Sagas & Sass began covering the Red Rising Saga by Pierce Brown in September 2022; this is our summary of Ephraim and Lyria’s chapters in book 5 – Dark Age – as they were written to introduce the Sagas & Sass episodes 69, 72, and 73.
AHOY! SPOILERS AHEAD!
Remember when Ephraim set off a bunch of grenades to keep the ship he’d stolen in his attempt to rescue Pax and Electra from returning to the Syndicate Queen? Well obviously it caused a catastrophic collision, and then the ship kept sending distress signals to the Queen…but scavengers reached it first, and as Ephraim floats in and out of consciousness, he hears someone ordering to keep him alive, because the Queen wills it…
When he wakes again, he’s restrained, but first Electra and then Pax are hovering over him, so he at least knows they’re both alive. Pax reveals that they are in fact on Mars, but Ephraim almost immediately falls into a one-track mindset – because although on the one hand, he’s been shouting for his ring, what he ends up begging for is zoladone.
Pax refuses him on both counts, telling Ephraim he’ll return the ring when he is himself again…before leaving Ephraim to chant himself to sleep with an old Gray marching creed.
Ephraim wakes up an indeterminate time later in a large bed. He’s been given a brand new leg and his accommodations are fit for a…well, if not a king, at least a “brooding but secretly sensitive knight from a holoCan drama”…which is probably extra fitting considering he’s apparently being held in Eagle’s Rest, one-time home of Cassius au Bellona.
Oh, and Ephraim has a babysitter – a huge Obsidian shaman who’s apparently reading bones that have been scattered in the fireplace. The shaman reveals that Valdir the Unshorn (Obsidian warlord and concubine to Sefi the Quiet) is coming to pay a visit, but Ephraim doesn’t plan on sticking around for any of THAT nonsense.
Instead, he runs out onto the terrace and jumps off, using vines to climb down the sheer – and very, VERY high – wall…and despite unraveling vines and the fact that his fancy new leg is way stronger than he expected, he thinks he’s almost made it to safety when what should appear but a riderless griffin!
And not just ANY griffin – Godeater, Sefi’s personal steed, who corners Ephraim for the moment it takes Valdir to finally arrive, trap him in a tacNet, and carry him off to be dumped unceremoniously back into the shaman, Ozgard’s, care.
They trek up a path that ascends the spine of the mountain, and when they arrive at the Bellona training grounds Ephraim watches first Electra and then Pax training with the Obsidians…but while Electra seems to fit right in, Pax isn’t exactly happy to be there, and he makes this known to Sefi after defeating the three Obsidian who are set against him.
After Pax storms out (spoiler alert: not the only time he’s gonna do this), Ephraim is brought to Sefi, who reveals that the scavengers who found them on Luna had Obsidian among them, and that Valdir abused the Syndicate of the notion that they had any claim on Ephraim and the kiddos.
Sefi then takes Ephraim on a walk and shows him the Bellona hangars. Once filled with ships, they’re now populated by Obsidians who are learning from Orange mechanics, Blue navigators, Green coders, Yellow doctors, Red builders…because she plans to break from the Republic and found a kingdom for her people, and bee-tee-dubs, she wants Ephraim to teach her skuggi (aka spirit assassins) spycraft. (Among, well, just about anything else he can think of.)
In return, Sefi will ensure that Lyria and Volga are returned to him – and of course he’ll be paid a hefty sum, as well. So what else is Ephraim to do but agree? Let’s be real, it’s not like he’s going anywhere else, otherwise…
Granted, while the skuggi seem to know more than they let on, there’s definitely a language barrier, and on top of that, they don’t trust Ephraim – which means they’re playing dumb or angry, because that’s what they learned to do. (Thanks a lot, Golds!)
But hey, while Ephraim might not be feeling like he’s doing a ton of good with them, he did secretly help out Pax by convincing Sefi to let him use the garage, where Pax is now fixing up an old gravBike in his spare time.
In return, Pax gives Ephraim a bit of help as well – by giving him VERY strong hints that he should turn his lessons with the skuggi into games. Which Ephraim does, and while there’s still a ways to go after their first gamified lesson, he knows he’s finally on the right track – especially when Freihild explains that Ephraim teaching them how to play cards is gifting them his own skillgift. TL;DR – they’re enjoying themselves, but they’ve also gained respect for their teacher. Go Ephraim!
