As Casnar and Ylyssus had said, Thane approaches Chiata Sanctuary as the suns rise over the Mier and the looming plateau on which it nests. Pressing on towards the sanctuary in the distance, his drab silks Ylyssus brought for him hang limply to his solid frame, as he travels in holey boots towards the Al'Kin's fortress. Thinking of Casnar's model, he has plenty of time to study the physical outline of the fortress, with its towers in truth of that dawn's light, and he works through the routes of ingress and egress into that particular place so ominous in the skyline. Sentries he spots as small light-colored figures atop the outlines of the fortress, right where he should expect them all to be at their various points of direction. Konis's sentries should have seen him advancing on their fortress by this hour, even just shy of broad sunrise. A small speck among the dunes, his movement would be transparent. A party should have already arrived to investigate his coming.

And an investigative party does issue forth from the fortress, heading straight for him. A cloud of dust is kicked up by they coming down the switching path from the fortress's entrance facing him…Thane can make out figures forming ahead of the cloud as he continues forth from the dunes that fall behind him. The small entourage is made of only three.

Within twenty paces of each other, Thane slows to a complete stop. The one in the middle of the trio addresses him, ( "…Who are you and why are you upon the sands of the Al'Kin!" )

Raising his voice to be heard, but without yelling, "…My name is Koirane," he adds, "…I have crossed this desert from the plains of Karmuta, to pay my respects to the one who calls himself the Spider, and seek his acceptance of me as one of you I might become."

The trio talk amongst themselves. Their ba'trans are yellow and tan and cream, clean and sashed tight about their waists…Overall, they look tidy. Pants are loose, boots on their feet and matching the dye of their individual outfits. One by one they turn from their conference with one and other to silently gaze upon him. The one to Thane's left speaks. "You will speak to me now, as I understand your language of the kosme. What is your status, Stranger."

"I once hunted for the illustrious Primacy before I was sent back to Rakhana, my services considered too bloody. I have heard the Al'Kin are recruiting Drells who can fight and use stealth wisely…I wish to pledge myself to the cause."

A sudden cracking noise rends the air as the Al'Kin drell makes to reply. It cannot be the dawn's work, a light—a series of explosions come from inside the fortress on the plateau, sunlight pockets of such fantastic intensity it burns their eyes from a distance.

The Al'Kin and Thane see the fortress begin to smoke and flame around and within its walls. The slopes of the plateau are littered with falling debris, rubble from inside Chiata Sanctuary has landed and continues to tumble down.

The sudden devastation throws Thane of his composure for a moment…He stares at the smoke and flames. The sound of sabers being drawn brings him back to the Al'Kin with his focus.

( "He was sent as a distraction—The sanctuary is being attacked! Kill him!" )

Sabers intending to hack and slice at him, they charge as Thane steps backwards and moves to the left.

"Not wise of you to assume an unarmed drell has anything to do with an internal plot," Thane moves forward suddenly and engages.

Thane knocks the first cutting Al'Kin out of the way, using his momentum, and catches the hacking arm of the second, twisting and causing the saber to drop free of the hand…The third catches the second Thane kicks into him, sending both into a tumble across the sand flat. The first Al'Kin returns, stabbing at Thane's middle, but Thane steps aside the thrust and the third Al'Kin accidentally pushes the one off him—directly onto the blade that Thane easily walks away from. The third Al'Kin yells with rage and slices down at Thane's face, Thane's hands slapping together and catching the blade by its flat sides…Holding it without a knick to his palms, he forces it up and kicks the Al'Kin in the chest, catching the saber's hilt once he flips it to use against the first Al'Kin who has freed his saber from the dead. He jams his fingers into the Al'Kin's neck, the saber drops as he grabs at his tebris and throat, choking from the hit that affects his trachea…Thane picks up the saber and spins, cutting at the third who has taken ownership of the second Al'Kin's blade, seeing it has no longer an owner. He slaps this one with the flat of a saber to the side of his patak, "…Konis has not trained you well in how to use these weapons," Thane says rather arrogantly. "Do any of you know how to fight?" he asks as the Al'Kin cuts and stabs at him feverishly. "I assume not."

