The following morning, Ryder stalked along his usual path to work, alert and edgy, and made it all the way to the studio without any disturbing sensations. As the day wore on, he found himself on more than one occasion staring off into space, reliving that moment of panic when he knew he had been seen. Each time the bell rang up in the shop with the opening of the front door, he froze and listened, certain that the next voice he heard would be deep and gravelly, announcing his arrest.

When sunset approached, he closed up shop and started for home, not bothering to alter his route since the spy already knew exactly where to find him. It was unnerving nonetheless when he felt the eyes of the watcher latch onto him again. The tingling up his neck was stronger than ever and somehow more insistent. His nerves were strained past the point of his endurance and he knew he had to do something to find out what was going on to alleviate the tension.

Without glancing around, he picked up his pace down the long block of elegant houses, keeping himself quite visible on the sidewalk as he navigated around several individuals making their way home. As soon as he reached the corner, he turned, sprinting forward as soon as he knew he was out of sight of anyone who might be behind him, and made for the entrance to a passageway leading into the courtyard behind the block. He slipped quickly into the alley and ran for the first darkened doorway along the side, concealing himself behind the stone frame of the shallow entrance which gave him a clear view back out to the street as well as anyone walking by. His heart slammed in his chest as he waited, pensively watching the sidewalk to catch a glimpse of whoever was on his tail.

He didn’t have long to wait. Several people passed the alley in their usual hurry to get home with heads tucked down and hands in their pockets, but only one pair of eyes turned to scan the passage searching for someone. They were shimmery and clear, and they belonged to the diminutive new housekeeper.

Ryder frowned. Since the guild had sent the woman in the first place, it made all too much sense that she had also been hired to shadow him. She was already on the payroll and it was obvious from her shabby clothing that she was in dire need of extra money.

He kept himself quite still as he watched her, studying her face as she peered into the darkness of the alley. There was something about her eyes that made him pause—a glimmer of sadness and a touch of desolation slipped out from beneath her bland expression as she shifted her gaze toward the street again, sifting through people who had already gone by.

He waited until the woman moved on past the alley before he stepped out from the doorway and hurried back to the sidewalk to see where she would go. She had come to a stop at the next corner and was looking both ways, hunting for him, and stood for several moments in apparent indecision before her slender shoulders drooped with defeat. He half expected her to cross the intersection to the right and continue on toward his apartment, but she surprised him by moving down the street in the opposite direction. He took off after her, intent on finding out who she was or, more importantly, who she reported to, and followed behind her at a safe distance, keeping her slight figure well within view.

When the woman reached the broad avenue running south from the business district, she took to the sidewalk leading down the gradual incline toward the southern gate in the wall. The light of both suns was almost gone by the time she passed through the open iron doors. For a moment Ryder hesitated—the fliers would be out soon and the gates to the artisan quarter would be closed and locked, but his dire need to know what was going on pressed into his chest leaving him only one choice.

Trusting in his own abilities and speed, Ryder continued on down the hill after the troublesome housekeeper and left the relative protection of his walled neighborhood. He trailed the woman for quite some time as she wound her way through the dingy residential district. He’d never had any reason to come into this older part of the city and he was appalled at the condition of the buildings. The apartment houses and storefronts were in a far greater state of deterioration than he had seen anywhere else in Tessin. Smashed facades, cracked windows, debris and refuse littered most of the blocks. Foul smells met his nostrils on several occasions, reeking of rot or ruptured sanitation lines which would never be repaired.

Ryder kept his eyes pinned on the housekeeper in front of him, wondering just where she was headed in this stinking cesspool when she came to a stop at the entrance to a tall high-rise and disappeared within. The dirty facade was covered with scores of uniform windows illuminated by scattered lights and as he crossed the last street into the block, a quick scan revealed that it was the only intact building left in the entire area. Slipping into the crumbling entry hall of a deserted apartment house across from the high-rise, he leaned against the wall in the shadows, debating what, if anything, this told him about the woman. If she lived here, it merely confirmed that she was poor, but gave him no further clue about her connections. As to the remote possibility that she had come to meet someone, he seriously doubted anyone in the guild, especially the wealthy grand master, would bother to leave the comfort of the artisan quarter to connect with a spy way down here.

Frustrated, he was about to head back home for the night to rethink what he could do about the intolerable situation when he felt the first heavy tremor vibrate the ground beneath his feet. He groaned inwardly, recognizing instantly what it was—a Drahkian raiding party out on a hunt with at least one of their colossal ground saurs.

The thundering booms of a large body smashing against buildings was hideously unmistakable. The sounds of breaking glass and falling rubble flowed into the street from a few blocks away. Lights in the apartment house were immediately doused, making it deplorably clear that the residents of this sector had heard the ominous sounds many times before.