Unfortunately, it’s only a matter of time before news of the Day of Red Doves reaches Mars, though at first all Ephraim and the kiddos know is that people in the city below are moving through the streets singing Eo’s song. And even when they’re eventually summoned by Sefi, they’re simply loaded into an armored military shuttle, and four days later disembark that shuttle onto a “cruise ship gone schizoid” – a luxury cruise ship that once upon a time Ephraim in fact vacationed on with Trigg.
When they’re finally brought before Sefi, it’s to witness the execution of a Pink named Amel who betrayed her – a scene that she immediately follows with news of the Sovereign’s death. Pax bolts from the room and Electra takes Sefi down a peg before storming after him, and even Ephraim is left wondering if Sefi might not be the bad guy here, after all…but when she asks if his skuggi can help take the mines she needs for their Helium-3, he shrugs his assent because hey, the world’s burning anyway!
SIGH.
Also, consolation apparently isn’t Ephraim’s thing, so he apparently avoids Pax, though eventually Pax finds him, only to tell Ephraim that he’s shit at pep talks. I mean…Ephraim did already admit as much, but even if his words aren’t quite the right ones, he’s definitely feeling some attachment, because he thinks about how if Sefi tells him to ‘use’ Pax, he’ll pop her right between the eyes.
I mean, good luck with that…and speaking of Sefi, just then Ozgard shows up to fetch Eprhaim for the Kjrdakan, aka “The Lord Wager”, which is quite an honor…and btw, this also signifies that Sefi chose Ephraim’s plan over Valdir’s. This is one hell of a statement on her part, and Valdir is apt to be piiiiisssed….then, as Ephraim follows Ozgard out, Pax advises him to NOT bleed into the ribcage – because if he does, and the campaign fails, he’ll die in a ritual homicide.
Cool cool cool cool cool cool.
Really, the whole custom is…a lot. Sefi splits an aurochs’s head open with her axe, Ozgard sets the body on fire, and when nothing is left but charred tissue and marrow leaking out of cracked bones, the Obsidians begin making their wagers. The women drop strands of hair, meaning they will be shorn if the campaign fails, but then the men essentially spit on Ephraim by only wagering torcs…oh, and Valdir literally spits at him after dropping his torc in.
Ephraim is justifiably pissed, lets his pride get the better of him, and does exactly what Pax told him not to do – that being, bleed into the rib cage. Turns out zoladone wasn’t just protecting him from FEELINGS and MEMORIES…but also from himself. OOPSIES!
However, in a surprising turn of events (okay, maybe not SO so much), Sefi follows Ephraim’s lead and also gives her blood to the ritualistic sacrifice. Needless to say…Ephraim is at LEAST two times screwed if his plan fails. OOF.
This leads to Ephraim having some BIG RAGRETS, even if Ozgard claims that Ephraim won’t die because Sefi CAN’T die…but then when Ozgard realizes Ephraim has been stress eating his walnuts he nearly goes feral…because guess what, y’all? They AREN’T walnuts, they’re the shaman’s spirit berries, and now Ephraim is high AF!
Thaaaankfully this turns out to be a better time than Ephraim thought it would…at least after the initial freak-out, during which he dons a far-too-large pair of gravBoots and picks up “a rifle of unknown and horrible power”. And once the high gets REALLY good, he has a moment of clarification…or so he thinks. Basically, Ephraim [kinda unfortunately?] decides that the Obsidians’ fight is just, and that the gods protect him as well, and he leaps from the transport.
His gravBoots speed him past the vanguard to be the first to land…and it’s only then that he realizes that his rifle is actually just a mop, and he’s surrounded by hunterkiller robots.
Oop…sies…?
Meanwhile, out in space, the last thing Lyria remembers was the feeling of warm water on her stomach, and then the cold of stone against her back after “that bitch of a Brown” (her words!) plunged a syringe into her neck…and she wakes up in a cold, glossy black room that’s ten by ten paces in size. No bed, and only a tube to go to the bathroom in…and it’s not pretty if she misses the tube.
Like. Ew. Gross.
She’s Victra’s prisoner, but apparently Victra doesn’t want anything from her – this imprisonment is all about revenge. And so Lyria gives up for a little while…until she becomes disgusted with herself for being just a watcher, just a victim, and begins taking care of herself again.
