Ward turned around in a slow circle, completely disoriented by the sudden and spectacular shift in his surroundings. There was only one thing that kept him from being convinced that Skye was digging into his memories again.

He knew, with absolute certainty, that this was a place that he had never seen before.

"SKYE!" he yelled out to the clear blue sky above him. "SKYE!" Ward started trudging up the steep hill in front of him, hoping that the clearing at the top of the hill would provide a road, a path...something that would give him a clue as to where the closest civilization might be. If there *is* civilization anywhere around here, he thought. I mean for all I know I'm in some sort of crazy lost in the middle of nowhere dream and I'm just going to wander around here until I starve to death or I wake up...

Sure enough, there was a rocky, but well-trodden path at the top of the hill. Ward turned to the south to find that the path wound down the hill into an empty, but fertile-looking valley, then through the valley until it emptied out into a vast and ugly-looking desert that stretched out to what Ward could only assume was the 'horizon'. "Okay," he told no one in particular, "guess I'm not going that way."

When Ward turned around, his eyes followed the road uphill, north and east. His destination quickly became obvious when the road ended at a large, wooden fence and gate that, Ward hoped, meant that there was at least a small village on the other side of that fence.

Twenty minutes later, Ward soon realized that the 'village' that was enclosed by that gate and fence had to be much bigger than he had initially assumed. The 'fence' was a wooden wall that seemed to be made out of an impressive collection of tree trunks. And the gate looked like it would be almost impossible to move on its own; each 'door' consisted of a half-dozen of the massive tree trunks held together by...Ward could only shrug. Unless there were steel rods running through these tree trunks, he had no idea what could be holding the wall together...or how the gate could possibly move to allow him entrance. "HEY!" he screamed out, hoping someone on the other side of the massive gate could hear him. "IS ANYONE THERE?! ANYBODY?!"

One of the gate doors slowly swung open with a nearly deafening creak. A small boy in a threadbare tan tunic and ragged brown pants opened the door. He looked up at Ward with wide, innocent-looking eyes...but said nothing.

"Hi!" Ward greeted the boy happily, hoping that the child would find his tone of voice unoffensive and non-threatening. "Is there a grownup around I can talk to? Someone who speaks English, maybe?"

The boy's response...wasn't to Ward. "SHÌZŪN!" he screamed. "SHÌZŪN!"

The giant wooden door closed as the boy ran off. Ward sighed, hoping that he hadn't just sealed his fate on the wrong side of...the gate? the tracks? How *would* you say it...he thought idly.

When the giant door opened for a second time, a buddhist monk clad in orange robes stood in the open space between the two massive sets of tree trunks. "Can I help you?" the man asked Ward.

"Oh, thank God, you speak English," Ward exclaimed, sighing with a massive sense of relief.

"I do not..." the monk protested vehemently, then let his voice trail off when he seemed to realize that his words were going to do nothing to encourage the end of the conversation. "How may I help you?" he asked Ward scornfully.

Sensing that this was a town that wasn't a particularly big fan of visitors, Ward got down to business. "This might be a weird question," he asked the monk, "but where am I?"

The monk didn't answer Ward; instead, he seemed to carefully study the man standing in front of him. "Follow me," the monk instructed. Ward did as he was told, following the monk through a dusty, surprisingly crowded cluster of ramshackle huts and thatch-topped stables filled with sheep, yaks, cows, buffalo and dark-skinned pigs.

It wasn't long, though, before the monk stopped at another large door. This one was much smoother; a masterfully made wooden door covered in intricate carvings. Ward found himself tempted to approach the door, reach out and touch those carvings for himself...but the monk opened the doors with a simple wave of his hand. Ward gawked at the doors as they opened, forcing himself to keep close to the monk as the doors automatically swung closed behind him.

Another monk joined them in the stone courtyard. "Is this him?" the monk asked.

The first monk turned to study Ward for a second time. "I sense magic in him," he told his fellow monk, "it is newly born and wildly uncontrolled."

"His aura is horribly tainted," the other monk added. "But it is still pure at its core...and his link to the child is unmistakeable."

The child? thought Ward. "Skye?" he asked the two monks, interrupting their conversation, "is she here? Is she okay?"

The two monks ignored Ward, crossing through the courtyard and through an orange-framed door into a candlelit space. Two more monks were kneeling on opposite sides of a stone bed, deep in meditation while a third monk seemed to be pacing, anxious about something.