As a piercing bellow split the air, Ryder trembled and fought down the overwhelming urge to flee, telling himself he would wait just long enough to see if the woman made it out. If he lost track of her now, he’d never find out exactly what she had seen or whether she had told anyone about his well-guarded secret.

Men and women came pouring out of the doorway across from where he hid, pensively watching for the face of the housekeeper. People pushed their way out and ran in terrified silence as soon as they made it to the sidewalk while those from the upper floors jammed back into the hallways and stairwells, anxiously waiting to for their chance get out.

Bestial growls echoed sharply off of the sides of the apartment house and the demolished buildings on the street. Ryder peered out from his dark hiding place just as a dark gray head appeared several stories up around the corner of the high-rise and let out a shriek when it spotted the stream of people running on the ground. As the giant saur stepped into the street in front of the apartment building, a stocky reptilian man appeared behind it shouting guttural commands while firmly holding a heavy chain attached to the beast’s iron collar. At the rear of the party, a band of tall, light-skinned Drahks in brown uniforms sauntered along the street, pointing and issuing orders to the Torg who was handling the animal.

The saur lunged several times over the heads of the crowd, drawing shouts and screams when its snapping jaws came down. A child’s cry rose above the screams and the saur trumpeted wildly, pulling against its chain and springing after a fleeing father who carried a toddler in his arms. The Torg forcibly held the animal in check while two Drahkian soldiers ran forward and seized the father and child, picking both up and hauling them back down the block in the direction from which the party had come.

With a tug and shouted command from its keeper, the beast shifted its attention to bashing its side and immense hind haunches into the building facade. Shattered glass and debris fell tinkling to the ground below as the animal struck repeatedly against the upper stories of the apartment house.

Ryder had almost given up hope of catching sight of the housekeeper when her face appeared among the last of the residents tensely pushing toward the entrance. The moment she reached the edge of the steps, she glanced up at the rampaging beast, her youthful features contorting with raw terror. Ryder’s heart caught in his throat. Making a quick decision, he stepped out from the ruined building and ran into the chaos of the street, moving straight for the clot of people tearing down the short steps.

“Come with me!” he shouted as soon as he was close enough for the woman to hear. Her face flew up, shifting from bewilderment to utter astonishment when she recognized who he was.

“This way!” he urged, motioning back across the street and pointing up the hill in the direction of the artisan quarter. She nodded frantically as she grasped his meaning and pushed her way past several people in a panicked attempt to reach him.

The saur let out a deafening squeal and lurched forward, its enormous foot crushing glass on the pavement a few yards away from where Ryder stood. He turned and ran, making for an opening between two ruined buildings on the opposite side of the street which he hoped might connect through to the next street over. He reached the passage just as another heavy foot fell on the road behind him, shaking the ground under his feet, followed by a loud bang as the beast’s big head hammered into the crumbling wall above the passage, sending a shower of rubble streaming down into the alley. He glanced over his shoulder and saw the small woman standing just inside the entrance with her arms above her head to deflect the falling stones.

“Run!” he screamed as the saur’s head appeared right behind her. He raced down the alley, listening intently, and was relieved when he heard the woman’s light footfalls bounce off the surfaces of the narrow passage after him. The beast pounded angrily against the wall next to the entrance, screeching its displeasure, but its gargantuan frame was too large to follow and its assault stopped all at once as the shouted commands from the Torg herded the animal on to closer prey still running in the street.

Ryder came to a halt at the far end of the alley and surveyed the empty street in front of him. The saur’s manic bashing had resumed on the street behind them, but nothing on this unlighted block stirred. “We’ll keep to the back alleys as much as we can,” he said in low tones as the tiny woman came up beside him. She gazed up at him with wide, questioning eyes and he stared back wordlessly before moving out into the street. There would be time enough for answers when they got back safely to his apartment.

They set off at a run, working their way through the desolate streets and back corridors of the ruined district, skirting piles of rubble and keeping to the shadows. Only once did they see another figure scurry and disappear into the rear entrance of an abandoned building. Thankfully the woman didn’t speak, but he could feel her eyes questing over him many times with the same probing intensity he had felt when she had trailed him earlier. He knew his elderly appearance didn’t match his agile movements or quickened pace, but his primary concern at the moment was getting them both out of this hazardous neighborhood and safely off the streets.

The sunlight was long gone and Ryder kept a vigilant watch on the starlit sky overhead for any sign of the flying lizards. He was certain the beasts were already out on patrol and was surprised that they hadn’t yet seen any sign of the loathsome creatures during their flight through the neighborhood. As if conjured by his thoughts, the muffled sound of leathery wings beating against air broke over their heads just as they reached the wide, open avenue stretching northward to the artisan gate.