The first Al'Kin recovered from Thane's hit to his neck, a dagger draws forth from his sash and he rushes the green and black drell. Metal hisses through air—where Thane's neck was before he bent flexibly backwards ninety-degrees from his hips and rotates behind the Al'Kin. Now at center with the drell's shoulders, Thane incapacitates him with a swift punch to the neck, realigning a vertebra. The Al'Kin drops into the dust. The third Al'Kin hurls himself at Thane, screaming for his blood. Thane backs up, turns and lets the Al'Kin fall passed, his blade cutting down on the tan ba'tran through the back.

The north wall of the sanctuary explodes open. Rubble fans away from the wall like water from a hose. Among the roiling balls of fire and black smoke, clouds of dust are flashes of purple energetic light. "Biotics," Thane says to himself. His own barrier lights as he makes towards the burning fortress. Thane starts to run towards the sanctuary, hoping Kasumi and Tetonbaum are not among the casualties.

Kasumi over his shoulder, Tetonbaum's eyes are lit with violent purple energy that readies to dance out and kick anyone else who attempts to prevent their leave of the fortress's interior…He moves towards the broken wall, steps over the stones and out onto the littered slope of the plateau beyond the wall he has just blown open. Turning halfway down the slope between the first switchback trail and the shattered wall, Tetonbaum raises debris from its temporary respite on the ground and fills the gap in the wall with it…Hoping this will discourage anyone from pursuing them that way.

Tetonbaum returns to his descent with Kasumi. He notices the three sprawled bodies on the sand in the desert ahead, and the glowing figure racing towards the plateau from these three.

Only in his thinking does he hesitate…Thane continues to run, trying to determine who among Konis's prisoners might be on the slope of the plateau. At the base of the slopes to the fortress, Thane stops among the scattered rubble to look into the aura of the glowing biotic descending towards him…The shape of a body among what he thought was only a peculiar roll of fabric over the drell's broad shoulder…Tetonbaum, Thane instantly realizes. "Kasumi," he calls as loudly as they may hear from his position below them, uncertain but willing to bet it is she in the drell's arm.

Feet bare, Tetonbaum slows to a stop, sliding a little on the slope and grit from the fortress wall…He is halfway down to Thane.

Both are naked, though Tetonbaum has fashioned a blanket into a makeshift robe about the woman he carries. "You must be Tetonbaum," Thane says, "…Irikah spoke highly of you."

Tetonbaum tightens his arm around Kasumi's hips, "…You know the name of my sister." He tilts his wavy crests towards Kasumi over his shoulder, biotic light crackling silently around his great frame, "…How do you know this woman."

"We are friends of Braith Shepard, Kasumi Goto and I. We all met through circumstances involving a powerful enemy and have shared in the loss of comrades together," Thane explains patiently, an eye to the destruction behind the drell. "I can assure you, you have nothing to fear of me…I am here for that woman, if it is she, and you, and I will go next after Braith Shepard if we get out of here safely and alive. You are the half-brother of my wife, Irikah Soterios-Sousan, you are Tetonbaum…Casnar and Cartira's kin."

Tetonbaum nods to the smoking fortress above. "That would be ideal." Tetonbaum's red hand on her thighs over the blanket, his gentle shrug with her causes the woman's figure to rise and fall some. "You are friend and kin of mine if what you say is true..." Tetonbaum pauses, "…I offer my late condolences on our loss, Son of Krios-Sahana." Tetonbaum's use of his clan-name assures Thane the drell is aware of who he is. "We should leave…before Konis and his Al'Kin recover."

