BOOK TWO: PURSUIT

THREE

Once again, I stopped for a moment or two before continuing with my story. I was getting to the darkest and most difficult part of it, and I didn't need to see the pain in Tifa's eyes to know that she was thinking the same thing. She knew it just as well as I did. It wouldn't be easy for her to hear it, any more than it was going to be for me to tell it, but the others had to know what had happened, who our enemy was, and what he wanted. That hadn't changed, I was sure of it.

"So Sephiroth stayed down there the whole time?" Aerith asked.

I nodded. "That's right. He never stopped and he never left. And it was during that time that I remembered how he'd told me by the town gate that Jenova was his mother's name."

"Jus' like I was sayin' earlier," Barret added. "But how…?"

"I'll get to that soon enough," I answered.

Tifa spoke then, as much to herself as to us. "I remember everyone was on edge that whole time. The air felt so still, so charged, and it was like we were all waiting for something."

I had felt it too, despite being stuck in the mansion for most of that time. As concerned as I had been for Sephiroth, I had keep seeing over and over again in my mind how he had killed that monster back in the reactor, how he had watched it die. There hadn't been any feeling in his eyes. There hadn't been anything at all. The creature hadn't threatened either of us, but Sephiroth had murdered it anyway.

Had he, in a way, been trying to kill what he must have thought he himself was at that moment? I hadn't been able to dismiss the idea, and it wasn't one that I liked. I shivered at the memory as I began to tell the final part of my story. "Early the next morning, I went back downstairs to see Sephiroth again. It was quiet, even more than usual. I knew that he was still there, but something was bothering me…"

I sat on the edge of the bed, still tired despite the hours of sleep I had gotten. Something wasn't right. I wasn't sure what, but my instincts were on edge. The hairs on the back of my neck were standing up as I glanced around, suddenly nervous without knowing why. It was quiet, more than before, as if a hush had fallen over the place.

I got up, strapped on my sword, and walked into the hall. I made my way down the upstairs hall until I reached the sitting room. The soldier I had spoken to yesterday was still there, sitting in a chair. I wondered if he had even moved at all since I last saw him.

"Anything?" I asked.

He looked as uneasy as I felt. "Sephiroth seems different."

"You went down there to see him?"

"Only for a moment or two," he answered. "I wanted to see when we were leaving. He completely ignored me, like I wasn't even there. So I just came back up here for now."

What was going on? I didn't feel like whatever change Sephiroth had undergone was a good one. My nerves were just too much on edge for me to think otherwise. I knew there was only one way to find out for sure, so I entered the bedroom, opened the secret door, and hurried downstairs to the basement. It didn't take long to return to the laboratory. At the end of the short hall off to one side, I found Sephiroth sitting behind a desk in a small office filled with more bookshelves.

"Who is it!?" he demanded.

I stopped short, caught off guard by his tone. He sat in a high-backed leather chair beneath a bright chandelier, a single thick book spread open before him on the desk. He looked up at me, his pale green eyes filled not just with ice, but also fury and even hate. Not himself, indeed. Sephiroth was about as far from himself as any man could ever be, and I wondered what could have pushed him to this point.

His eyes narrowed when they met mine. "Hmph… traitor."

"Traitor?" I echoed. What did he mean by that?

"You're nothing but an ignorant, selfish traitor. And I'll tell you why." He stood up and glared darkly at me. "This planet originally belonged to the Cetra. As a race of travelers, they would migrate in, settle the planet, and move on. It was said that at the end of their long, hard journey, they would find the Promised Land and supreme happiness."

Sephiroth's stare turned accusatory as he continued. "But then came those who disliked the journey. They put an end to their migrations, built shelters, and chose instead to live an easier life. They took what the Cetra and the planet had created without giving anything in return! And those, traitor, are your ancestors."

"Sephiroth…" I began, trying to understand both what he meant and what had happened to him. It didn't make any sense.

He ignored me, though, and kept on going. "Long ago, disaster struck the planet. Your ancestors escaped. They survived because they hid like a group of frightened children. But the Cetra, they sacrificed themselves to save the planet. And after that, your ancestors continued to multiply like rodents. Now all that's left of the Cetra is in these reports."

"What does that have to do with you?" I asked.

"Don't you see?" Sephiroth walked right up to me, almost in my face, his voice laced with barely restrained rage. "An Ancient known as Jenova was discovered within a 2,000 year old layer of rock. The Jenova Project. Its goal was to create people who had the powers of the Ancients. That is, the Cetra. And I… I am what was produced."

