Bursts of fire exploded across the night sky from direction of the harbor.

At once, the serenity of this quaint island ritual vanished. The crowds descended into madness all around, and Urla’s battle instinct took over.

She sprinted from the fields on the far side of the village. Weaving between frantic bodies. Heading straight toward the flames.

Urla had to find Campos. And Ruan. Where the bloody Abyss had her son gone? He’d been right there only minutes ago.

But she’d left her guard down. Lulled in by the magic of the night, and Campos’s assurances, and the strange beauty of so many disparate cultures gathered in one place. Pulled in conversation with Thenius and Rykus, recounting tales of battles with her fellow captain and sharing capital gossip with Thenius, who’d become far more amiable after a few hits of Faltari dream smoke earlier in the night.

Gods damn me to the pits of Skrala, I should have watched Ruan more carefully.

She hadn’t wanted to be that mother. Her son was a man grown. A potential Dragonmount. And she was a Lady Captain of the imperial legions, ordered to mingle with the other parents and act fascinated by the ritual, and she’d fallen into the role even more than expected. Not realizing just how much she’d longed for a night of frivolity after the Sigan campaign, after the dragonfall.

Now, she was only grateful she’d still had the sense not to dull her wits with drink or smoke.

Dark plumes filled the skies on the other side of the village as she raced through the village lanes. Only two things could trigger such an explosion. And there were no Dragonmounts here.

Her lungs kept a steady rhythm as she lumbered forward. The cadence of a body built for war, honed over a lifetime of training.

Most of the crowd ran in the opposite direction, and Urla found herself pressing her way against a raging torrent of frantic villagers and traders. Most of whom, Urla knew, had seen nothing of battles. She’d never seen a firebomb used anywhere but the battlefield.

Urla leapt over a toppled vendor cart, shouldered her way between a pair of shrieking Ytani traders. She longed for the comfort of her war axe in her palms. Her body responded with the focus and precision of the battlefield. Eyes noting every movement, every space to maneuver, every possible threat.

A scream. Somewhere to her right. Different than the others.

Urla turned.

The attacking creature appeared in the lane ahead as though it had formed from the air itself.

Dark wings protruded from a naked humanoid torso with a span of at least ten feet. Its skin was dark as pitch. The thing leapt into the air, fiery eyes scanning the crowd, before settling on Urla.

It flapped hard toward her, shooting over ducking heads with remarkable speed.

The crowd parted around her, and Urla leapt to the side, narrowly missing the slashing attack of long black talons. She rolled on the hard ground of the village lane, eyes fixed on her attacker.

Urla had never encountered such a creature before on the battlefield. It seemed to be some sort of gruesome cross between dragyr and man. Urla sprang back to her feet. The creature landed in the middle of the street where she’d stood a moment ago, and transformed in an instant back into a fully clothed man. Hair was dark brown, skin fair and smooth as ivory.

Valucian!

The crowd thinned around him, save for a Chardonian woman.

Urla backed toward a toppled cart, eying a long rod that held the tattered remnants of a vendor’s curtain.

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Without fear, the Chardonian woman came abreast of the shapeshifting creature.

What in the Abyss was it?

But Urla knew who he served. Such dark magic was possible in only one heathen land.

The man nodded to his Chardonian companion and both creatures morphed, taking on hideous dark-winged forms, faces distorting, eyes turning feral, teeth flashing long and white and menacing. They leapt into the air and shot forward.

Urla ducked their attack, this time letting her momentum take her toward the cart. She rolled on the hard-packed dirt and seized the splinter of the curtain rod, ripping it out of looped fastenings, and whipped it around to face her attackers.

The first creature soared out of reach, selling her feint. Urla ducked the other’s swooping attack and drove straight up with her splintered weapon.

The rod did not pierce easily. Urla thrust with all her strength, forcing the dull wood thick leathery skin. The rod wrenched from her grasp with a sick squelching sound, and the creature tumbled onto the ground.

