23. Riggs

23

Riggs

The Shades gathered in the bright lights that lined the front of the building.

Breana and I stood with the other Dragon team members. I admired the glitter of crystals in her hair—she'd tied them in, rather than leaving them around her neck.

I supposed shapeshifters needed to worry about those things.

It was now pitch black out. Cody read out a list of which instructors the teams had been assigned to. Most teams were working in pairs, but it seemed we were to be alone, with Cody as our instructor.

The Sabre shifter took us deep into the meadow before telling us why.

"Most Night Games are done with two teams—a recon, and a strike. But Dragon has the ability to fly solo—you have excellent recon talents with Adilyn's Faerie form and Nar's camouflage, as well as the strength to complete the actual mission." He paused to let us absorb that. "As your team is so new, and hasn't had much time together, I am going to accompany you. Physically, I will interfere as little as possible, but I will provide guidance."

I relaxed a bit, reassured that he would be leading us. We'd worked together with the volcano refugees, but it wasn't the same as training as a unit.

"Our target has agreed to provide us an educational opportunity. They know we are coming, but not exactly when. If they catch us, they will utilize nonlethal means to subdue us. And we, of course, are bound to the same means to complete the mission." He made eye contact with each of us, and we nodded.

"Okay, team. Here we go." He shouldered a substantial pack, and handed out dark cloaks for us to don, before leading us to the gateway. Pausing just outside it, he extracted ear communicators from the pack. "These have homing crystals for both our destination and the academy. So do not lose them. Hoods up."

We obediently installed the comms and raised our hoods before he took us through the gateway.

We arrived in an alley, and Cody moved as though he knew where he was going. Adrenaline flooded through me, and every sense I possessed sharpened in anticipation. As we followed the Sabre down the darkened street, I realized I was enjoying myself.

What I'd sensed before hadn't been a fluke—this kind of thing satisfied something deep inside of me. With my amnesia, it couldn't be rooted in training or memories.

It had to be part of who I was.

My mother had said as much. Could she be right? That I was still who I'd been, despite my not remembering?

The thought was curiously reassuring as Cody took us to a building off the main drag and inside a space with a large "for lease" sign in the window. There, he pulled blueprints from his pack and spread them across a desk.

I peered at a drawing of a large four-story building that appeared to be surrounded by a substantial-sized forested area. It was located on the outskirts of the town.

"Okay. Our target is a machine, three feet by two, and it weighs about 200 pounds. It is held in the basement of this building, behind a locked door. The building is surrounded by a deep moat with a single bridge spanning it. Ground is open for three hundred feet, then forested beyond that, but not densely."

I listened as he outlined the security—two guards at the bridge, another on the roof, and three that circulated through the surrounding forest.

He paused. "Each of you have talents that will help us achieve our objective. As you are all still developing them, we will be cautious in their use. Bree and Riggs, both of you require more training before you can reliably call your talents to bear. So for this mission, we will be relying on your physical aspects."

Breana's eyes had widened. "Do you mean my shapeshifting ability?"

Cody nodded. "Which do you think will be most useful for this?"

Her dark brows dropped. "The roof guard would see the Gryphon in an instant."

"That's right. If we get in a pinch during the withdrawal, it might be useful then. But that isn't your only contribution."

"My equine can carry weight," she said.

"Exactly." Cody purred the word. "We will need it to carry the payload."

Sid spoke up. "I can cart two hundred pounds for a fair distance."

Cody smiled at him. Or rather, bared his teeth. "We will need you to carry it out of the building to Bree's equine. And we might need your strength for other things, too."

Breana bit her lip. "We might need Sid, if I can't shift to my equine."

Cody stared at her intently. "Is that a possibility?"

She sighed. "I don't know. My shifting is not foolproof."

"That is something we need to work on, then, during training," Cody stated. "You should attend a few of the shifting classes. I will talk to Cara."

Breana's mouth twisted, and I wondered just what was up with her internal guide. I'd thought the shifting thing was his deal. Was the crystal dust not working to strengthen him?

