So Asanka, Lyr and Suak grew into adulthood together. There came a time when Asanka was in his late teens that Suak grew big enough to trigger the Kalonian plateau defences. Then Crinomu made a loose collar for the alegoyle's neck with a coded transponder which allowed Suak to fly at will over the plateau, for by now he had bonded totally with Asanka. Yet it was this change to the defence protocols which Gyrun blamed for the tragedy that resulted in the death of Cassia. Somehow there was a failure in the systems of station three and an alegoyle attack caught the horse unawares, ending in a fatal chase. Though Suak raised the alarm and tried to draw off the attack from his wild kindred he was unable to do more than briefly distract the three larger creatures and Orietta's faithful mare met her end on the soft downs of the Kalonia plateau that she had come to regard as her home. Orietta was distraught and as he watched his mother weeping over the body Asanka felt his first intimations of mortality and a disturbing sense that his childhood was over. Two events which followed closely were forever linked in his mind. Hirrilow announced that Asanka was old enough now to learn something darker about the politics of the Enclaves. He explained to the young man exactly what the curse of Kalonia meant and how the arrival of his mother and his own birth had both compounded the sins of the Kalonian station of Seers in the eyes of more orthodox Enclaves. For the first time, Asanka heard the name of the station of Trassamul, highest amongst Enclave "equals" in the Conclave and foremost in denouncing Kalonia as a traitor to the Vow of Earth. "Trassamul moves against us more openly now than ever before", Hirrilow said. "They claim to know much of what happens in the station and it appears that they do. They must have a spy for our curse prevents them from obtaining information through the vurtiverse. I have my suspicions as to who that spy may be but I dare not to act on them yet." "I am concerned too about the attitude of the local Rider tribes. Embelin reports that they have been organising in unusual ways which suggest some disturbance in the social balance. It is unclear why this is happening now or where it will lead but I do not think it a coincidence." Less than a week after the disquieting meeting with Hirrilow, Crinomu took Asanka down to a deep room below the surface of the dome. It was a place the youth had never seen before. "This is my treasure trove", he said. "I negotiated for this space with the original builders of Kalonia long before the Seers took over this station. I want to show you something from the times before the Vow Of Earth, something I brought back from the Galactic Compact."