Or well…starts eating, finds a way to sleep, and is more careful about going to the bathroom, which is basically all that she CAN do – at least until she finds a note in the air duct.
A note written on a piece of cloth. A note written in BLOOD. A note from….
…Wait for it…
….VOLGA, of all people!
At first Lyria is pretty pissed, but what else does she have going on? Might as well become fingernail-and-blood-pals with her fellow prisoner, right? (Even if she sees Volga signing each note as “Your friend, Volga” as a desperate plea for a friendship that Lyria refuses to admit exists.)
Eventually the Brown woman who captured Lyria shows up to collect her and Volga and reveals that Ephraim has arranged for an exchange – for both of them! The woman – whose name is Figment – brings them to the showers, but in the midst of hers Lyria hears a high-pitched noise, and when she tries to investigate, sees a blade cutting through the wall.
A blade that opens a hole – a hole which is then covered by a membrane, before seven dark forms plop through it.
Again. Ew. Gross.
Thankfully Figment is still around and summons their guards, buuuuut it turns out that these bastards aren’t easy to kill…and then the gravity in the ship reverses and the intruders go on the offensive!
The guards are slaughtered quickly, and to a man, but Fig, Volga, and Lyria manage to escape…granted, not before Fig sets off a bomb and they almost get sucked out into space, but Volga and Lyria help each other out of that scrape even as Figment scampers away on her own.
Once the breach is sealed, Volga collects weapons from the dead and she and Lyria are off to find the hangar, passing by quite a bit of carnage along the way. Finally they run into a group of Golds and their guards, but their new companions have no idea that the creatures are already spread throughout much of the ship – and even as Lyria is trying to explain as much to them, and tell them that some of the creatures are small enough to fit in the ducts, a nearby elevator shaft opens…revealing a giant of an Obsidian.
Y’all, it’s Volsung Fa! He’s real, and he’s come to……offer Volga his stains? What the WHAT?
The Golds try to fight, but Fa cuts through them like soft cheese, leaving Volga and Lyria on the run again. They’ve been tracking Fig via the blood trail she’s left behind and eventually catch up with her, but Fig’s having none of their shit and tries to use some of her apparently built-in defense systems (or would it be mechanisms? ) against Volga. Uuuntil Lyria stops her, that is!
But their trials aren’t over yet. Victra’s voice comes over the ship’s coms to announce that they will be purging the ship in ten minutes, and Fig explains that the hangar is overrun and that any escape pods they might find will become, eh-hem, “murder pens”. Thankfully Fig has backup plans upon backup plans and knows about an escape craft that isn’t in the schematics…aaaand so they’re off! (Again!)
Turns out that Fig’s backup to the backup plan is to utilize Victra’s personal escape craft, but when Fig, Lyria, and Volga take the chute down into it, they’re deposited right in front of the Lady Barca herself!
…Who punches Lyria out, and when she comes to, the shuttle is being shot down!
Talk about bad luck heaped upon bad luck, here. Lyria and Volga barely escape from the wreckage, and when they go in search of supplies Lyria stumbles upon Fig, who is very obviously dying from her wounds – and who suddenly grabs hold of Lyria and, err, sneezes out what looks like a tiny metal squid…a tiny metal squid that then crams its way into LYRIA’S nose, congratulates her for killing Figment, tells her SHE is now Figment, but to not report for duty…?!
Again, what the WHAAAAT?!
When Lyria finds Volga and tries to explain what just happened, Volga doesn’t seem to care, and instead ensures Figment is dead before plucking out one of her eyes, explaining that Quicksilver has a huge bounty out on Fig. Volga then goes in search of the orb that the contractor had with her (even though she doesn’t know what, exactly, it is)…an orb that apparently whispers to Lyria.
Oh, and Lyria is also hearing a weird humming sound, and when she follows it it leads her into the forest…and right to VICTRA! So yay, Victra made it out alive, but she’s angraughing (angry laughing, of course) over the fact that it’s these two “cockroaches” who survived and came to her aid.
Lyria, for her part, is totes ready to shoot Victra with a pulseFist, but Volga stops her, even after Lyria reminds her that Victra put them in a dungeon…
Only that just makes Victra laugh more, because apparently it wasn’t a dungeon, it was Electra’s playroom, and if Lyria had just solved the PUZZLE of the room, she probably could have gotten out of it herself.