My eyes widened. "Pr… Produced?!"

"Yes. Professor Gast, head of the Jenova Project and genius scientist, produced me."

"How…" I stammered. "How did he…? Se… Sephiroth?"

He brushed past me and walked down the hall. "Out of my way. I'm going to see my mother."

Sephiroth's long strides carried him through the basement laboratory and into the main passageway before I could take more than a few steps, and by the time I entered the passageway myself a few moments later, he was already gone. I hurried down the corridor and raced up the spiraling wooden stairs, my heart pounding as fear raced through me like wildfire. The old oaken steps creaked underneath my boots, and it seemed to take forever to reach the top and step into the bedroom.

When I did, I almost wished I hadn't.

Sephiroth had already left, but when I returned to the sitting room, I found the soldier still in his chair where I had left him earlier. But he was dead. In his chest was a single narrow puncture wound, a slit surrounded by a small circle of blood. A chill swept through me as I understood what had happened. Sephiroth had done this. He must have caught the soldier completely by surprise, running him through in one swift stroke before he had even realized he was being attacked.

On impulse, I walked around and checked the back of the chair. Sure enough, there was a slit in the wood behind the soldier's back. Sephiroth's katana must have gone all the way through until it hit the wall. The man had died instantly, no doubt. Then suddenly I thought of the town, of all the other people here, and my head shot up and I gasped in alarm at the thought of Sephiroth, enraged and completely out of his mind, embarking on a murderous rampage on his way back to the reactor.

Whirling around, I sped into the upstairs hall and down the stairs at a dead run, hoping and praying I wasn't too late and that Sephiroth had ignored the town and everyone else and had gone on into the mountains without stopping. But the wickedly bright orange glow visible through the windows told me that he hadn't. Moving even faster now, I yanked open the front doors before suddenly skidding to a halt just a few steps outside, my eyes wide as they took in the hellish vision before me.

Nibelheim was in flames.

Fire was everywhere. Every building, every last home and shop, was burning. The roar of the inferno filled my ears, and huge, billowing gray plumes of smoke choked the air in every direction. Beads of sweat coated my skin as the immense heat reached me even though I still stood within the mansion's yard, dozens of feet from the edge of the blaze. But it paled in comparison to the searing firestorm of anger and fury quickly building up inside me as I gazed at what Sephiroth had done.

Finally snapping out of my paralysis, I hurried past the gate and into the town and the midst of the devastation. Bodies lay scattered upon the ground like so many broken dolls, either burnt, slashed, or both. The old water tower had become a giant torch, and I coughed and put my arm in front of my face as the smoke swirled all around me. Then I heard a man calling out to me, a voice I recognized.

"Hey!" It was Zangan. "It's you! You're still sane, right?"

I turned to my right and saw him standing there. His skin was bright red and he was covered with ash and bits of wood from all the doors and walls and fallen timbers he must have punched through to save whoever he could, but he seemed to be alright.

I nodded in answer to Zangan's question. "Yeah. I'm fine."

"Then come over here and help me!" he ordered.

With a short dash and a jump, I reached Zangan's side in a matter of seconds. "What do you need me to do?"

He pointed behind him and then past me. "I'll check this house. You check that one over there!"

"Got it!" I agreed.

I hurried over to the house he had indicated, and then I was running again as I suddenly realized it was my own. On my way, I nearly tripped over the body of the other soldier, my friend. I bent over to check on him. He was unconscious, had probably passed out from all the smoke, but he was alive. There wasn't much I could do for him at the moment, though. I rushed inside the house, trying to avoid the fire as much as I could, and called out to my mom.

"Mom! Are you there? Say something!"

But there was nothing. Half the main room was caved in, the ceiling having collapsed from the heat and the flames, and most everything else was already burning. At first I didn't see her, the smoke was so thick, and I nearly choked on it as it stung my eyes. But as I looked back at the pile of charred, broken beams and shattered slabs of what had once been part of the ceiling, I found her.

She was lying beneath the rubble, all but buried aside from her head, shoulder, and one arm. Heedless of the pain, I grabbed onto the still-hot pieces of wreckage and strained to pull them off her, casting what I could aside as I desperately tried to free her. A thin line of blood trickled down the side of her face from her temple, and her eyes were closed. Although I knew the truth of it, knew she was gone, I couldn't bring myself to stop. I kept going, kept trying to dig her out until finally what remained was too large and heavy for me to move.

