Much of what we know regarding the life of Kharn Sagara is confined to Hadrian Marlowe’s autobiography, given the fact that—from antiquity—the planet Vorgossos maintained its status as a hermit kingdom, obscuring its existence even from the majority of the Extrasolarians. Indeed, it was not until Marlowe’s day that the planet’s existence even entered official record. Based on information remanded to Legion Intelligence by then-Captain Bassander Lin as part of Operation Purseweb, we know now that Vorgossos was originally located in orbit around a field brown dwarf about 30 light-years from Old Earth system (referenced in ancient Mericanii map data as CFBDS J005910.90-011401.3). From Marlowe’s writing, we know the planet was originally selected by the American Dominion Government to house one of their black sites, Fort Grissom, in their war against Earth’s early colonies, among them Avalon.

Also from Lord Marlowe’s writing, we are given the barest sketch of the young Sagara’s background. Born on an Imperial colony in the first or second millennium of the Sollan Empire, the young Sagara was captured and carried off to Vorgossos as a slave by reavers associated with the American remnant. Conscripted into their service under one Crowninshield, Sagara eventually seized control of Fort Grissom for himself, suborning the artificial intelligence, Brethren. How this was done is unclear, and we can but speculate. We can likewise only speculate on how it is that Sagara first came to utilize the technology of remote synaptic kinesis, that process by which a person’s mind might be transmitted one from the next. It is widely believed to have been inspired or created by Brethen itself.

We can, however, be quite confident that it was the Cielcin who designed the planet’s engines for Kharn Sagara. Following the success of Operation Purseweb, several legions were dispatched to Vorgossos system, only to find the planet gone entirely. When the planet was discovered later by the joint Imperial-Latarran armada under Ohannes Douro and Calen Harendotes (himself a clone of Kharn Sagara), it was found several hundred light-years away, in the Pleiades. Marlowe credits Syriani Dorayaica itself with the construction of Vorgossos’s world-engines, part of an agreement wrought between the Cielcin Prophet and the King of Vorgossos, though it is possible other of the clan chieftains—such as Aranata Otiolo—were involved in that venture—which is estimated to have taken several thousand years.

Despite the fact that rumor of Kharn Sagara has increased in frequency since the Battle of Gododdin, he remains a shadowy figure, one little examined by greater galactic history despite his mythic nature. If Lord Marlowe’s account is to be taken at face value (as indeed it ought not), Sagara’s careful tradition of a neat line of succession, donor-to-clone, collapsed in the wake of Operation Purseweb in ISD 16227, and was shattered by the Harendotes incarnation at the Battle of Vorgossos in ISD 17458. There may now be hundreds, even thousands of clone-variants of the former Monarch loose in the galaxy.

He may not remain in the shadows much longer.