No one was feeling particularly good about landing here.

When the airship was anchored and the rope ladders thrown over the side of the vessel, Khyber assembled everyone but the Druid Guard and the Rover crewmen on the aft deck. There were muted exchanges of comments and responses from those gathered as the Ard Rhys waited for them to get settled. More than a few gave worried glances at the forest of rock spears and mist serpents that formed a gloomy, shadowy wall ahead.

“We go on afoot from here,” Khyber announced. “We’ll take everyone but Farshaun, Mirai, and the Rover crewmen, who will stay to keep the Walker Boh safe for our return. Garroneck will choose six of his Druid Guards to remain behind, as well—an added precaution. The rest of us will enter the Fangs to search for a marshland. Once we’ve found it, we will decide what to do next. Are there questions?”

“I’ll have to go, as well,” Farshaun spoke up at once. “The Speakman won’t go without me. Mirai and my Rovers are perfectly capable of caring for the airship without me.”

Redden, standing close to Mirai, expected the Rover girl to object to being left behind. Staying close to the twins was one of the reasons she had been allowed to come. But to his surprise, she didn’t say a word.

“Very well, Farshaun,” the Ard Rhys agreed. “You come, as well.”

She dismissed them to gather their equipment and weapons and meet on the ground in thirty minutes.

Redden glanced at the overcast sky, noted the position of the sun, and decided they had less than four hours of light remaining. He glanced again at Mirai, who was looking away, and then at Railing.

His brother shrugged. “I don’t like it, either. Should we say something to her?”

Redden shook his head.

Thirty minutes later, the search party set out. With the Speakman and Khyber Elessedil leading the way, they pushed ahead into the forest of stone columns and within minutes could no longer see the ship and its occupants. Right away Redden felt uncomfortable with the size of the search party. It was too large and too unwieldy, an opinion he shared with his brother but otherwise kept to himself. Presumably the Ard Rhys knew what she was doing, and if she thought they needed twenty-odd people it wasn’t his place to start criticizing. What Redden didn’t like was the way they were spread out, so far apart as they picked their way through the maze of rock formations that those on the opposite wings of the loose formation often could not see one another.

Reacting to his instincts, he moved Railing and himself into the center of the search.