"Mom…" I breathed, bowing my head for a minute.

She was dead, and at that thought, the anger flared within me again and I snapped my head up, gritting my teeth and swearing to end this, to find Sephiroth and stop him no matter what it took. Reluctantly, I sighed and left the house, hating that I hadn't been able to save Mom, that there were so many others that had died as well. And all because of Sephiroth. I didn't want to believe what he'd done, but I couldn't deny what my own eyes were telling me, what I had seen and lost.

"Terrible…" I shook my head. "Sephiroth… this is too terrible…"

Lying on the ground near what had once been the inn but was now a blazing furnace was the body of the photographer, his camera still held in one dead hand. He'd been slashed open, and his eyes stared sightlessly up at the smoky haze swirling around us. And then I thought of Tifa, and as I did, I felt my heart beat faster with worry for her and an overwhelming need to find her and keep her safe.

Screams from behind me suddenly drew my attention, and I spun to face back the way I had come, back toward the mansion. In the field just outside of it, which was now burning as well, Sephiroth stood, his katana drawn and stained with blood, and cut down a pair of fleeing townsfolk with hardly a thought. Then he paused, standing within the flames, and looked at me, his gaze cold and cruel and utterly alien. The icy stare of a man who had descended into the most deadly kind of madness you could ever imagine. The man I had known was gone.

I noticed then that, as with the rain other day, the fire didn't seem to touch Sephiroth at all. He seemed to repel it somehow, and no sweat was on his skin, no ash or dust. I was willing to bet that he didn't even feel the heat. He just stood there amidst the fires, his sanity gone and his glowing green eyes like shards of ice as they rose up to meet mine. For a long, slow moment, we just stared at each other, our gazes locked on one another. It was then that I knew I hated him. I hated what he had become, what he had done. And I would do whatever it took to stop him.

Then Sephiroth simply turned and walked away, his back to me and his long strides carrying him through the blaze and onto the path leading into the mountains. At first, all I could do was watch him go, watch as he vanished within the swirling, hungry flames of the inferno, his long silver hair flowing out behind him as he moved. Then finally, I started moving as well, ignoring Zangan's urgent shouts to come back. Instead, I brought up my arms and charged right through the fire after Sephiroth, sprinting across the field and onto the trail, determined to catch up him no matter what and kill him. I knew I didn't stand a chance against him, but I had to try. I had to make him pay for what he'd done.

I hurried into the mountains, jogging as quickly as I could but not so hard as to wear myself out, either. I didn't need to be out of breath when I finally caught up to Sephiroth. He stayed well ahead of me, and when I reached Mt. Nibel, I had to slow down to a walk in order to climb up the dark, barren slopes and through the twisting caves to the reactor. I saw a few monsters on the way, but I just avoided them, intent on getting to the reactor as soon as possible and stopping Sephiroth.

Before I knew it, I was there. Within the core, on the platform at the far end of the main walkway, was Tifa. She was kneeling next to the body of her father, who lay lifelessly on his back near the doorway leading into the next chamber. Although the constant humming of the machinery and the hissing of steam was loud in my ears, I could still hear Tifa's words as she cried over her father's body.

"Dad…" Tifa sobbed brokenly, tears streaming unchecked down both cheeks. "Did Sephiroth do this to you? Did he? Sephiroth… SOLDIER… mako reactors… Shinra… I hate them all!"

Before I could call out to her or even move from where I stood in the middle of the main walkway, Tifa grabbed Sephiroth's katana, which was lying on the floor next to her father's body, and charged straight through the doorway into the next room, her face a mask of grief, fury, and sheer focused determination. I knew she couldn't beat Sephiroth, just as I knew he must have left his katana behind on purpose. He had probably known she would come after him after he had killed her father and had dropped his weapon there as bait to goad her into doing just that.

Snapping out of my temporary paralysis, I ran across the walkway to the platform, frantic now at the thought of Tifa going into a fight that she couldn't possibly win and furious with Sephiroth for toying with her and killing so many people. As I reached the platform, I carefully stepped past the slashed, tormented body of Tifa's father and ran through the doorway after Tifa, knowing what I would find in the next room and hoping that I wasn't too late to save her.

At the top of the stairs with his back to us, Sephiroth stood before the door to Jenova's chamber, his arms stretched out wide. The door was still closed and locked, as it had been during our first visit, and off to the side, I could see the dead monster he had killed still laying sprawled in front of its open pod. Tifa was just ahead of me, but she didn't seem to know that I was behind her, as focused as she was on Sephiroth.

