Cutty pushes Rocinante up into the scrubby mountains above Pasadena, following a hand‑painted sign toward the Temple of the Rising Moon and the sister who vanished into its orbit. What he finds is a crumbling "spiritual community" with a prophet who talks like a brochure, a classic woody wagon half‑packed for escape, and a law‑school dropout named Paula who is closer to mutiny than enlightenment. A simple argument over a pink slip spirals into a raid on the commune's money man, a showdown with Ayer's hired muscle, and Cutty's first real glimpse of how dangerous this brotherhood is willing to be to keep its flock.