Chapter 9 · The Secretary’s Fingerprint

The fleet drifted through the dark like a wounded animal that had forgotten how to breathe.

No engines roared. No maneuvering thrusters whispered. Only the occasional groan of stressed metal traveled through the hulls, a deep, animal sound that made every corridor feel narrower. Beyond the armored viewports, the stars burned with unnatural sharpness. Kestrel Rift had spat them into an empty pocket of space, a region no League chart admitted existed.

Evan Venn sat beneath the navigation console with his left hand clamped over his shoulder. Blood had soaked through the gray fabric of his uniform and dried in a black crescent beneath his collar. Every breath pulled at the torn muscle. Every movement sent a hot wire of pain down his arm.

He barely noticed.

The terminal hovered above the central table, projecting a lattice of blue coordinates into the command chamber. At its heart sat the destination the system had generated after their escape: a cluster of numbers wrapped in a command authority seal.

The seal belonged to Evelyn Thorne.

Beneath it, one line of text remained frozen in the air.

WELCOME TO THE ROUTE YOU WERE NEVER MEANT TO FIND.

Mara Quill stood on the opposite