"Mother," he said, "I'm here to see you. Please, open this door."

Tifa paused near the bottom of the stairs, Sephiroth's katana in both hands. I didn't need to see her face to know she was glaring daggers up at him. "How could you do that to Dad and all the townspeople!? You came to our town to help us! Not to rip away everything and everyone that we love! What kind of a monster are you!?"

She charged up the stairs, yelling at the top of her lungs and bringing the Masamune up to strike. But just as she reached Sephiroth and swung the blade at him, he spun around with a cruel, knowing smile on his face and seized the weapon by the hilt, halting its momentum. As I started up the stairs myself, I could only watch as Tifa fought to keep her grip on the Masamune before Sephiroth wrenched it away from her and slashed her right across the chest from shoulder to hip.

I froze, staring in horror as Tifa tumbled down the stairs toward me, blood all over her body. At that moment, the door at the top opened, and as he started to turn away again, Sephiroth sneered at me, his pale green eyes meeting mine before he entered Jenova's chamber and was gone. Tifa landed just a step or two above me, and for a moment I forgot everything else as I raced over to her.

"Tifa!?" I knelt by her side.

"You promised…" she murmured. She was barely conscious, her eyes finding me for just a moment before they slid closed. "You promised that you'd come… when I was in trouble…"

As gently as I could, I picked her up, cradling her in my arms. Then I walked over and laid her down out of the way in front of one of the pods. Her skin was clammy and cold, and the blood was everywhere. I took her hand briefly, then carefully brushed a few strands of hair from her face. I didn't know what else to do for her. I didn't have any magic or potions on me, but I didn't want to lose her. I was going to, though. It looked like she was already dying. I slammed my fist into the floor, hating myself for my helplessness and Sephiroth for doing this to her.

Rage swirling within me now, I rose to my feet and ran up the rest of the stairs. It was time to end this, to kill Sephiroth. Even if I died myself, I was going to at least take him with me. I didn't know how I was going to beat him, but at this point, I didn't care. I just knew that I had to try. For Tifa, Mom, and everyone else this madman had killed, and for my home, the place where I had been born and raised and which was now nothing more than a pile of ash and smoldering cinders.

Inside the next room, I found Sephiroth. He was standing in front of the containment unit that held Jenova. A long, thick tube maybe a foot in diameter and filled with a murky, reddish fluid wound its way snakelike up to Jenova's holding tank. I couldn't see the thing itself, but in front of it and attached to the tank was an eerie figure of sculpted metal. It had no arms or legs, just a body, head, and a pair of large, outstretched wings to either side. Its female face had no expression at all, and its eyes were only a pair of empty sockets. The feeding tube was connected directly onto the waist of the statue and from there, to Jenova as well.

"Mother," Sephiroth whispered, gazing at Jenova's tank and the dark angel protecting it. "Let's take this planet back together. I've had the most wonderful idea. We'll find the Promised Land."

I walked right up to him, my blood boiling. "Sephiroth… My family! My hometown! How could you do this to them?"

He laughed, still looking at Jenova and her silent guardian. "They've come again, Mother. But thanks to your superior power, knowledge, and magic, you were destined to become the ruler of this planet. They… those worthless creatures… are stealing the planet from you. But now I'm here with you, Mother, so don't worry."

Reaching up, Sephiroth grabbed onto the angel with both hands and ripped it off Jenova's holding tank. Sparks flews from the flattened cables that formed its hair and from its severed waist, and fluid leaked from the small tubes connected to its face as the wings broke apart. Sephiroth then tossed the whole thing aside and looked into the tank upon the true form of Jenova, and for a moment, so did I.

It was humanoid, something like a woman but decidedly alien in its feel and the rest of its appearance. Her dark skin was a mottled purplish-blue, and her arms were folded behind her. A pair of short, reddish wings sprouted from behind her back, their ends ragged and irregular, and her light gray hair swirled lazily around her within the pale blue fluid filling the tank. The feeding tube connected directly to Jenova's abdomen amidst a number of other coiled pinkish organs that looked almost like intestines floating around her. The sight made my stomach turn.

