On the left, Dalia Knar. Great-grandneice of Dromi Cael, her once-proud family line, so closely tied to the great family of Xarsil, has been whittled down over the years. Her sister Niana was killed by the assassin Saal'Ku in a treacherous plot when Dalia was not even a teenager, and though her father and her elder brothers and sisters grieved and cursed the killer, only Dalia dedicated her life to avenging her dead sister and her disgraced father. While she has accomplished this, assisting Kathra Noor and Alex Reese in bringing Saal'Ku to justice, her fight has not yet ended. With the help of Dromi Ahreis Khral, she uncovered the perpetrator in the scheme that claimed the life of her sister, and exacted her justice upon him, while earning the trust and respect of Dromi Ahreis, to the point that she became his blademaiden, his right hand warrior and bodyguard. It was a position she was honored to have, though after the mysterious assassin Zartran killed Ahreis, it was one she felt unworthy of. Leaving Xarsil, she helped Kathra Noor's allies once more, tracking down the ruthless killer to bring him to justice. While they succeeded, events back home had reached a boiling point. Sector Lord Rilan Kerse, usurping the seat of the Dromi, launched an invasion of the Triani Alliance, devastating many worlds, but bringing down the wrath of the tokin, who defeated Kerse's forces and bottled them up in the Xarsil system, leaving the Dro'Xaren Ephex beaten and broken. Dalia found herself without a place to call her home, as she refused to grant the xenophobic and murderous Kerse her allegiance. Instead, she wandered the DMZ of the outer xaersi colonies, searching for a man who, according to rumor, could take back the seat of the Dromi and oust Kerse, returning Xarsil to glory hand in hand with Triani. On the right, Cron Retka. Great-grandson of Dromi Cael, his family line completely shattered with no relations still breathing, none to tell him that, with the death of Dromi Ahreis with no successors and the Khral family line obliterated, he remains the closest surviving relation to the Imperial family. Brought up in an orphanage on the border world of Tarsis after the death of his mother in the Fire of Karos, tutored by a retired Seeker by the name of Marus Tvuren, and with a mind full of stories of xarsian glory in decades long past, Cron never believed he would rise any furthur than a civilian guard in the DMZ. Despite the protestations of his mentor, he firmly believes that the Triani Alliance was responsible for the tokin onslaught following Rilan Kerse's assault on Triani worlds, and that the overzealousness that led to thousands of innocent xaersi deaths should be avenged a hundredfold upon the humans, brakens, zhintaui, and renjiri that brought the tokin to the Imperial doorstep and ordered them to attack. Unknown to him, agents of both Rilan Kerse's True Imperials and the Triani Alliance are searching for him, knowing full well that to put a Dromi back on the seat of the Dro'Xaren Ephex could very well unite the entire xaersi populace in both the quarantined Xarsil system and the DMZ and turn the path of Takisi Garden to either war or peace, to a Fifth Imperial War and subsequent slaughter by the tanu, or a chance to hold firm and protect their homes. All rests on the actions of these two, Dalia and Cron, future heroes of Xarsil.