Lots to unpack there, but too much else going on to focus on Electra’s weird torturous puzzle room, especially as Lyria doesn’t want to stick with Victra, but Volga apparently does. So Lyria leaves them behind, packs up some supplies for herself, and continues on her way…only to see ships heading toward the crash site.
One of which she recognizes as a Red Hand vessel, so of course she turns and races back to Volga and Victra to warn them. And despite Victra being so pregnant she’s about to burst, she bolts. Volga ambles in her wake while Lyria struggles to keep up with them, until they finally think they’ve gone far enough and stop to watch the Red Hand sift through the wreckage.
And it’s not just ANY members of the Red Hand – the chief bitch herself, Harmony, is with them. Unfortunately there’s nothing to be done about it now – they’re too far for Volga to get in a proper shot, and it looks like Victra would stop her from attempting a shot, anyway. And unfortunately Victra doesn’t think her men could find them, but the Red Hand will for sure soon find their tracks…so looks like it’s time for another not-so-merry trek!
After two weeks of plodding through rain and snow the Sisterhood of the Traveling Parasite reaches a coastal village, and after staking it out for a while Lyria still isn’t sure how safe it is…only it turns out they don’t have much of a choice but to find shelter there because Victra’s baby is finally on its way!
They use their overall threatening presence to “convince” a Red man named Cormac to invite them into his house, where Victra makes herself at home in the bedroom while Lyria and Volga question their host…and Lyria soon realizes that no matter how nice he seems, she Does. Not. Trust. this guy.
But it’s too late for them to go anywhere else – Victra is popping out a baby, and SURPRISE! This time it’s actually a boy!
Congrats Victra, we’re entirely certain this will all end well for both you and the bébé. Especially as y’all were smart enough to tie up this shifty-eyed Cormac while Volga heads off to the village communications array to send an encrypted message from Victra…
Wait, nope, because Cormac is actually part of the Red Hand – a fact that his supposed daughter, Brea, reveals to Lyria by way of a bloody palm – and although Lyria and Victra take out Cormac and his son, they aren’t able to save Brea, and it’s likely that Volga has already been captured. Victra takes off for the highlands and Lyria tries to follow, but by the time she catches up with Victra’s trail, all she finds are signs of a fierce fight.
And while Victra might be gone, what Lyria does actually discover is much, much worse.
Ulysses has been killed, his body nailed to a tree, and Lyria has no idea what to do other than take his body with her because the ground is too frozen for her to bury him.
She returns to the village and is taken in by a couple – Brea’s parents, in fact – who tell her that the Red Hand arrived a year prior, moved into the nearby mine, and eventually started taking the local girls as wives. Forcibly. Because of fucking course that’s what they would do. ::SIDE EYING HARMONY SO HARD RIGHT NOW::
Good news is, now Lyria isn’t just desperate to get her friends back – she’s also ANGRY. So she goes back to the ruins of Cormac’s house, digs out Figment’s orb, and opens it to find…well, not much that’s actually of use to her, because the thing in her head – which she deems a parasite – keeps telling her its functionality is impaired and she needs to get it fixed.
Buuut then Lyria does find something that gives her an idea – Figment’s acid teeth! So she trucks back to Brea’s parents’ house and asks the mother to make her up and lend her a pair of pliers.
Cuz Lyria’s going up to the mines to become a wifey, y’all!
(Listen, we can make a joke out of this because Lyria’s got plots and plans here, guys. Plots. And. Plans.)
And honestly, Lyria is wayyyyy smoother about this than we would have thought possible – she shows a little ankle and flirts her way into the group of brides-to-be, where she scares the crap out of the girls by making sure they know the truth regarding what’s about to happen to them.
Then she takes out the pliers she borrowed from Brea’s mother and rips out one of her teeth, replacing it with an acid tooth, and asks who wants to save themselves. All but two of the girls go along, and when one of Lyria’s new friends, a girl she dubs Freckles, tells Lyria that one of the two – who Lyria calls “Tails” – will absolutely rat them out, Lyria simply stomps on Tails’s jaw until it’s broken.
Maybe stupidity isn’t a victimless crime, but still, big OOF.