Ward's focus was entirely consumed by the figure on the stone bed. He passed by the three standing monks, approaching the head of the bed as if it was the only thing in the world. "Skye?" he asked her quietly, gently caressing her hair.

The anxious monk put a hand on Ward's shoulder. "He has walked the line between good and evil for many years," he told his fellow monks. "And your daughter's meddling did him no benefit."

Daughter? thought Ward, his eyes widening. The Clairvoyant's story came back to him in a rush, and Ward immediately knew where he was and who he was talking to. He turned away from Skye and knelt before the monks. "Honored ones," Ward greeted them, praying he remembered the protocols correctly, "forgive me for asking, but how did we get here? Why are we here?"

"I brought my daughter here," declared one of the monks at Skye's side as both monks came out of their meditation. The monk stood up, regarding Ward's kneeling form with scorn and disdain. "You, apparently, 'came along for the ride', as I believe the expression goes."

Ward stood as the monk stood, confused as to why the older man was treating him with such contempt. "Sir...I..." He sighed with defeat as the monk left the room without ever turning his gaze back to the younger man. "What did I do?" asked Ward.

"Is any man ever good enough for a father's daughter?" asked the other monk who had been kneeling by Skye's stone 'bed'. The monk stood up, clasped his hands together, and bowed to Ward in a gesture of welcome greeting. "I am Tsewang Kunchen, Grant Ward," he introduced himself. "It is an honor to meet one who has been chosen to be the soul's mate of my brother's daughter."

Ward felt like he had been sucker-punched. Soul mates? Me and *Skye*? That...that's just not possible... Skye stirred in her sleep, and his heart skipped a beat. Ward thought about how hard and how quickly he had fallen for the woman on the stone pallet below him and started to reconsider his denials. Is it...?

Tsewang chuckled as he watched Ward's expressive face wrestle with his internal conflict. "Come, child. Your mate needs her rest, which will give you time to start your treatments and training."

"Okay, now you've lost me," said Ward.

The monk who had put his hand on Ward's shoulder stepped up to join Ward and Tsewang as they moved their conversation to the courtyard. "Do you know who we are, child?"

Ward nodded. "The first Guardians."

The four remaining Guardians in the room all smiled and chuckled, enjoying Ward's mistake. "No, child, we are not the firsts," said Tsewang. "But we are the ones who came before those that you know to be the Guardians of your world."

Ward found himself stuck on the last two words of Tsewang's explanation. "'Your world?' What world is this?"

"This is the spirit world," one of the other monks explained. "The world between your world and the world beyond."

"The spirit world?" Ward exclaimed. "Are...are we dead?"

The Guardians all shook their heads. "The Dàfú allows us to travel freely between the worlds," Tsewang explained. "Although now that a new age has begun, we find less and less of a need to do so."

Ward found himself getting frustrated. "So we're dead?"

"No," Tsewang replied, more forcefully emphasizing the word to try and get through to the younger man. "Your journey here is much more of an exception than the rule."

"Because of Skye?" asked Ward.

Tsewang nodded. "Lobsang felt his daughter connect with the mind stone. He begged Wangchuk and Jamyang to bring her here so we could look after her until she regains her strength."

"Wangchuk and Jamyang?" Two of the other three Guardians nodded their heads in introduction. "Then why am I here?"

"Lobsang wasn't wrong," Wangchuk explained. "I suspect that your connection to Skye pulled you here with her."

The idea made sense to Ward...if he could get himself to accept the base for the premise. "Because we're soul mates?"

"Partially," Jamyang replied. "Although I believe that your rebirth had something to do with it as well."

"My what?" asked Ward, eyes wide. "What the hell are you talking about?!"

"You do not know?" asked the remaining Guardian. When the younger man shook his head, it seemed to bring the Guardian to a decision. "I do not normally do this," he told Ward, "but I suspect that giving you a glimpse into your future will save us precious time." He held out a hand to the younger man. "Give me your hand, child."

Ward put his hand in the older man's. He immediately gasped as his eyes were forced closed and his mind focused on the vision that was being given to him. Ward watched an much older version of himself in what looked like a ruined section of some city in Eastern Europe. A flamethrower was being launched in his direction and... "That's me?!" Ward exclaimed as he watched the flames harmlessly curl around him and a group of people behind him. "I'm doing that?!"