Urla raced over, seizing the rod. The creature morphed back into the form of the Chardonian woman. Sheer black hair and sandy skin. Face trembling with fury and frailty. Urla drove the rod deeper into her chest, timber scraping against bone as it slid deeper between her ribs. The woman’s eyes and mouth gaped, blood seeping from all orifices.

The impact of the second monster ripped Urla away from the kill, talons tearing into her shoulder, sending her reeling.

Urla fell back on to the road. Her skull crunched against something hard. Wooden. The cart!

She shook her head to ward off the swirl of haze filling her vision. The creature pinned her to the ground, talons boring into her chest.

But she might not have worn weapons, but she’d had the sense to wear a leathern chest piece beneath her gown, at least.

Urla’s fingers searched the ground, latched on to something hard, and she whipped it around. The piece of pottery shattered over the creature’s skull. Its head jerked back, but it did not let go, talons digging through her armor, piercing her chest. Its face was hideous up close, mouth blood red, though its breath was strangely sweet.

Talons gripped Urla around the throat.

“Where’s the boy?” it asked, voice thick and gravelly.

“Wh-wh—”

“Your son!” it snarled.

“If I knew, I’d never—ah!”

The creature’s talons slashed across her face. It shoved her head hard against the ground, waves of pain shooting down her spine. Urla cursed herself for getting pinned.

The creature traced one talon up her cheek and pressed into the soft tissue beneath her eye. She shrieked.

“Where is he?”

“Do your worst, you bast—ah!”

The pain was unlike anything Urla had felt in her life. Her vision went dark.

Blood gushed over her face with a horrific squelch. Pain leeched through the cracks in her skull. She thrashed with arms and legs, but the creature was stronger than any warrior she’d faced on the battlefield. Supernaturally strong.

“Tell me where—”

Its voice cut off with a croaking howl of pain. Talons ripped out of Urla’s body, and the creature’s weight was gone.

Urla flailed around, vision dark on one side, a blur on the other. There was another shriek of pain. The scrape of weapon on bone that Urla knew all too well. Her fingers grasped another piece of pottery. She leapt to her feet, ignoring the blazing pain, but feel instantly. Her mind dizzy with pain.

She scrambled up, forced herself to her knees, and brandished the pottery.

“I’m no threat, Lady Captain.”

Urla recognized that calm voice. All other sounds were distant. Screams. Flames. Mayhem.

She wiped blood from her face, and her vision focused some. The elder Faltari shaman.

He’d saved her life, she realized dimly. Her mind whirled. Pain lanced through her skull like a thousand needles pressing from all sides. She slumped back, and the pottery slipped from her grasp and shattered on the ground.

“The creatures…” she murmured. Her voice was a gurgle. Blood in her mouth. She spat, and it dribbled down the side of her face.

“Both dead,” the man said, kneeling beside her in the darkness.

“My eyes,” she murmured.

Warmth swept over Urla’s body. She’d felt the touch of a healer before, but this was far more powerful than any Peroian arcanist. Pain dulled in her thighs and torso. And then, her face. Her head throbbed with a dull ache, but she could see more clearly again, on the one side. The glow of flames filled the smoky skies above. To her right, the body of the female creature, back in her Chardonian human form.

The shaman stood before her, but she could not see him entirely until she turned her head.

“You’re lucky. The beast would’ve taken the entire eye next, I expect. You believe you’ll see fine once the swelling goes down. This will have to do for now.”

Urla did not let her mind dwell on it. The man had done incredible work in moments. She shook her head, temples throbbing.

“We must go,” Joren said. “Where’s the consul general?”

“Campos returned to the ship for the night.” Urla eased up to a sitting position with the shaman’s help, then got to her feet. She forced herself to focus, pushing back against the pangs that wracked her body, despite the shaman’s healing.

Joren pulled the length of a bonespear from the male creature’s chest and drew a short axe from his belt, and handed it to her.

Clarity swept over her at the hilt of a weapon in her fingers.

“Hurry,” said the shaman.

Urla grabbed the man’s wrist. “They’re not just here for the eggs. They wanted my son.”

“They’re after riders too.”