Eventually Picker, aka the Head Asshole, comes ‘round to remind all of the girls to mind their manners, because the Head Bitch – Harmony, of course – is about to pay them a visit. Now, the girls have all been given some drugged wine, and for a moment – when Harmony gives them a beatific smile – Lyria wonders if she has it all wrong…
…uuuuntil Harmony starts talking, that is, giving them a Big Bitch Speech all about how they are about to experience the “honor” of being married to heroes of the Red People, after which the girls are led down to the township Common where they are chosen as brides. Lyria gets QUOTE lucky UNQUOTE when the resident Nice Guy(™), Duncan, chooses her, and then ding dang dong she’s married.
She knows she needs to find the big girls – Volga and Victra, of course – so she tricks Duncan into taking her to see their “tamed Obsidians”, manages to grind a haemanthus flower into the growler of swill they bring for the guards…AND, once she sees Volga, give her a hint about what’s what. You go, girl!
Problem is, Lyria does have to go home with Duncan, but hey, that’s what the acid teeth are for! Unfortunately even after Duncan is dead and Lyria has gathered up his weapons, there’s another hiccup in her plan – Tails the Tattler has somehow managed to warn the Red Hand. This leads to Lyria’s capture, but it’s all good because it’s Freckles to the rescue!
Side note: Yes, Lyria’s parasite does give her a bit of an edge, it’s pretty clear that her own gumption was a huge part of what’s gotten her this far.
That said, it’s probably just pure luck that when she and Freckles duck into a room to hide from some soldiers, it happens to be Harmony’s quarters…and her luck continues, because not only is there a radio, but Freckles’ dad was a radio signal operator! They might only be able to get out a broad transmission, and Lyria knows her options of who to call are limited, but she has an idea that leaves her smiling as she leans toward the microphone…
Now, while Lyria has been suffering through her captivity, making friends with Volga, trekking around Mars as part of the Sisterhood of the Traveling Parasite, and leading a mini rebellion against the Red Hand, the person who essentially got her into these predicaments has been having his own adventures!
Because while Ephraim might have dove into a pack of hunter-killer robots in a drug-fueled, mop-wielding attack, it turned out that those robots were programmed to ignore Grays! So he’s alive and well and even receives some perks for his madness – a brand new fancy ship that he dubs the Snowball (after Volga, of course), and an invite to tag along on a special drake hunt.
And honestly, it’s reeaaalll good that he’s there, because when Sefi and the Valkyrie do find and corner the drake that they’ve been stalking for days, something goes wrong. Sefi can’t seem to summon the strength to shoot her bow, and though Freihild tries to come to the rescue, in the end Ephraim has to shoot the drake down from afar.
Normally the use of a gun would be a HUGE no-no on a hunt, but in this case the Obsidians just add another tick to Ephraim’s hero chart, because his shot saved Sefi AND Freihild as well as killing the drake. So on top of everything else he gets to be celebrated at the post-hunt party!
Before, ya know, boarding the Snowball with Ozgard and Freihild to bring the drake skull to its final resting place near the ruins of the Valkyrie Spires. While Freihild goes in search of a special flower called nightgaze, Ozgard tells Ephraim his story – the tl;dr of which is that he’s also a con man.
Great bonding time for the boys, but this camping trip soon comes to a grisly end when a giant of an Obsidian arrives on the scene, kills Freihild, pops out one of Ozgard’s eyes, and hands Freihild’s heart to Ephraim, telling him to return to Sefi with a message – Fa has come to contest her claim.
RUT-ROHHHH…
So now Ephraim also finally knows that the Ascomanni and Volsung Fa are real. Problem is, not everyone believes Ephraim and Ozgard’s tale – including Valdir, who’s a big dang mess over Freihild’s death and even accuses Sefi of conspiring to have Freihild killed.
Ephraim is already concerned about the state of things, and makes sure Pax and Electra are keeping their harnesses on before having a sit down with Sefi…but lo and behold, their sit down ALSO comes to a grisly end!
It turns out that Valdir had gone off to drink away his sorrows and his drink was laced with Ozgard’s special berries….whiiich led to him going on a killing spree, murdering three Valkyrie…
…And Sefi’s beloved griffin Godeater as well.
Seriously, WTF man, drugs or not, HOW DARE.
