KALLUM
Torek.
The name burned in the center of the holographic display, surrounded by encrypted data streams and partial coordinates.
Names. Locations. Fragments of the Sovereign’s contingency plans, scattered across the sector like seeds waiting to sprout. Details of a hidden cache of supplies that might give us more of an edge in the final fight.
And one ghost from my past.
The war room hummed with tension. All of us gathered around the holo-table, watching the data coalesce into something meaningful.
Rylos stood at the head, arms crossed, his violet sigils dark against gray skin. Talon flanked him, one hand resting on Tamsin’s shoulder. The others ringed the table in pairs. Zarek and Bronwen. Varrick and Sabine. Brevan and Carys.
I was already standing, my chair scraping back against the deck.
“Kallum.” Rylos’s voice was sharp. “You know this name.”
“He trained me.” The words scraped out of my throat like broken glass. “Before the Sovereign recruited me. Torek made me what I am.”
Silence settled over the table. I felt their eyes on me. Curious. Concerned. I wasn’t the one who shared. Wasn’t the one who had a past anyone asked about.
Tamsin leaned forward. “Is he Conclave?”
“No.” I shook my head. “He retired decades ago. Disappeared completely. Said he was done with the shadows.” I stared at the name hovering in the display, glowing soft blue. “If he still has the fifth key... if he’s still alive...”
I trailed off. Did the math I didn’t want to do. Torek had seemed ancient when I was young, his movements still precise but slower than they’d once been. The years had worn grooves into his face like water cutting stone. Now, after all this time...
“He’d be very old,” I finished. “Very old, or dead. If he had the key,” I said, “his apprentice might know where it is. Might be protecting it.”
Rylos nodded slowly. “Then we split up. Talon, take the others to Verath. Secure the supply cache before the Conclave traces the same data we did.” His red eyes found mine. “Kallum. Find whoever Torek left behind. Find the key.”
“TheTuretsala’sfaster than thePenumbra,” I said. “I can be there in thirty hours.”
“Go.” Rylos didn’t hesitate. “Contact us when you know more.”
I moved toward the door. The others parted to let me pass. Bronwen caught my eye and grinned, sharp and knowing. Varrick nodded once.
Talon caught my arm as I reached the threshold. His grip was firm, brief. He said nothing. Didn’t need to. We’d fought together long enough that some things didn’t require words.
I nodded back and kept walking.
TheTuretsalasatin docking bay three, sleek, dark and waiting. My ship. I’d built her piece by piece over the years, trading favors and credits for parts that couldn’t be traced. Small enough to slip through sensor nets. Fast enough to outrun anything in her class. Sensor-blind hull painted the color of deep space. Whisper engines that ran so quiet you couldn’t hear them from ten meters.
Perfect for insertions. Perfect for extractions. Perfect for a ghost who worked alone.
I ran through preflight checks while the computer pulled everything Varrick had scraped from the data burst. Property records. Agricultural permits. A single name on a deed transfer three years ago.
Anhara.
Someone had inherited Torek’s farm. Someone who’d stayed.
The jump coordinates locked in. Thirty hours in hyperspace. Thirty hours to prepare myself for what I might find.
Whoever Torek had left behind, they’d been living alone on that moon for years. Protecting something. Waiting for something.
Maybe waiting for someone like me to come looking.
I engaged the drive and watched the stars stretch into streaks of light, then blur into the formless gray of hyperspace. TheTuretsalahummed around me, systems running smooth, carrying me toward answers I wasn’t sure I wanted.
