I eyed the hole she’d made at the top of the debris, feeling more than a little bit claustrophobic, but told myself if I could subject Maata to the horrors of water, I could survive skinnying through a small hole deep in the earth.

We made it through unscathed, and continued our careful ascent up the passageway when it became obvious that we were approaching a lit area. I shadowed and crept ahead of Maata and Cyrene, pausing as the passageway made a sharp turn.

Before me was a door, partially opened, and a large collection of crates. I made my silent way around them and peered through the door into a bedroom.

Voices, indistinguishable in gender and identity, were audible through the closed door opposite.

“What is it?” Cyrene asked in a whisper, trying to see around me. “Is that a bed?”

“Yes. Stay here. I’m going to see who’s in the room beyond,” I answered, gesturing the two of them back.

Maata made a noise of distress.

“No one will see me,” I reassured her and, being careful not to disturb a couple more crates placed in front of the opened door, tiptoed my way across the bedroom. Carefully I cracked the door open just enough to see out.

All I could see was the edge of a wall, and the entrance to a larger room that evidently served as a living room. A man leaned negligently against the wall, his back toward me, but the long brown ponytail stirred memories.

Blue flashed as another man crossed the room, his hands gesturing as he spoke. “—be so unrealistic? What you ask is not possible at all. I will not put my sept in jeopardy by allowing it.”

A woman’s voice answered. “Your sept, such as it is, is in ruins. The situation has changed, and we must change with it. With the silver dragons possessing a shard—and surely they will be given access to the green sept’s shard—we must gather together the remainder.”

“Who is it?” Cyrene asked in an almost silent whisper. Both she and Maata had crept up behind me, Cyrene kneeling in order to peer through the crack in the door, while Maata, a good foot taller than me, simply looked over my head.

“Fiat, the man who may or may not be Baltic, and some woman, I don’t know . . . agathos daimon,” I swore as the woman marched over to stand toe to toe with Fiat. “It’s Bao.”

“You are allowing your greed for the dragon heart to override the reality of the situation,” Fiat answered, his eyes glittering wickedly. “That is a mistake your predecessor did not make.”