In the wake of this, Sefi accuses Ozgard of putting the berries in Valdir’s drink and tells him that while he can remain with the tribe, he will no longer be seen, heeded, heard, or noticed. He leaves the room, defeated, at which point Sefi finally reveals her awful secret – she’s been poisoned (courtesy of Atalantia, ofc) and not only will she die, no one can even touch the scaley yellow arm she’s been hiding with long sleeves and gloves.
Oh, and she found out that Volga is teeeechnically Ragnar’s daughter…so Sefi wants her brought to Olympia to rule the Alltribe once Sefi is gone.
Which Ephraim is vehemently against, because he believes that HIS Volga deserves more than to die for SEFI’S people.
But before he can do too much other than mourn the loss of his previously growing optimism, he sees that the Pandora – ya know, Victra’s ship, the one that Lyria and Volga are on – is under attack. It falls to ships bearing Alltribe colors, and soon after this some supposedly Alltribe troop carriers pelt the city with the bodies from the ship.
Ephraim is certain that it’s all Volsung Fa’s dirty work, but the only thing he can think to do at this point is to get the kiddos out of there, and luckily those plans he and Pax hatched in secret work pretty well – or at least they do after Electra cracks open his sternum to remove the heartspike Sefi had implanted to kill him in just such a scenario as this.
But hey, they do in fact get free of the Obsidians, and now it’s time for them to go on a search-and-rescue mission in hopes that Victra managed to get to an escape pod…only to fly around searching for two weeks before finally catching wind of something.
And what’s that something, you ask? Why, it’s Lyria’s broadcast from the mines! Ephraim and the kiddos know they’ll need help if they want to go to her aid, and Pax (who is truly his parents’ son) has a great idea: they’re going to boost Lyria’s signal to the people of Mars!
So at this point we join back up with Lyria, who has unfortunately run into yet another snag. While she was able to shove her new friend Freckles into a maintenance closet with the weapons and Gold breastplate they’d gathered, Lyria herself is once again captured. This time she insists that the men who get hold of her bring her to Harmony, claiming that she has information on where Victra’s other daughters are…which VERY conveniently lands her in a cell with Victra!
Now, Lyria had not one but TWO acid teeth, and as soon as Harmony shows up to question her, she uses this other tooth on Victra’s cuffs…and once freed, Victra becomes a killing machine. Granted, Harmony flees the scene and Lyria has to convince Victra not to give chase just yet, but as soon as they meet up with Freckles and Victra realizes they have not just weapons but armor as well, she’s much more agreeable about doing things Lyria’s way.
And really, PHEW. Because the Red Hand has gathered many of the girls in the Common, and Victra was DEEEEFINITELY needed to make short work of them before rushing into the tunnels to help out Volga and the other freed slaves. Because yes, THAT part of Lyria’s plan worked, too!
Seriously, everything is coming up Lyria right now and We! Are! Here! For! It!
As for Harmony? Well, they catch sight of her pushing her own men into the path of the freed slaves in her desperate attempt to escape, and now Victra really goes on the hunt. The chase turns into a close-quarters fire-fight in the tunnels…uuuntil Harmony runs out of ammo, that is.
This is when Lyria realizes that Harmony has lured them right up to the edge of a pitviper nest, but they turn that very nest into Harmony’s undoing instead, when Victra hurls Harmony into the pit…where the pitvipers will apparently paralyze her and burrow their eggs IN HER, so that in a few days’ time Harmony will be eaten from the inside out.
WOW-wow-wow-wow-wow. Talk about ROUGH.
Unfortunately they can’t breathe easy QUITE yet – they’re still shut inside the mine, and thanks to the cameras outside they can see the Red Hand torchShip rising from the sea. Victra believes they’re finally done for…until the scanner starts lighting up with dots, because when Gondor calls for aid –
Oh, sorry, wrong series. But really though, Lyria called for aid from Mars, and once that beacon was lit, it lit fires under, well, apparently a whole fuck ton of people.
Okay okay, gotta give credit to Ephraim and the kiddos for boosting her signal once they got a hold of it, but more than that – HOLY SHIT PAX IS APPARENTLY A WHIZ AT PILOTING! Like seriously, not just good – AMAZING. And y’all, this is a talent that’s all his own, not something he can do because of his parents. SNAPS FOR PAX!