"Okay," Cody said. "What are your thoughts on gaining entrance?"

"I can fly in and do a recon," Adilyn hurried to say. "I can also do glamors to help hide our advance, although they do not last for long."

"Very good." Cody smiled. "That might help get us to the moat. We'll have to swim across it."

Sid snorted. "I don't so much swim, as sink. But I can hold my breath for a while."

Breana looked uncomfortable. "I can't swim," she said. When Cody glanced at her, she added, "Centaurs can't swim. And I haven't yet had an opportunity to learn as a human."

"One of the reasons we do these Night Games is to determine where our weaknesses are, as well as our strengths," he told her. "We'll add swimming classes to your list."

"I'll teach her to swim." Nar backed it up with a leer.

"Nice try, fishbreath," I said lightly. But I backed it up with a look that made him blink and take a step away.

Cody's stern eye moved to the Sea Krayt and Leah. "I am well aware of the attraction between mates, but you two push the boundaries. What you do on your own time does not matter to me, but while you are on this mission, you will keep on task and treat your teammates with the respect they are due."

Nar's expression was filled with resentment.

"If you cannot comply, both you and Leah can pack up and leave right now. The last thing we need are distractions during a mission."

Leah poked Nar with her elbow. "We understand, sir," she said. Her eyes flashed, and Nar subsided.

"Will you comply?" Cody pressed.

Leah gave Nar another poke, and he said, "Yes, sir."

"Good." Cody crossed his arms. "Because we have two non-swimmers and a moat between us and the target, we are going to need your talents."

Leah's chin lifted. "I can help with that…"

Adilyn's tiny form flew ahead of us as we skulked through the trees.

I noticed that Sid's eyes had adopted the characteristic flashing that signified telepathic communication between mates. When had that happened? I cast my mind back and assumed they'd been busy while we mixed up cookies and bathed bearing beasts.

Breana moved silently just behind me. I was as aware of her as I was of my own footsteps and had little doubt of where we were headed. It caused a small pang of concern rather than the overwhelming worry of before.

We were in the hands of Fate. Sid and Adilyn were proof that she always got her way.

Nar and Leah, Sid and Adilyn—was Team Dragon going to consist of three mated pairs?

I forced my attention back to the task at hand. In many areas, the trees were mowed to the base. Patches, however, had bushes beneath them, and we stayed to those as much as possible. For the open stretches we were forced to cross, Adilyn spread her faeriedust to glamor us as invisible.

We raced across the more open areas. Sid ghosted through the trees, so light on his feet you couldn't hear them hit the ground. How could something so big move like that?

According to Cody, the three guards loose in the forest did not follow a prescribed route. Adilyn flitted away often to track their progress, and a few times, took us in another direction.

We were more concerned with the guard on the roof because he overlooked everything. So she led us to the last bit of decent overhead cover, before we all hunkered down.

"You'll have to glamor Leah's path to the moat before going after the roof guard," Cody whispered to her.

"Glamoring direct perception is touch-and-go," the Faerie replied. "I can only do it in flashes, and every time I repeat it, it gets weaker." She looked at Leah. "You'll have to be fast." Her glance moved to me. "And you, too."

I nodded. "How will we know you've got him disabled?"

"You won't," she stated. "But by the time Leah does her thing, he will be."

Well, that wasn't perfect, but I guessed it would have to do. She was far too small to carry a comm unit, and my part in this was hard enough without worrying about hers, too. I peered through the leaves to the building, examining the stone that formed the walls. Vines grew up the first three stories, the fourth was basically bare. But the exterior had a decorative feature that would help me—offset stones that formed narrow ledges that were, hopefully, not too tiny.

"If I can't scale that, we're kind of sunk," I said.

"You will." Cody gave me a reassuring smile.

Was he counting on abilities that Razir had? Because they could be as gone as those memories?—

Or not. I'd certainly remembered how to fight.