On her head and secured with four thick bolts was a metal device of some kind with a plaque that had her name embossed on it in large, bold letters as well as a few lines of a smaller type with what might have been dates of some kind, I wasn't sure. Jenova's dark lips were full and her eyes were open, one of them glowing with a bright, wicked pink light. As I saw that, I swallowed, wondering how aware she was of all that was going on around her and not really sure I wanted to find out. This thing, it was an Ancient? Somehow I couldn't quite believe it. But whatever it was, Shinra was keeping it alive. I thought I was beginning to understand Sephiroth's feelings a little, his pain, rage, and sense of betrayal after finding out that he was nothing more than a lab experiment. But it didn't excuse what he had done. Nothing could. And he had to answer for it.

"What about my sadness!?" I argued. "My family… my friends? The pain and lossof having them and my hometaken away from me!? It's the same as your sadness!"

Sephiroth laughed again, facing me as he stood before Jenova's tank, his arms out wide and the Masamune grasped in his hand. "My sadness? What do I have to be sad about? I am the chosen one. I have been chosen to be the leader of this planet. I'm going to take the planet back from you stupid people for the Cetra. What should I be sad about?"

I shook my head. "Sephiroth… I trusted you. I looked up to you. No, you're not the Sephiroth I used to know!"

I drew Buster, ready to fight even if it was hopeless. My gloved hands gripped the hilt tightly as I gazed at my enemy. Sephiroth stood above me and held his katana in both hands, as prepared for the battle as I was. It was inevitable, and it was unavoidable. We gazed at each other, our eyes blazing with hate and fury, and prepared to attack.

"And that's the end of my story," I finished.

Barret gaped at me. "Wait a damn minute! That's it? No more?"

I sighed. "I don't remember."

"You what?" he frowned. "That don't make a damn bit of sense! I'd sure as hell remember somethin' like that!"

I understood Barret's frustration, and I felt it myself. I had survived that encounter with Sephiroth, but I couldn't remember how or why. It didn't make any sense, as Barret had said. I only hoped that I'd find the answers during the course of our journey. I had the feeling that I would need them before the end of it. Jessica's words, what she had told me in the dream we had shared together, had implied that as well, although I hadn't realized the connection to Sephiroth until now. But if Jessie was right and there was more to me than I was aware of, I had to find out. I had to discover the truth, sooner or later.

"What happened to Sephiroth?" Aerith asked.

I found myself wondering the same thing. "I don't know, Aerith. In terms of skill, I couldn't have killed him."

Tifa looked at me. "Official records say Sephiroth is dead. I read it in the newspaper."

"Shinra owns all the newspapers," Aerith pointed out, "so you can't rely on that."

I stood up and folded my arms in front of me. "I want to know the truth. I want to find out what happened. I stood against Sephiroth and lived. Why didn't he kill me?"

"I'm alive, too," Tifa added, her eyes on me.

I thought of that horrible moment when Sephiroth had slashed her and she had fallen. It wasn't something I liked to remember. I was glad she had survived, and thinking about what had happened to her made me value her presence and her friendship more than I had before. Just for a moment, a long one, I held her gaze, and I knew she was thinking of those dark memories as well. We had both lived through the terrible nightmare that was Sephiroth's fury and the loss of our homes and our families, and after so many long years, we had found each other again. Wherever this journey took us, I promised myself that I would protect Tifa and keep her safe no matter what. I never wanted to come so close to losing her like that again.

Aerith shook her head. "A lot of this doesn't make any sense. What about Jenova? It was in the Shinra building, right?"

"Shinra must have shipped it from Nibelheim to Midgar sometime after Sephiroth went missing," I answered.

"Did someone carry it out later? It was gone when we escaped."

She was right. Jenova's holding tank on the 67th floor had been torn open. It had been hard to tell whether it had been done from the inside or from the outside, but either way, Jenova was gone. And at that same time, Sephiroth had returned. I doubted that was simply a coincidence, not with everything I knew about them.

"Sephiroth?" Tifa suggested.

Barret shook his head and stood up. "Damn! None of this makes a bit of sense! I'm goin', goin', goin', gone! An' I'm leavin' all the thinkin' to you! Yo, Cloud! Let's get a move on! Now that we're done here, we best get ready to set out tomorrow."

"Right," I agreed. "We should also ask around, see if anyone's heard or seen anything suspicious."

Barret nodded. "Yeah, good idea. Let's go!"