Tetonbaum resumes his course down the slope. The sky is thick with black smoke above his figure. Ignoring the fact Tetonbaum wears nothing and all is free, even the erection from fighting inside the fortress, Thane inquires of the woman in his care, "…It is…indeed Kasumi." Tetonbaum passes him at the bottom of the plateau's incline and Thane turns, seeing her face's profile behind the corded back of red and blue-veined muscle, like a hero out of some graphic novel literature. "What…has happened," Thane dares ask.

"Don't fret, Son of Reule," Tetonbaum murmurs, a smile iggling at his lips' corners, "…She is heavily sedated, mostly on my venom."

Thane asks, "…How…Did Konis—"

Tetonbaum casts him a cold sapphire glare, "…No, Konis will never lay a hand on her," and moving Kasumi into the cradle of his arms, under his bare chest, he carries her into a light jog that seems effortless for him even encumbered by the woman in her blanket-gown. "Konis wanted to use her against me. I have forgone all of my oaths," Tetonbaum says as he gazes north over the dunes. "For love…Kasumi will recover, but we must be away…She is not in her capacity to run, much less fight." They run over the sands, kicking up small divots within the wake of their feets' impressions.

"How did you and Kasumi expect to escape after," he tilts his head behind them as they jog along rather fleetly, indicating the devastation Tetonbaum has managed. "What means, in other words, did you have in mind for your—our—evasion of Konis and his forces?" His hand chops at the sand before them, "…Surely you are aware of what he will follow to reacquire you both and I as well now."

"I had a system of conflagrational material in place at strategic points throughout the fortress, Son of Reule," Tetonbaum shares, hardly a puff of exertion between his words as he carries Kasumi tight to his chest, "…Konis and his Al'Kin are caught unawares…for now. If they do make it out of the rubble I have buried them under," he looks aside him at Thane, "…You and I will be able to handle any foolhardy pursuit…Konis does not have I'lorie within his barra of Al'Kin, and once Kasumi shakes off the effect of my venom," his grin breaks through, showing white teeth, "…She will be able to assist until we can break away from the pursuers."

"I take it she took your venom willingly," Thane's dark eyes do not reveal where his pupils fall to the woman, gently ajostle in Tetonbaum's bare arms, but his face is turned to see her.

The smile on his lips still, Tetonbaum gazes down at Kasumi's face. "She has been waiting…I tried…not to give in." His eyes forward again, "…Konis thought—by putting us together—he would compromise my loyalty to my institutions, to everything I have been brought up to follow and believe in…Technically, I cannot be with her, I should not have slept with her, not without my master's permission…Konis has succeeded in that."

"Now what happens."

The high th'ane says nothing for a time, still running with Thane at his side. "I will marry her once we recover Braith Shepard," he says. "Casnar will have to speak for me to Merce'des…and my father." No more bound to the Terje Tierrea and Casnar than he is to the ground over which he flies with his powerful legs carrying them effortlessly along, Tetonbaum holds his love tighter to his chest, his heart filled and free. He feels her stir in his grip, his own head high with love and fulfillment.

Through her sleepy lashes, Kasumi sees his golden tebris under the frame of his angular jaw of red skin, and Tetonbaum looks down at her, his sapphires bright and smiling. She moves her palm to cup his chest as he runs, the muscles rippling under her touch. "Sleep, Little Meile," Tetonbaum says to her, drawing Thane's glance to the lovers, "…I will keep you safe from harm."

Thane looks from Tetonbaum and Kasumi to their trail behind them.

At the base of the plateau, the cloud kicked up by a pursuit is growing, heading for them.

Tetonbaum turns his head over his shoulder to see as Thane warns them, "…We have been discovered," he begins to slow, letting Tetonbaum carry Kasumi ahead of him, "…Take her to the Souir caverns…There are friends there. I will try to mislead them, or detain them for a while at least, Tetonbaum." Thane stops and turns in their tracks to meet Konis and his Al'Kin, astride their di'leans they whip and kick to catch up to Tetonbaum and Kasumi from the burning fortress. Tetonbaum does not look back and carries onward, his love a treasure he will see to safety. Facing forward from the naked high th'ane's blue-veined back, Thane prepares to meet the assassin who almost claimed his son.

