Darrow evacuates the spire after the gala fight, wracked with guilt over leaving Mustang behind. Augustus shows rare grief for Leto and fear for Mustang as their battered entourage descends, seven dead and many wounded. Darrow carries a dying Praetor while Victra tends wounds; Tactus, injured but irreverent, banters and credits training with Lorn. The group’s warriors look to Darrow as their decisive leader.

Missing Obsidians and Grays signal the Sovereign’s interference, but she cannot openly slaughter a Great House. In the forest below, Darrow witnesses a Falthe hunting pack led by Lilath and Cipio butcher House Thorne members, including children, underscoring the night’s collapse of rules. Daxo reports a data jammer is active, severing contact with orbit. The Praetor dies; Darrow assumes command, assigning Kavax and Daxo to guard Augustus.

Reinforced by allied Norvo and Codovan Golds, they fight toward the hangars. Tactus, cloaked as a decoy, draws off attackers, then repels an ambush, killing Cipio while Lilath escapes, raging against “babykillers.” The Jackal silently follows; his crippling of Leto remains unseen by others.

At the stone halls, they discover all family ships recalled and ripWings patrolling—confirmation that the Sovereign preplanned isolation by removing ships and barring Obsidians. Then ninety-nine Obsidian Praetorians and an Olympic Knight descend. The wolf-helmed knight reveals himself as Fitchner, Darrow’s former Proctor, now the Rage Knight.

Fitchner mocks appeals to Mars, declares house arrest by Sovereign order, and claims to have killed Augustus’s Stained. When Augustus bristles, Fitchner drops him with a stunFist, then stuns the Jackal. He demands Darrow accompany him. Kavax intercedes, but Fitchner orders the Telemanuses to return Augustus to his villa. After extracting Fitchner’s assurance that nonresistance will spare their house, Darrow chooses not to resist and submits to avoid giving cause for executions.