The Guardian nodded as he pulled his hand away, ending the vision and allowing Ward to open his eyes once again. "You are a Bǎohù," the Guardian declared.

"A what?" Ward asked, clearly confused by the unfamiliar reference.

"A shield-bearer," Wangchuk replied. "Your gift is the ability to create and project a barrier that nothing can get past."

The idea that Ward was capable of such a display of supernatural ability was blowing the younger man's mind. "How?!"

Jamyang gestured to the opposite side of the courtyard. "Stand over there."

Ward crossed the courtyard, stopping where Jamyang prompted him. "Okay..."

"Close your eyes." Ward obeyed. "Picture something or someone that you would want to protect over everything else in your world. You would throw them out of a burning building even if it would mean your own death. You would use your body to shield them in a crash. You would take a bullet for them. Feel that love. That primal instinct to protect something outside of yourself, even at your own expense." Jamyang conjured a dagger, lifted it in his right hand, and flung it at Ward.

The dagger embedded itself in Ward's left shoulder, sending the younger man to the ground, grunting in pain. Jamyang sighed wearily, rolling his eyes with disappointment. "That is not how this was supposed to go," he chastized.

"Yeah," Ward grunted in reply. "No kidding."

When the Guardian pulled the knife out of Ward's shoulder, the bleeding and pain ceased as the wound instantly healed. "What were you thinking about?" asked Jamyang.

Ward rubbed his shoulder, surprise briefly crossing his mind at how normal his shoulder felt. "Skye," he replied, disappointment pushing the extraneous thoughts out of his mind. "I think..."

"Hmmm," Jamyang mused. "The thought of your mate should have been enough to project a shield..."

"Not in his condition," Lobsang declared. "In his current state of mind, I doubt he could shield his pinky from a paper cut."

Ward found the Guardian's irrationally low opinion of him to be grating on his last nerve. "What is your problem with me?" he exclaimed. "You barely know me..."

"I know you well enough," Lobsang countered. "Your thoughts are a muddled mess. Confused. Frustrated. Torn in fifteen different directions. And you are currently committed to a group that is dedicated to killing my daughter at best or at worst, using her as a catalyst to destroy the world. Am I wrong?"

"You are," Wangchuk declared.

Lobsang quickly matched the younger man's level of frustration, although his frustration was being leveled at his fellow Guardian. "Wangchuk..."

"Look through my eyes," Wangchuk countered. "Read his aura and tell me there's no hope for him."

Lobsang sighed, but chose his loyalty to his brother over his own emotions and made the connection to Wangchuk's mind. What he saw eased his concerns. But only slightly. "Fine," he conceded, "the core of his aura is still pure, even underneath all of that..."

"Now," Wangchuk yelled, talking over his fellow Guardian to cut off the man's rant. "Now look at what he is doing for your daughter in the living world."

Lobsang closed his eyes, allowing his focus to shift to the 'other realm' through the eyes of his Lièrén. "He's a Bǎohù?" Wangchuk nodded.

"How could you tell?" asked Ward.

Lobsang send Wangchuk's 'sight' through to the younger man. "Without your 'conscious' thoughts getting in the way, your protective instincts kicked in. Those might be keeping her alive right now. And they are most certainly the only thing keeping her sane."

"He's what?!"

The six men turned as a group, relieved to see Skye up and about. "It is good to see you awake, my dear..." Tsewang greeted her.

Skye shushed the healer and left her attention focused entirely on her father. "You didn't answer my question. How the hell is he keeping me alive?"

Out of the corner of his eye, Ward saw Jamyang conjure a fresh dagger and throw it...at Skye. He wrapped his arms around his soulmate, determined to take the hit for her if it came to that...

The dagger fell to the stone floor with a loud CLANG! as Skye pushed Ward away from her. It was then that she finally noticed the dagger. Skye knelt down and picked up the 'weapon'...which was now so horribly mangled and bent out of shape that it could never possibly be used for its intented purpose.

Lobsang, Ward and Skye stared at the dagger in awe...while Jamyang smiled at Ward with an expression approaching pride. "That, child, is how your gift is supposed to work!"

Skye's shock shifted from the dagger to Jamyang in a heartbeat. *His* gift?! she thought. What the... "All of you," she demanded. "Start talking. Now."

Ward decided to bite the bullet and start the explanation. "Skye...what's the last thing you remember?"