The Cardinal wants her alive—her Termination bloodline is the instrument of their annihilation agenda, and they intend to harvest it. Every Choir operation in the Reach is another occasion demanding her power.
Remove the Cardinal.
End the Choir’s operations.
Create a world where Tanith doesn’t have to burn herself to survive.
Syrren answersmy communication request within minutes.
The intelligence runner’s words come through with practiced flatness, giving nothing away despite the unusual timing of my contact. “Scaleleaf. I understood you were engaged with the Feleth Crossing engine.”
“The engine has collapsed. The immediate threat is eliminated.” I keep my own voice flat, betraying nothing of the night’s events. “I require updated intelligence on the Ash Cardinal’s location and operational patterns.”
A pause. Syrren is calculating—assessing the deviation from standard protocol, determining whether to comply or escalate to Vaelrix. “The Cardinal’s location remains unknown. The targethasn’t surfaced since the Kharos Spire demonstration six weeks ago.”
“Then I require all intelligence gathered in the intervening period. Movement patterns of high-ranking cult members. Resource flows. Communication intercepts. Everything your networks have collected.”
“That is a significant data request. Commander Vaelrix will want justification.”
“The justification is operational efficiency.” I layer conviction into words that are technically accurate. “The Cardinal’s continued existence enables cult activity throughout the Reach. Eliminating the leadership will disrupt their infrastructure more effectively than continued tactical strikes against individual nexus sites.”
Another pause. Longer this time. “Your analysis isn’t incorrect. I’ll compile the relevant intelligence and transmit it to your position by midday.”
“Transmit it now.”
“Scaleleaf—”
“Now.”
The line carries silence for several heartbeats. When Syrren speaks again, the neutrality has acquired an edge. “Acknowledged. Stand by for transmission.”
The intelligence arrivesin fragments over the next hour—decoded intercepts, observation reports, pattern analyses that the Ashen Flight’s intelligence apparatus has accumulated without clear direction for utilization. I process each piece as it arrives, sorting relevant details from noise with the speed of long experience.
The Cardinal is cautious.
No surprise there. A cult leader who has survived for decades while expanding operations across multiple territories doesn’t do so by exposing themselves unnecessarily. The Ash Cardinal moves through proxy networks, issues directives through intermediary cells, maintains physical separation from the infrastructure that could be traced back to a primary location.
But patterns emerge.
The Cardinal appears personally for significant events—mass erasure rituals, recruitment demonstrations, occasions where theological presence matters more than operational security. Kharos Spire was one such event. The intelligence suggests at least three others in the past year, each one carefully documented by observers who did not survive long enough to report their findings through official channels.
The next such event is predictable.
The ash engine we collapsed at Feleth Crossing represented a significant investment. The Choir won’t ignore its loss. Standard cult behavior following setbacks of this magnitude involves consolidation, reassurance, demonstration of continued capability. The Cardinal will appear—must appear—to prevent morale collapse among the faithful.
When they appear, I’ll be waiting.
Tanith stirs.
The movement is minimal—a shift in posture, a change in breathing pattern—but I register it instantly, my attention snapping from intelligence reports to her prone form with instinctive speed.
Her eyes open.
Storm-gray irises focus slowly, tracking across the shelter’s ceiling before finding where I’ve stationed myself. Confusion gives way to recognition, then to assessment as she catalogs her own condition—wounds, reserves, location, the gap in her memory between collapsing the engine’s core and waking into this basement.
“How long?” Her voice is rough with disuse.
“Fourteen hours since the engine collapsed. You have been unconscious for most of that duration.”
