Character portrait - Saal'Ku, the b#tch who killed my main character's parents in cold blood. Hired by the Dro'Xaren Ephex, by a Sector Lord named Arala Khatu, Saal'Ku was ordered to assassinate a nobleman's daughter in a public gathering, then finger the khite cults that had long been a thorn in the Ephex's side in that area. She succeeded, and was then hired to hunt down and kill the two refugees that were blamed for the assassination, an innocent young pair of siblings named Ao and Rama Dei'Rein. Saal'Ku followed them to Khursinhi, killing Rama at the spaceport and tracking Ao through the streets. Desperate for help, Ao sought shelter in the home of Ejori and Sachia Noor, but Saal'Ku found her and killed both her quarry and the innocent renjiri couple trying to protect her. She nearly killed the then-eleven-year-old Kathra and her five-year-old brother Kiril, but Kathra snuck up behind Saal'Ku and shot her in the leg with her own pulse pistol. Thus began Saal'Ku's downward spiral into poverty and her implacable hatred for Kathra, and Kathra's adoption by Nari and induction into the Dari resistance. The two women would not meet for twelve years, but when they do, sparks fly.