Chapter 12 · The Crown's Second Master

The black warship hung beyond the broken jump array, its hull swallowing the starlight around it.

Seven white stars burned beneath its bridge. Above them, a crown had been split down the middle, one half painted in ash-gray, the other in blood-red. The emblem belonged to Gray Ring—the city Ashring had watched burn thirty years ago.

Kellan Vey stood beneath the flagship's command dais with one hand braced against the railing. The Crown pulsed along his spine, hot as a brand beneath his skin. Every beat sent fragments through his skull: burning towers, soldiers kneeling in dust, a boy in a silver helmet screaming his name.

Commander Vey.

The voice from the black ship had used the title like a claim of ownership.

Behind him, alarms stuttered through the bridge. The fleet Kellan had forced into hesitation was waking again. Red targeting lines crawled across the forward glass, converging on the coordinates where Sable stood beside the primary neural cradle.

Brom Hark spat blood onto the deck. "Tell me that ugly bastard out there is not what I think it is."

"It's Gray Ring," Kellan said.

The mechanic stared at him. "Gray Ring was turned into vapor.