Without waiting for any of us to follow, he hurried across the room and stomped down the stairs, leaving me alone with Red and the girls. When he was gone, Tifa got up from her chair and walked over to me, her eyes locked on mine again. At first she didn't say anything, as if she were struggling to find the words or whether to say anything at all. But then she did, and when she finally spoke, her voice was quiet, almost a whisper as she stood so close to me, her fingers clasped loosely in front of her. "Cloud? How bad was I after Sephiroth stabbed me?"

I took her hands in mine, my eyes never leaving hers. "I thought I'd lost you, Tifa. I was devastated."

She smiled then. "I'm here now, Cloud. And I'm not leaving."

"Me either," I flashed her a small grin.

"I…" Aerith murmured, still sitting, her face pale. "The Ancients… the Cetra… Jenova… Sephiroth and myself…"

Tifa went to her at once and took her shoulders. "It's not your fault, Aerith. Don't think that."

"But it was because Shinra wanted to create people like us…"

"No!" Tifa's voice was firm, unyielding. "Don't go blaming yourself for what happened in Nibelheim. Whether Jenova and Sephiroth were Ancients or not, it doesn't matter. They're the ones responsible for that, them and Shinra. Not you. Understand?"

Aerith looked up at her and nodded. "Yes. Thank you, Tifa…"

Tifa smiled again as she helped Aerith to her feet. "Anytime. We're friends, right? You've been there for me, so I'm gonna be there for you, too. Now let's go. Barret's waiting for us."

I felt the same way as Tifa and was glad that she'd been able to help Aerith. Just because she was an Ancient didn't make her responsible for what Sephiroth and Jenova had done, and her unusual melancholy had bothered me more than a little. Fortunately, though, Tifa had explained things to her and had set her straight. Aerith seemed like she felt a little better now, and I was relieved to see that.

Red got up then and stretched his legs, and we headed to the stairs. He'd said barely a word the whole time, but as he padded along behind us, I heard him talking to himself, and apparently so did the girls. They both laughed when he spoke.

"What a fascinating story…" Red murmured.

We found Barret downstairs, tapping his foot as he waited for us by the front door. "Damn! 'Bout time you showed up. You ready now? We got a lotta work to do!"

"Yeah," I agreed. "We need to get supplies and look for leads about Sephiroth and which way he might have gone. I was also thinking that when we leave tomorrow, we should stay in two groups same as we did on the way here."

Tifa glanced at me. "That's a good idea, but I think we should have a way to keep in touch with each other, too."

"We can pick up a few cheap phones while we're out shopping. We ought to have enough gil for that and whatever else we'll need. I figure we should split up for now. Barret, Red, you two go and take care of the supplies. The girls and I will check around and see if we can find out if anyone's seen Sephiroth or knows where he went. We'll meet back here at about 6:00, get a bite to eat, and then we can figure out our next step from there. Any questions?"

No one had any, but when we started to leave, the innkeeper gave a discreet cough and we turned to him. "Sorry to interrupt, but I can see you're new here and there was something I thought you ought to know. If you're going to head over to the market district to do your shopping, you'd best keep an eye on your wallet."

"Why's that?" Barret growled. "You got a problem with thieves?"

"Well, just one, really," the man explained. "She's been operating in the area for a while now, but she's so quick nobody's been able to catch her. I don't think she's from around here, though."

I frowned. "Why do you say that?"

"People haven't seen much of her, but what glimpses they've gotten tell of almond eyes and short, straight black hair. Sounds Wutainese to me. I wonder what she's doing so far from home, though? She's young, or so I've heard. That's all I know, I'm afraid."

"Thanks for the tip," I replied. "We'll keep an eye out for her."

Stepping outside, we all stood together in a group for a moment as the afternoon sun shone brightly down on us from above the rooftops. With the dark and terrible story of Nibelheim behind us, it was time to prepare for our long journey. We all glanced at each other, then split up to get started on what we had to do. Barret and Red ambled off toward the market district while the girls and I spread out to talk to the people nearby and see what we could find out.

As I started to move, I suddenly looked back behind and above me as I thought I glimpsed something small and lean flitting across one of the rooftops. It was just a dark blur in the corner of my eye, and when I looked back at the place where I thought it had been, it was gone. But I was certain that I hadn't been imagining things. The shape, whoever or whatever it was, had seemed to be moving off in the same direction as Barret and Red, toward the market district. Was it that young thief, the one the innkeeper had told us about? I considered going after the guys but then decided against it. Barret and Red could handle her if they ran into her, I was sure of that. But I had no idea then just how skilled and troublesome she would prove to be.