[Report by VanNet encrypted router.]

Meaning unclear. Perhaps simply a threat. "We are hidden closer than you know."

[Personal notes, knotted in a codex of Hive gut.]

Now I am hiding the truth even from my own friend. I do not want to make them distrust the Vanguard. But I am sure that this warning is genuine… and that it points to a threat in our own ranks. There are inflections to this logograph that speak of a killer hidden in plain sight.

I must not become paranoid, as Kuang Xuan did—but I think the warning is for me. I think the enemy wants me safe from my own kind, so that I will continue to receive its messages. (And share them with my friend? Is that my true purpose? Am I only a conduit for their corruption?)

I am convinced that the absolute interdict upon knowledge of the Darkness is misguided. We CAN understand the enemy without falling under its sway. If I can pass through Darkness and return, so can others. Perhaps… under my guidance.

Perhaps I can be a teacher.

Mara would be horrified if she knew—afraid for me—but my Queen herself stole Oryx's power. Can communion with the black fleet be so much more dangerous?

I planted the pine-apples. They have already blossomed. The Golden Age agriculturalists must have tweaked them for growth and hardiness. Little purple thistles—they delight me. Enina asks after their health.

I am suspicious of her. She is too eager to please. And who knows which faction that snooping Ghost reports to? Was it hers?