In fact, EXTRA snaps for Pax because hey, remember that torchShip? Well, he single-handedly takes it down! And even though some of those who answered the call scoffed at a kid running things over the radio, once they see who he is – and catch sight of the pilot halo he’s wearing – well, let’s just say that they might be chanting his father’s name, but it’s Pax’s own legend that is truly beginning.
Reunions follow, but it’s all somewhat bittersweet as they exchange news of Ulysses’ birth and subsequent death and the fact that they now know who was behind the problems with the Obsidian…it was Xenophon all along!
Oh, and they are working for the Fear Knight, which makes things even WORSE. Problem is, there’s no way to get this information to Sefi – the Alltribe is too paranoid to receive communiques, which leads to Pax asking Ephraim to carry the message to them himself.
Listen, Ephraim is right when he says this is getting ridiculous, but he still agrees to go – though he refuses to let Volga go with him, promising he will be back by breakfast.
We…probably shouldn’t be shocked that this promise doesn’t come to fruition. LE SIGH. Because while Ephraim IS able to sneak into Griffinhold, enlist Ozgard’s help (such as it is), and even break into Xenophon’s room to confront them, this just leads to Xenophon spilling ALL THE BEANS…and then offering Ephraim a place in the Fear Knight’s retinue
Not that Ephraim is about to accept THAT, but on top of everything, it turns out that things are simply too far gone for him to do any good with his intel.
First, the Ascomanni are already there; second, Sefi still believes Xenophon is her ally; third, Xenophon had already conveniently organized a “peace summit” that allows Volsung Fa to stride right in, blame the Alltribe’s problems on the women, and challenge Sefi’s rule.
Sefi is between a rock and a hard place, with no real choice but to accept the challenge…which SUPER sucks because Fa is apparently one hell of a fighter, and she’s not in top form anyway.
It takes Fa less than a minute to cut her down. He then blood eagles her, cuts out her heart, and EATS it, before ordering the Obsidian to sack Olympia…in the AllFATHER’s name, of course.
Gross. Gross. GROSS.
Meanwhile, Ephraim is forced to watch the aftermath of Fa’s ascension, and it’s about as bad as you’d think. Yet there’s Xenophon, reminding Ephraim of their earlier offer to join the Fear Knight’s crusade. Ephraim pretends to consider so that he can get close to Fa – physically, in the immediate moment – and hey, remember that heartspike Electra removed from him? Well, Xenophon has still been assuming they can control Ephraim with it, but it’s not just a heartspike anymore – it’s a BOMB!
Whiiiiich Ephraim sneaks into ol’ Xeno’s pocket and sets off as soon as they are standing before Fa. Of course this means Ephraim is gravely injured, but his moment of celebration regarding taking out Xenophon is short-lived – because Fa has survived the blast, and the last thing Ephraim sees before he dies is that monster yanking out his heart and taking a bite, deeming Ephraim Worthy.
He tried so hard, and got so far, and in the end, it didn’t even matter…
Okay okay okay, not the right time.
Let’s be real, Ephraim went out like a damn hero, and he will absolutely be missed…and by none more than Volga, who we later learn – through Lyria, of course – joined the Julii aid ships that flew to Olympia after Fa and the Obsidians departed, and was found cradling the pieces of Ephraim’s body.
And the sad times aren’t over yet, either, because then Lyria and Volga attend Ulysses’ funeral, remaining on the beach with the kiddos as Victra swims out to sea in a Julii funeral rite that Electra explains some choose not to come back from.
But Victra does return, and after renewing her life oath to Pax and Electra, she swears one to Lyria and Volga as well.
After this they discuss Lyria leaving to find her nephew while Volga goes to Earth to bury Ephraim, but before they can hie off to complete these tasks, who shows up but the current ArchGovernor of Mars – Darrow’s brother Kieran – here to make sure that Victra reveals Volga’s heritage to her and that Volga knows that Fa has requested her presence.
…And that in exchange for her joining him, he will leave Mars.
Volga being Volga, of course she agrees – after all, by doing so she’ll be saving millions of lives. She promises Lyria that Fa will pay for his evil, and then she’s off.
As for Lyria herself, well, her search for her nephew is curtailed as well. Instead, Pax tells her he knows where she might be able to get her parasite fixed…because if she does get it fixed, she could be someone who makes a difference. He insists that he can find Liam easier than she could, anyway, and then pulls out a holoMap of the inner asteroid belt, presumably to tell her about a city called Oculus…