“Damn it,” he swore under his breath, flattening himself quickly against a building and motioning for the woman to do the same. His eyes darted to the sky and caught sight of the dark brown beast as it glided over the gate in the high white wall at the end of the street and disappeared. He waited, straining his hearing for any further movement from above.

“The doors are already locked,” he whispered to his companion. “Watch what I do and follow me.”

After a few minutes of tense listening, he broke into a run across the cobblestones, and as he neared the gate, he hurled himself directly into the heavy iron doors and shifted into mist at the moment of impact, allowing the momentum to carry him through the crack to the other side. He rematerialized in the darkness and turned in time to see the woman’s figure reform right next to him in the shadows under the stone archway.

Winded, Ryder stood and waited so they could both catch their breaths, holding himself still when a saurian cry echoed somewhere in the distance followed by the faint answering call of another.

“Ok,” he said softly, “we should be safe for the moment. They usually only fly two a night.”

The woman nodded and they stepped out from the dark archway, walking side by side up the gradual incline through the hushed, affluent quarter. The streets were completely empty and still. Other than the illumination from an occasional streetlight that still worked, not a flicker could be seen that might give away which of the silent buildings held occupants.

They reached his street of lofty townhouses without any further sign of the fliers and Ryder veered into the narrow walkway to the back with a sense of relief mixed with dread at the prospect of confronting the woman about her actions. She surprisingly hadn’t bolted during their journey and he wondered what kind of story she’d concoct to cover her motives. He unlocked the front door with shaking hands and stood aside to allow the small housekeeper to step through into the dark apartment.

As soon as the door clicked shut, Ryder fell back against it and let out a long, frazzled breath. “Would you kindly turn on the light?” he asked quietly.

The woman stepped over to the chair and reached for the lamp. Warm light filled the small flat as she walked straight over to the curtains, yanking them taut across the window, confirming his suspicion that she had been the presence outside peering in at him the night before and had seen him in his true form.

Ryder watched her nervously from the doorway. She fussed with the drapes and turned back around, regarding him with a penetrating look. The left eye no longer wandered and she seemed quite a bit prettier than he remembered—straight, grayish hair typical of Algolians surrounded a doll-like face, and there was a pleasing curve to her feminine form beneath her dowdy clothing.

“Why have you been following me?”

The woman dropped her eyes and a rush of color bled into her cheeks. “I … I’m sorry, I wanted to talk to you, but I didn’t know much about you or whether I could trust you, so I ….” Her voice trailed off as she studied the floor.

He was baffled by her words and momentarily caught off guard, but the question that had been burning in his chest burst out of him all at once. “Who do you report to?” he demanded with a sharper edge to his voice.

Her eyes flew up while her brow furrowed with confusion. “What? Report—?” Her features contorted with shock as she grasped his meaning. “No! It’s not like that—I’m not spying on you!” she declared, shaking her head in vehement denial. “Is that what you thought? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to threaten you. I would never do anything to hurt you or anyone else!” She frowned miserably, looking at him with bleak resignation and the same sadness he had seen shadowing her eyes before.

Ryder collapsed against the door and heaved a silent sigh as the worst of his fears dropped away. There was one way to be absolutely sure she was telling the truth, but he couldn’t bring himself to touch her to find out. Thankfully, he believed she didn’t mean him any harm and from her disconsolate expression, she appeared to be quite upset that she had frightened and most likely alienated him.

“You can stay here for the night,” he began, taking a few steps into the kitchen and tossing his keys onto the counter.

“Thank you,” she replied in a small voice. “You’re the first person who’s done anything to help me since I got here. I don’t know anyone in Tessin.”

“You don’t live in the city?” he asked as he stripped out of his jacket and slung it over the back of the chair at the table.

“No, I’m from Cullen.” When he blinked and shook his head, she hurried to elaborate. “It’s a small village in the mountains, several days west of Tessin out in Silverloch Province.”

Ryder nodded, contemplating her words. It hadn’t occurred to him that she might be a stranger to the very bizarre terms of living in the capital. It went a long way in explaining her wariness as well as the touch of loneliness he sensed about her. “What’s your name?”

“Kea—Kea Lachlan.”

“I’m Ryder,” he stated just as his stomach decided to rumble loudly. He raised a hand to his stomach and lifted his brows in humble question.

A hesitant smile hovered around the corners of her mouth. “Yes, I made you something—take a look.”

He motioned for her to be seated in the lone chair at the kitchen table. “Come, sit down. I'm sure whatever you prepared will be enough for both of us.” He stepped over to the counter and found a covered basket of rolls as well as a pot of soup simmering on the stove. When he lifted the lid, the heady aroma of its contents rolled up into the room. “Oh my god, split pea,” he murmured, having a dim recollection of tasting it sometime in the past.

