An excerpt from Isker Bey at World's End...

Grayish-black smoke from the fires raging onshore choked the air. An acrid smell burned Isker's nostrils. The air felt very hot even though the smoke blocked out the sun entirely. He hadn't noticed the night before, but the blast wave that struck the ship damaged several of the sails, mandating hours of repair work. When the crew completed the repairs around daybreak, Sahar ordered Captain Kopaska to sail east to within several nautical spans of the shore. When they arrived, the Captain weighed anchor and brought a monoscope to Sahar. She stood at the starboard railing facing the former location of Revodna, once the capital of the Saraka Dominion and now only burning ruins. She thanked him, extended the scope, and looked into the area of wreckage.

"Gone!" she declared excitedly. "It's just all - gone! Flattened to rubble and ash! Lots of fires still. I'd say about ten wagon spans around the city is burning, but that's a guess. It's so beautiful!" She dropped the monoscope from her eye and looked at Kopaska. "The Dominion will collapse without the king and court. It is no more! The Xu are avenged!" She turned her gaze to Isker (who now stood equal in height) with a bright smile and the light of triumph in her dark eyes. "Here, Isker, look upon my work!" She handed him the monoscope.

Isker put it up to his left eye. Indeed, nothing remained of the Sarakan capital city except rubble, ash, and fire. He spied s only a flat, burning circle of destruction created by Sahar's detonation of the Narata weapon. The blast burned all the wooden port buildings to gray ash. The explosion shattered the city wall into nothing by broken pebbles. Sarakans charred corpses bobbed in the water like buoys. Isker found it all a gruesome sight and could not share Sahar's evident delight in the devastation.

"A great victory, mum!" Kopaska told her.

"Indeed, the greatest victory of our age!" Sahar replied with a laugh. "And in a few solars, no one will remember!"

"I always will," Kopaska told her

Here ends the Saga of Isker Bey and the Last Timekeeper.