( "Catch them," ) Konis shouts over the rush of wind and fiery clamor at their back, ( "…Gut him and let him live long enough while we sate our revenge on his mate," ) he screams, whipping his di'lean with her tethers, Konis's eyes filled with red fury and vengeance. His Al'Kin whip their animals' flanks and withers, simply to catch up.

Canines bare. He kicks his heels into the rooker's lean sides of her belly, bent forward over her neck, his grunts and pants of rage competing with the sound of her claws scratching through the pact sand and her huffs of exertion. ( "Don't let him get away with her! I'll run you down, Tetonbaum Soterios!…And I will feast on her while you watch helplessly," ) he hisses into the back fur and feathers of his ride.

The rooker out front of the rest, Thane can make out the blue and black fangs of patterning on the drell's patak…This must be Konis Traus, he feels more than thinks it safe to assume. The murderous expression tells him this Drell that rushes the rooker in a frenzied cloud of dust and sand has been insulted and looks to avenge what Tetonbaum had taken from him…His Drells, his fortress, his pride…His prey…

He can read the intent in the eyes, the mouth, the flared tebris raised to kill. Thane slows his steps until he stands still, waiting for the rider and di'lean to reach him.

His thighs hugging tight to the rooker, Konis reins back hard, curbing the creature sharply…It hisses at Thane, the hook of its black beak only a few hands' out in front of him, but Konis backs the animal up and the talons return to the sand. ( "Who are you to stand and not know Death when it races upon you," ) Konis sneers malevolently, the whites of his eyes thinning, ( "…Speak, Drell, so I may send your name to our gods once I have let my beast filet you!" ) As the riled, sweating rooker tugs and wheels in a figure eight, its frothing rider on its back controlling it still with sharp tugs of the tethers around its head and neck, Thane sees the rest of his party catch up and hang back a ways from the drell and rooker up front with him…Konis waits for the drell on the ground to answer. He spits on the sand over the di'lean's shoulder, ( "…Speak!" ) A saber he pulls from his back. ( "Who are you!" )

Thane assesses the situation quickly with his able mind…Their rides, their weapons, their number…Konis.

"Are you the almighty Konis Traus?" Thane asks.

Konis jerks on the reins and snaps his tebris with a trill…The rooker stops its dancing about, breathing heavily through the nostrils under its rostrum as red eyes flick with the head to watch Thane on the ground. Konis's lips start to cover his canines, bringing the blue and black fangs of his patterning together, but not completely. "Look no further," he drawls slowly. "What for are you here…You still have not said who you are."

"My name…is Thane Krios."

"Thane Krios," Konis registers the name against the multitudes in his head, and their affiliations…or relations…He begins to smile.

"…I killed your son."

"You are responsible for his murder, you admit it."

Thane continues to gaze up at the drell astraddle the beast lifting its feathers and fur to cool itself.

"The path of the son will lead to his father…" Konis slides off the rooker onto the ground and tosses the reins to his Al'Kin that has ridden up cautiously to take over the beast's control. "Do you wish to avenge his death, Thane Krios?…Do you think that by killing me, you will save him—He who lay dying in the Mier, choking on his prayers, crying for his father…His mother?…Now in the arms of her no doubt," Konis drags the tip of his blade through the sand, "…as they weep in eternity together…"

"I ask you, Why…"

"Because, Thane Krios," Konis says to him as he comes to a stop within reach of Thane's own sabers, Konis's ba'tran pungent with smoke, slate dust, rooker and death, "…I needed you to come to me…What better way to have lured you home," he grins less now, "…Pity Casnar was too scared to reach for you sooner."