My heart surges in my chest at that. Incredible. Impossible. The thought crackles between us as Saedii’s eyes widen—that maybe somehow, against all odds, the man who destroyed the Syldrathi homeworld is …
“Gone?” she hisses in Syldrathi, incredulous. “Dead?”
There’s a reply in the negative. I catch words like confusion and retreat. A rush about Terrans and Betraskans and—
“Void take you, Erien, speak!” Saedii demands.
The First Paladin asks forgiveness, speaks again. And as Saedii’s eyes meet mine, I hear three words. Words that send my thumping heart all the way down to my boots. Words that could spell the end of everything.
Starslayer.
Weapon.
Vanished.
4
TYLER
I’m sitting in a briefing room with thirteen Unbroken warriors, and the only thing I’m certain of is at least twelve want to kill me.
Honestly, I’m still not sure about Saedii.
When I insisted she bring me along to the meeting of her command staff, I thought for sure she’d tell me no. I’m technically a prisoner here, after all. An outsider. An enemy. She told me to stay in bed and rest.
“I’m half-Syldrathi myself,” I’d reminded her. “And I know more about the true enemy here than anyone. The Unbroken are being played, and I know the tune. Bed is the last place I want to be right now.”
She’d watched me thoughtfully, wiped my blood off her mouth, the memory of that … kiss/fight/whatever we just had still hanging between us. I can still feel her body pressed up against mine if I try. We both knew my line about bed was only halfway true… .
“This is not some Terran pleasure ship crewed by cowards and weaklings,” she’d warned. “This is an Unbroken war cruiser. The crew will view you with disdain at best. Murderous hostility at worst.”
“I didn’t know you cared, Templar.”
Her eyes narrowed at that. Saedii is every bit the tactician I am—she could see the trap I’d laid, and there was no way she was about to admit she gave a damn about my welfare. And so she scoffed, tossed her braids, and stalked out of the room, with me limping behind.
Tyler Jones: 1
Saedii Gilwraeth: 0
The air is thick with tension in the briefing room, red light washed gray by the Fold. Holo reports from major news feeds all over the galaxy are projected on the walls, hundreds across every network, the volume turned low so the Unbroken can speak without interruption. They kneel at an oval table carved of dark lias wood, Saedii at one end, her staff around her, and her second-in-command, Erien, opposite.
I sit against the wall, sucking the bite mark on my lip.
I remember Saedii’s lieutenant Erien from my imprisonment aboard Andarael. Her First Paladin is tall and willowy, his beautiful face marred by a hook-shaped scar beneath one eye. He wears a string of severed Syldrathi ears at his belt. Around him are a mix of battle-scarred veterans and young bucks full of fire and fury. They’re all heavily armed and dressed in beautiful black armor decorated with sleek Syldrathi glyfs. Their hair is fashioned to denote their rank—the more braids, the more authority they carry. Each smooth brow is marked with the sigil of the Syldrathi warrior cabal: three crossed blades.
The atmosphere is … odd. It’s like watching a pack of man-eating tigers hold a tea ceremony. Every word and gesture is underscored with measured hostility. I get the feeling there could be bloodshed any second, but there’s two ironclad cables binding these people together.
First, of course, they are all Unbroken.
There’s a bond forged in war that people who haven’t fought for their lives will never understand. When you put your trust in someone to watch your back in battle, when you kill and bleed together, you become more than family. And as I look around the room, that’s what I see here—people who are more than blood, the ties that bind them forged in the fires of a lifetime of war.
And second, of course, there’s Saedii herself.
I can tell every one of the Warbreed in this room loves her. Hates her. Fears her. Worships her.
Even if she weren’t the daughter of the Unbroken’s greatest Archon, I’ve seen Saedii in battle now—ship to ship, and hand to hand. And I know she didn’t get her seat at the head of this table because she’s Daddy’s little girl. She got it by moving whoever was sitting there before her.
When we walked into the room together, twelve sets of eyes fell on me like I was the appetizer. One word from Saedii, they got down to business. But business, as it turns out, is not good.
Like I said, I don’t speak Syldrathi as well as Scar, but I’m fluent enough to catch every few words. And listening to Saedii’s command staff speak, watching the myriad newscasts glowing on the walls around me, I’m beginning to piece together exactly what happened at the Battle of Terra.
A massive Unbroken fleet, bigger than anything that has been seen since the fall of Syldra, massing outside Terran space.
The Terran navy mustering in response.
The Betraskans stepping in to help defend their Terran allies.
Archon Caersan demanding the return of his daughter.
Now, for two years, Earth had tiptoed around the Unbroken. Our last war with the Syldrathi had lasted two decades, and we’d been so desperate to avoid another, we even turned a blind eye when Caersan destroyed Syldra’s sun.
But TerraGov didn’t even know the GIA had Saedii in custody—the Ra’haam had taken her prisoner to start trouble, after all. So they couldn’t exactly comply with the Starslayer’s request to give her back. Instead, they politely asked him to vacate their doorstep or eat a fleet to the face.
Caersan didn’t like that.
I’m watching footage of the battle now, my heart surging every time I see it—a massive spear of crystal, rainbow-colored, big as an entire city. As the Unbroken, Terran, and Betraskan fleets clash, it cruises through the bloodshed like a shark, pulsing with energy. The newscasts are labeling it an “Unbroken superweapon.” But from what Saedii told me aboard the Kusanagi, I know it’s not a Syldrathi device at all.
It was made eons ago, by the beings who fought the Ra’haam the last time it tried to consume the galaxy. The Ancients, the Eshvaren, who’ve somehow been behind everything that’s happened since I pulled Auri out of that cryopod what seems like a lifetime ago.
My heart aches at the thought of her. I wonder where my sister and the rest of Squad 312 are, praying to the Maker that they’re okay, that they didn’t get caught up in this insanity. But as much as it hurts to push all that aside, truth is, we’ve got bigger problems. Because time and time again, I watch it unfold on the feeds—the Weapon, the Neridaa, the one hope the Eshvaren left for the galaxy to fight the Ra’haam, flaring like a new sun in the middle of the battle, sending out a blast that disables half the ships around it, and then …
Disappearing like it had never been.
Nobody knows what happened. Why it vanished or where it went. But the Starslayer’s disappearance, combined with the burst of force that accompanied his weapon’s departure, put the brakes on the battle.
The Unbroken paused their attack. The decimated Terran and Betraskan fleets fell back into defensive posture. And after a few more hours of tense standoff, the Unbroken bounced back through the FoldGate and right out of the system.