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"Ugh," groaned the red-haired man. "Not this again."

Leo turned to him. "I signed up to defend the Empire and see the world, Harry! Not stand guard on a wall or a damn basement, waiting to be eaten by some terrible monster!"

Harry shook his head. "Well, I for one am glad for this assignment. Outside of the raids, we don't have tofight. Makes me almost wish the Guardian prevented us from fightingeverywherewe went."

"Yeah, but Lady Frexin just makes those wolf shifters and mechs do the fighting in our stead."

"Yeah, well," Harry shrugged. "As long as it's not me."

"Gaaa," Leo crowed. "You're such a coward!"

Harry smiled. "Most definitely."

Was that a joke? Or did I forget what coward means? Humans were so confusing sometimes …

A screech sounded overhead, and we looked up.

"Something riled up the squigs again," Harry said. "Let's get under cover."

"Take us out of here," I whispered as shadows began to plummet towards us.

Serali blinked, and then we were hovering in the shadow of a tall building deeper in the city.

My heart raced in my human body, and I patted the dragonling's back. "Good job!" I praised. "You really are getting better at moving around like this."

She nodded tiredly and moved to rest on a nearby windowsill.

"Good idea. Let's rest a bit, and then go to that soil —"

A familiar voice interrupted my thoughts, pulling my eyes to the room on the other side of the window. The Stone Sage, or Frexin, or whatever they called her now, stood inside talking to that sneaky wolf shifter with brown hair and scars. His eyes and ears were too keen for my liking.

Below, I could just make out the screams of a man … one of the ones Kaiya reacted to.

Serali narrowed her eyes at Frexin, but I patted her side to soothe her. Now was not the time to attack. Not with my human body locked up and my powers weakened.

"And what about the search teams?" the Stone Sage asked, gesturing towards a large paper on the table. A map perhaps?

"Teams 16 and 19 are believed to be lost."

"Damnit!" Frexin cursed.

"However, team 3 just returned."

Frexin shook her head. "Useless. It's been months. Their path is too long."

I peered closer, trying to understand the map they studied. It seemed to be a city of some sort. It was almost familiar … but the memory I wanted kept slipping away.

"Yes," the shifter said. "They lost two months getting to the rift. But they took a different route back." He traced a winding path from the center of the city to the edge of the map. "And that path only cost them a day."

Frexin sat up straight. "A day! Are you sure?"

The man nodded.

"Gods! That's excellent! Begin clearing the path for —"

The body mage's head turned in our direction, and he held up a hand to quiet her. "We have company," he whispered, eyes narrowing on our window.

Frexin's eyes went wide. "Guards!" she shouted. "Guards!"