My gaze dropped to the two guards standing on each side of the building entrance at the far end of the bridge. There wasn't more than a few feet between the building walls and the water.

Cody handed me the rope. I tied it around my waist and draped the remainder of the loop over my shoulder and head.

Adilyn dropped to flit above Leah. "You ready?" she asked.

Leah was clad only in her fur-clothes. She nodded to the Faerie. "Let's do this."

Adilyn sprayed a mist of sparkly dust, and Leah bolted out into the open. Every pace she took was accompanied by more dust. I watched the roof and saw the guard standing there, looking out across the forest. He glanced right at Leah, and then away again.

Leah reached the moat and vanished into the water with hardly a ripple. Adilyn, visible as only a darting dot, rose toward the roof guard.

I couldn't see Leah anywhere, but then her head popped up beneath the bridge.

"She's singing," Nar whispered.

We couldn't hear her from where we waited, but the two bridge guards rubbed at their eyes. Then they both sat down and rested their heads on their knees.

"We're good to go," Nar stated.

We jogged across the open area. If Adilyn's glamor on the roof guard failed, this initiative would be over before it began, but no warning shout sounded.

We crossed the bridge and gathered just outside the door. Leah and I headed along the wall, examining a possible route up. I crouched, and Leah climbed onto my back, locking her arms beneath mine, and then over my neck.

"Ordinarily, I would enjoy hugging you, big guy," she lamented. "But promises are promises."

"Distractions fifty feet in the air could get us killed." I said.

"Yeah. I'll be good." She sighed. "But I am going to close my eyes because I have a thing for heights."

"Okey-dokey. Just stay as still as you can." I inserted my earplugs, fastened my fingers onto a tiny ledge, and began to climb.

I'd only gone about twenty feet when I realized that I did know how to do this. The only thing was, I kept curling my fingers, trying to get my useless human nails to sink into the stone. Which, of course, they couldn't.

Leah didn't weigh much, and she tried to stay very still, but carting her threw off my balance. The vines were ancient and mostly well-anchored, so I used them whenever possible.

Which was almost my undoing. I grabbed one thick stalk, and it came away beneath my hand.

Leah sucked in her breath as we slipped, suspended by only my one hand, but we didn't go far. It wasn't until I looked for a new handhold that I discovered why.

My fingers had sprouted talons. They only extended two inches, but they easily sank into the stone.

My heart thundered. It was the first true sign of what might still live inside me. I hoped Leah had her eyes closed, as I'd be hard-pressed to explain away Dragon talons, even small ones.

We hung there, frozen, while we waited to see if anyone had heard the stalk fracture, or my talons sinking into stone. But nothing happened, and my new additions made scaling the last story a simple exercise. I paused beneath the parapet, and Leah's arms tightened as she began to sing.

With the earplugs, I couldn't hear her, but the vibrations penetrated my body, and I had a sudden craving to do whatever she asked. I was very glad I couldn't hear the words.

That was some radical power she possessed.

After a few minutes, Adilyn appeared above my head, and I climbed the last few feet onto the roof. The guard was just lying there, snoring loudly.

I kept my hands as much in shadow as I could. How in the heck was I going to get those talons to vanish? I turned my back and heaved the rope over my shoulder?—

And stared down at normal, human fingers. Had I imagined the entire thing?

I extracted the earplugs and pulled the rope off my shoulder, tying one end to the parapet protrusions to make sure it was secure for the few hundred pounds of Anisau coming up.

Sid climbed so fast he was there before I realized he'd grabbed hold. Then he and I hauled up Nar, Breana, and finally, Cody.

I grabbed Breana's hand as she reached the parapet and lifted her onto the roof. She met my gaze, and smiled.

The feelings that surged through me as I smiled back had nothing to do with the mission. If I still wanted to keep her out of my chaotic life, I was doing a pitiful job of it.

My heart told me it had gone too far for me to back out now. I wanted her there. Because a large part of me insisted that it was where she belonged…