Skywardens

Where endrinriggers mend, Skywardens unmake. Veterans of the aetheric harness, they serve as the fleet's outriders and skirmish screen: lancing down on skypikes, seeding the air behind them with skymines and timed charges, and cutting apart anything that tries to close with the vessels they are paid to protect.

Skywardens tend to be older than the riggers whose harnesses they share: arkanauts and privateersmen who traded the deck for the open sky and never came back down. They fight with a cold economy the young riggers lack, for the warden's trade teaches one lesson above all: in the high airs, the first mistake is generally also the last.