did while serving his family. Octavia taught her to obey while she was young, and she kept obeying even when that meant killing helpless people. After everything she had done, Kalindora felt unable to leave.

In private, Kalindora admits that she and Atalantia planted the bomb that killed Lysander’s parents, on Octavia’s orders. His mother, Anastasia, was horrified by Rhea’s destruction and Octavia’s influence over him. She planned a coup with Nero au Augustus and Revus, Romulus’s father. Octavia had her killed, then used the Pandemonium Chair to erase Lysander’s memories of his mother. After two weeks in the chair, he stopped crying for her.

Kalindora begs him to stop Atalantia taking the throne. She brought him the Praetorians because she hoped he could change Gold. She advises him to trust Rhone and Atlas, saying Atlas loved his parents and never knew how they died.

Lysander leaves devastated, knowing he has agreed to marry one of his parents’ killers, but hides what he learned from Atalantia. Kalindora dies that evening. After her funeral, Lysander still returns to Atalantia’s bed when she summons him.

Chapter 91 — Virginia: Salvation or Vengeance

Virginia reaches Mars knowing that Sevro, Clown and Pebble remain prisoners on Luna. Kavax sent Cassius to rescue Darrow after Cassius escaped the Rim and reached Mars, but no one knows where the Archimedes has gone. Virginia still struggles with having withdrawn her fleet, though staying would have left it exposed to the Rim.

Mars is preparing for invasion, with Victra’s fleet among its defenses. Fá’s Obsidians have left with Volga and half the helium Sefi seized. Kavax suggests the Iron Circle, an old custom where the Sovereign flies around a world without an escort to claim its people’s loyalty. Virginia makes the flight, worried that Mars will reject her. Instead, she sees fires across Cimmeria forming a huge slingBlade, and crowds rally to her as well as Darrow.

At Agea, Kieran grants Virginia emergency command and presents her with Darrow’s original mining tool, now called the Sword of the Rising. She is also reunited with Pax. He has changed, but her fear that they will no longer know how to be mother and son eases when they hold each other in private.

They visit Ulysses’s grave at Victra’s home. Electra explains that he was buried so Sevro would have somewhere to visit. Victra wants Virginia to rescue him immediately and accuses her of abandoning him. Virginia shows Victra the injuries left by Lilath and the mob and tells her she tried to save Sevro. Victra embraces her. They both want their husbands home. Victra wants revenge if they can’t save them, while Virginia still hopes they can all be together again.

Then Pax brings news that Earth has fallen to a combined Society and Rim attack. Lysander has brought the two sides together, leaving Mars to face them.

Chapter 92 — Lysander: Graveyard of Tyrants

Lysander returns to the Ladon to meet Apollonius. After Kalindora’s confession, Lysander no longer feels he owes anything to Octavia. He won’t keep obeying Atalantia just to keep Gold united. He wants an ally powerful enough to help him escape her control.

Apollonius says he watched Lysander’s captivity and escape through drones. He also explains Earth’s defeat: Atalantia lured its fleet into a Rim ambush by pretending to retreat, while the Vox fleet stayed at Luna. The alliance Lysander helped create has cost the Republic another world.

As they talk, ships raise statues of the old Sovereigns around them. Lysander wants to take what he admires about the old rulers and build a better Society. Apollonius is willing to help for a price. He wants Lysander’s help killing Atalantia, Ajax, Atlas and eventually Darrow, along with lessons in the Mind’s Eye. Lysander agrees in exchange for his strength and military skill. Apollonius has no interest in governing, so Lysander would rule.

They shake hands, accepting the alliance Lysander rejected earlier. The restored statues once pointed toward Luna. He has turned them toward Mars.