The journey home took two days.

Marina spent most of it processing the two configurations she had absorbed, running them through her awareness the way she had learned to integrate new frequency work, slow and deliberate, checking each piece against what she already carried.

The fundamental frequency reading was the simpler of the two. She understood its mechanics clearly now, the way it confirmed rather than revealed for people she already knew well, the way it would function as a diagnostic tool for corruption or deception in people she did not.

The second configuration was harder to name.

It was not a reading tool. It was closer to what the...