Pan Eyta and Kassav didn’t seem particularly thrilled, either. Tempest Runners could authorize raids within their own crews without asking any of the others, but anything that would require Paths needed a full-on vote. Usually, that meant Marchion was the deciding factor, because most of the time the two Tempest Runners who didn’t have a stake in a given job voted against it. Not a bad system, really. As Eye, Marchion was the custodian of the Paths, and so he should have the loudest voice in deciding how they were used.

“I have a new group in my Tempest,” Lourna continued. “Seven Strikes under a Cloud. Came to me with a really interesting plan, actually—they found this settler family on a mining world, very connected. My guys want to kidnap them, hold them for ransom from their rich relatives. It’s smart.”

“No, Lourna. I told you. We all just agreed. No raids until the heat dies down from Hetzal.”

She stepped toward him, her thin face focused, her eyes intense.

“I’m telling you, Marchion, it’ll be easy. The planet is Elphrona, which doesn’t have much of a security force, and apparently the family decided to go all rustic, live way out on their own in the middle of nowhere. Easy pickings. We’ll be in and out.”

Marchion went still, which Lourna took as an invitation to keep talking.

“The Cloud asked for some Paths. You know…just in case. I know we’re under pressure, but this is a new group, lots of potential. I want to bring them into the fold, give them a chance to prove their worth. I’m telling you, too—this operation will have a huge payoff.”

“Elphrona…” Marchion said. “There’s a Jedi outpost on that planet.”

“Is there?” asked Lourna Dee, in a way that made it clear she had already known.

Marchion went silent. The Nihil were not just another group of raiders, like the thousands that operated in the Rim. They were special, powerful…and the reason for that was the Paths. In all the ways that counted, they made the Nihil what they were. They allowed crews to use hyperspace in ways denied to every other ship in the galaxy. Microjumps, leaps to locations inside gravity wells, entering hyperspace from almost anywhere as opposed to having to run elaborate calculations or travel to a non-occluded access zone…they allowed the Nihil’s ships to appear and disappear at will, like spirits. They could be anywhere, at any time, and no defenses could stop them.

The Paths made the Nihil what they were, but they came from a single, unique, not inexhaustible source, and Marchion had placed significant demands upon that source recently, both to fuel the Nihil’s growth and to support plans of his own. The Legacy Run disaster was not the only reason he wanted things to cool off for a little while.