Hasdrubal peered at Jean-Claude through the loop of the ring. “The Prophecy is the Breaker’s greatest lie. I was raised and trained to believe the Savior will come and finish the task the saints began. He will restore the Primus Mundi, but only once we have prepared the way. My belief in the Prophecy was absolute, but so was that of every other fanatic. Thus every sect and cult seeks to impose their will upon the world, believing that only their truth can save it. Yet with every passing decade, the number of sects grows. The number of heresies multiplies with each new schism, perfection recedes into confusion, and the soul of the world rots. With so many truths to choose from it becomes clear that all roads are false, and the quest itself a delusion. Mortals do not die into Torment, we are born into it, and it is time to bring our suffering to an end.”

Hasdrubal’s cold determination put a chill in Jean-Claude’s bones.

Ivar’s time shadows skirled about like leaves on an invisible wind. What he saw in those might-be moments Jean-Claude could not guess, but to Hasdrubal he said, “You have what you came for.”

Czensos herded Hasdrubal out the door, the two of them speaking in low tones.

Jean-Claude said to Ivar, “Are you sure this is what you have signed up for? Madmen and the end of the world?”

Ivar rubbed under his eye patch. “Most likely they’ll turn on each other before they even get where they think they’re going, and by then they’ll have showed me where the Conquest lies. Leaves the way clear, and the wonderful thing about gold is that it doesn’t go mad.”

“Watch this!” Rebecca cried as she leapt into the air, did a backflip, and snapped into her wyrm form like the crack of a whip.

Bitterlich was tempted to make a comment about famous last words, but Rebecca was clearly beside herself with glee, a welcome reprieve from the general gloom of the last few days, and it warmed his heart that he was the one she’d come running to with her very important yet secret discovery.

She’d brought him out past the edges of the current depot to the remains of a previous settlement, evidence that it had taken the navy several tries to figure out how to build on an ever-tilting surface.