After ladling out two servings and piling rolls around the sides, Ryder placed one of the bowls on the table in front of Kea and took his own dish over to the living room where he propped himself on the arm of his chair facing her before digging in.

With the first spoonful of soup, he paused and closed his eyes, struck again by the savory flavors of her cooking. “Ummhh,” he grunted in appreciation, bringing another small smile to Kea’s face.

“You like it?”

He nodded as he shoveled more scoops of the hot deliciousness into his mouth.

“Good, I’m glad I could do something for you,” she said in a hopeful tone. “There’s only so much I can clean around here and you don’t seem to have much laundry. With all the money the guild gives me to take care of you, I thought the least I could do is make you some good meals.”

Ryder privately wondered about “all the money” the guild gave her, knowing the funds for the so-called privilege of her services were added on to the sizable monthly tithe he was charged by the guild and that in all likelihood, very little of it made its way into her pocket.

“I’ll give you extra money if you need it—for groceries,” he added, not wishing to embarrass her, but at the same time wanting her to keep cooking.

She shook her head shyly as she watched him dip the bread into the soup and bite into the soaked roll. “Thank you, but no, what I’m given is enough. It looks like you really worked up an appetite out there,” she said before the smile dropped off her face.

He caught the undercurrent of guilt in her voice since she had been the reason behind his perilous sojourn after sundown. “Your building got quite a beating tonight,” he stated around mouthfuls.

“I know,” she replied, shivering at the thought of the traumatic experience with the raiding party. “I’m just glad I wasn’t in my room when the saur hit the windows. The one I’m renting is on the top floor in the front which is probably why it was so cheap. I’ll have to go back tomorrow and see whether it’s even still livable, and if it isn’t, I’ll have to find a new place.”

“I wouldn’t stay there,” he advised as he bit into another roll. When she looked at him in puzzlement, he added, “They’ll just come back. The reptiles are predictable, if nothing else.”

“I see,” she stated softly, watching him again with renewed speculation. “You seem to know a lot about them.”

“I deal with them every day,” he commented, unable to keep the disgust out of his voice.

“I was told you were a master goldsmith, that you run your own studio and have other jewelers working for you.”

“Um-hmm,” he nodded absently, mopping up the soup with his last bite of bread.

“So why do you live in such a small flat?” she asked candidly. “Why not one of those big, beautiful houses, like the ones up front on the street?”

Ryder stopped chewing and nearly choked at her abrupt turn of thoughts. He looked up, regarding her warily before he answered. “Privacy.”

Kea tipped her head to the side, giving him a calculating appraisal.

“Why did you come to Tessin?” he asked quickly to divert the young woman from probing any further into his affairs.

Her delicate features twisted with pain as she dropped her eyes to her barely touched meal. “I’m searching for my family.”

“Your family?” he croaked, staggered to encounter anyone who actually had living, surviving blood relations.

“My mother Ilánn and my older brother Stani were captured about three weeks ago in Cullin. I’m sure the Drahks brought them to Tessin after the raid, so I came into the city to find them.”

“I’m sorry,” Ryder offered in a low voice. “Kea, they could be gone by now, sold off-planet, or even—”

“I know,” she answered gravely. “But I can’t live without knowing what happened to them.”

The silence in the room stretched into long minutes as Ryder left her to her thoughts. After some time, he set his empty bowl on the side table next to the chair and stood up.

“You can sleep in the bedroom,” he stated awkwardly. “I'll sleep out here. I'll be gone early in the morning … before you get up.”

Taking her cue, Kea rose noiselessly from the table and glided past him toward the bedroom doorway. She hesitated and whirled back around, appearing for a moment as if she had something compelling to say. “I just thought … maybe—" she began, raising a shaking hand and making a tentative move in his direction.

With a closed look, Ryder took a step backward.

Kea dropped her hand immediately and erased all emotion from her face. “Thank you for your kindness tonight. I deeply regret causing you so much trouble,” she whispered and disappeared into the bedroom, closing the door behind her.

Ryder rubbed his tired face with both hands and collapsed into his chair, running his fingers through his shaggy, windblown white hair before letting his head fall back onto the upholstery. There would be no relaxing or changing into his own form tonight, but the woman would be gone by the time he got home tomorrow night and he could repair the pieces of his well-crafted solitude. She had refrained from speaking about what she had seen the night before and he was enormously relieved that she wasn’t the threat he had feared her to be.

At the same time he was profoundly uncomfortable having her stay in his private space for the night. This sad, lonely female was … strangely alluring. Ryder squirmed in his chair, unable to find a comfortable position. In spite of his mental and physical exhaustion, he stayed awake for the longest time thinking about the tiny woman in the next room before finally dropping off into disquiet slumber.