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Lewis. “But according to all the legends, even the apocrypha, Moon was the only one of the great heroes who never went to face the Recreated. He wasn’t there when Owen and Hazel disappeared. There’s no doubt he knows many things now lost to history, things that might well prove useful to us, but like you said, no one’s set eyes on him in over a century. And the people on Lachrymae Christi are said to guard his privacy very jealously. We’d have a hard time getting to him, and no guarantee he’d be in any condition to give us helpful answers even if we did. No, I think there’s someone else who’s even better qualified to tell us what we need to know.”
    “God, you’re long-winded sometimes,” said Jesamine. “Just say where you think we ought to go next!”
    “I don’t care where we go,” said Rose. “Just as long as I get to kill someone soon.”
    “We go to Unseeli,” said Lewis. “Because that’s where we’ll find the man called Carrion.”
    Everyone looked at him. Jesamine nodded slowly. Brett put up his hand, like a child in class.
    “Excuse me? Do you think that perhaps you could let the rest of us in on this? Who the hell is Carrion? I have to say, the name alone doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. And as for Unseeli—we are talking about the Ashrai here, aren’t we? The alien species noted for killing anyone who tries to land on their planet uninvited, and there are no invitations? The only alien species in the Empire to tell the Empire to go to Hell and make it stick? That Unseeli? Am I the only sane person here? ”
    “Carrion was a friend of Captain John Silence,” Lewis said calmly. “He was there with the captain when the heroes faced the Recreated, out on the Rim. He went through the Madness Maze with the captain. He is the only great hero never to make it into the official legends. And it seems to me that someone like that might well know all kinds of things that also never made it into the official legends.”
    “Carrion. Carrion . . .” Brett said thoughtfully. “You know, I think I have heard that name before. In the apocrypha . . . No, it was from a really old data crystal some alien was trying to sell in the Rookery. I never saw the contents myself, but Nikki did. Yes . . . Carrion. The human Ashrai. The only man ever to fly with the Ashrai. Hero, villian . . . monster. That Carrion?”
    “Sounds about right,” said Lewis.
    “The Ashrai,” Jesamine said dreamily. “Owen’s dragons. I’ve always wanted to meet Owen’s dragons. Oh, Lewis, darling, we have to go to Unseeli!”
    “Give me one good reason why they’d listen to us, when they blow up everyone else?” said Brett.
    “Because I’m a Deathstalker,” said Lewis.
    And so it was decided. Lewis couldn’t help feeling that he ought to be taking charge more, like his ancestor Owen always had, but this didn’t seem to be that sort of group. He had no real authority over any of them. And yet still he felt responsible for the ragtag bunch of companions he’d somehow acquired. And his own motives for this quest were confused enough, without getting into theirs. On the one hand he wanted to find Owen, so that his glorious ancestor could lead Humanity against the Terror, but on the other hand he desperately wanted to clear his name and Jesamine’s. Lewis . . . wanted his life back. The way it used to be.
    In the end, he had to do this thing. This impossible quest to find Owen Deathstalker, who might or might not be dead. Because it was the right thing to do; because he had no choice. Because he was a Deathstalker, and the Empire had to be saved—as much from itself as from the coming Terror. And yet . . . he wished he felt more like a leader. Like a hero. He wished he was more certain over what to do for the best, instead of just stumbling from one crisis to another, with only the vaguest of intentions and plans. He wished above all that he was more like the blessed Owen, who had always known what to do.