Once they were out of sight, they headed toward their headquarters. Shyla soon discovered that using a cane in sand was difficult. Every step soon became an effort. Jayden walked beside her, helping to support her weak leg. He also erased their tracks.

“Are you going to be able to meet up with the caravan? Or should Ximen and I go?” he asked when they reached the temple.

She considered their strategy to purchase the platinum. Surely her leg would be better by then. And then it hit her. “We can’t follow our original plan with the caravan.”

“Why not?”

“Because there’s a good chance the priestess knows about it.”

“Not this again. Shyla, your logic is flawed. Banqui—”

“That’s enough.” She’d reached her limit and was finished with being nice. “Let’s go settle this right now.” She limped to the ladder.

“Wait!” Jayden caught up to her. “What are you going to do?”

“You know what I’m going to do. It’s time everyone takes the oath.”

Everyone gathered in the common room. Fifty people crammed together. A few had been in the middle of work and full buckets of sand sat by their feet. Gurice and Mojag stood in the front with Ximen. Some had been woken up and they peered at her with tired and grumpy expressions. Too bad.

Jayden helped her to step up onto a low table to address them. “We’ve gained a number of new members and we’ve learned some critical information. Danger is approaching and we must be able to counter it as a unified organization. I’ve heard people talking about being an acolyte, or an original member, or a vagrant. That needs to stop. You’re all Invisible Swords.” She paused and met each of their gazes.

“And you will all take the oath and pledge your loyalty to the organization and to each other. You’ll all stand as witnesses. As part of the ceremony, I will draw our symbol on your upper arms.” There was a rumble of dismay. “You won’t see the symbol unless you can wield magic, nor will blood be shed.” Shyla drew the glyph on the wall with a piece of chalk. “This is what it will look like.”

She let her words sink in before continuing. “As your leader, I will go first.” She handed her stylus to Jayden.

He stared at the writing instrument in alarm. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

Explaining how she’d pushed her magic through the instrument when she’d practiced on Gurice, Shyla rolled up her left sleeve, exposing her shoulder.

“I don’t think—”

“At least she didn’t ask you to cut out her eyeballs,” Ximen said, interrupting Jayden. “Like she did to me.”

He shot Ximen a horrified glare.

“Ready?” she asked.

“No.” Jayden sighed. “I’ll try.”