Danny was standing with his team in the dining hall. A number of other shadows were waiting there as well. It wasn't during a meal time so no one else was there. Instructor Meadow walked in and unceremoniously turned to face them, "Congratulations teams, you are now officially no longer trainees, but apprentice Shadows. When you have successfully completed enough missions you will be advanced to a journeyman shadow, and given a name. You will no longer bunk in the trainee dorms. While here, you will stay in the assigned rooms that all shadows stay in. You will be working alongside an experienced shadow until your team reaches the rank of journeyman. With that out of the way, I have some more news to share with you.

As of this morning, the military has begun mobilizing to address a goblin threat discovered on the eastern ranges of the dwarven mountains. Additional troops will be stationed at the towns and villages nearest to this latest threat. The elven ambassador has assured us her people can be ready to mobilize quickly and will be with us in this fight. Since issuing military orders is outside the dwarven ambassador's authority, she has sent word to her people for their response. It is likely that your missions will revolve around addressing the goblin threat. I will now hand out your next assignments. Report to your assigned senior shadow, at the location listed, as soon as possible. You are dismissed."

With that, Instructor Meadow left the room. New trainees could be heard through the open door going through their morning drills.

Ivy looked at the paper and smiled, turning to Jade, "Looks like we are going to get to spend some time with your family."

Jade's eyes lit up and she smiled.

Ivy read the rest of their orders, "We are to wait for them in the town of Crossbark. There is a map included. Looks like it is on the edge of the Great forest along the main path to through to the elven forest. Let's meet up here for lunch with our things, then head out. I don't want to keep shadow Basalt waiting."

Shortly after the meeting Danny peeked into Instructor Meadow's office through her open door, "Instructor Meadow, you asked to see me?"

Looking up from some papers she had been busily writing on her desk, Meadows waved him in and gestured towards the vacant chairs in front of her desk.

She finished writing something down and looked across her desks at him, "Danny, thank you for coming in. How are you doing?"

Smiling, Danny replied, "Good, and you?"

Meadows smirked, "I would be better if your first mission didn't result in a mountain of paperwork and more headaches than I care to mention."

"My apologies, I will try to be less conspicuous in the future."

Meadows barked a laugh, "I would appreciate that. Now, onto why I brought you here. You are the last person in our graduating shadows for me to speak with. This is because I had to wait for some final approvals and decision to be made before meeting with you.

As you know our organization is a known entity to the public, but we don't go around openly broadcasting who our members are. The black uniform you wear is to be worn only when here at the headquarters. I will talk about that more in a bit. Once you step outside of the walls, you are not to mention anything about us, even in private conversation to your shadow."

Danny looked confused, "But what about Leaf?"

Meadows sighed, "Yes, seeing our uniforms, he might have suspected who we were. What was even more unfortunate was that he saw your... special abilities. Plans have been moved forward and others tossed aside. I wish we had had more time to train you in the more… urbane skills of our order.

The elves have requested to meet you. The elves have always been exceptional at earth and water magics, but their proudest achievements are in nature magic. Just having a human with nature magic alone would interest them, but you being so young has them all but demanding your presence. Then Leaf saw you at least using fire and ice... Fortunately for Leaf, those in charge decided he was worth more alive than silent."

Meadows got up and went over to a small table next to her desk. The table held a tray with a decanter and couple of glasses. Pouring herself a drink, she downed it, before turning back to Danny.

"Danny, I don't know what the elves will want from you. You will need to be on your guard at all times. Listen to your superiors in the other shadow. Our relationship with the elves is of the utmost importance, especially at times like these. We hope showing your abilities to them will help close the gap between our two nations even further."

Meadows sat back down at her desk and, in her distraction, placed her empty glass on top of the papers she had been writing. Running a hand through her short hair, she finally looked Danny in the eyes, "I have been asked to relay a personal message to you from the Umbra... ‘Make sure you come back. If not for your shadow, then at least do it for your family.’”

Danny rocked back as if physically slapped. All he could do is sit there wide-eyed, as he processed what he had just heard.

Meadows looked down and nodded her head slowly. Pulling out a drawer, Meadows slapped down onto the desk a duster with an alternating pattern of red, grey, and white colors.

“Congratulations on your appointment to wizard Creek. You chose these elements in the academy and you will have to stick with them. Wizards with three affinities are rare. So don’t let anyone, in the public or military, see you use a spell other than from these three affinities. Away from prying eyes and then once you reach the elves, you can do as you please.”

Standing, Danny grabbed the duster off the desk and turned to leave.

“Danny…” Meadows' voice called out behind him.

Seeing him stop and look back at her, Meadows looked like she wanted to say more, a lot more. After a few moments, she frowned, “Good luck, Danny.”

Danny stared at her for a few seconds then left silently.

They made good time south through the edge of the Great Forest. Phantom ranged alongside them, running off to chase after something, only to return to Danny's side later. Having known Danny for over five years now, the girls easily picked up on Danny’s strange mood. They each tried to cheer him up and find out what was wrong, but couldn’t get anything out of him. Danny figured what he was told was meant to stay with him, or else.

It took two days for them to reach the small town of Crossbark, named so because it was the last village on the main road, separating the rest of the human lands from the Great Forest.

The town was surrounded by a large stone wall. Danny could tell it was a major trade hub for merchants traveling to and from the elven lands. Brooke informed him that elves didn't come often to the human lands but welcomed human traders into their borders. The town looked prosperous but on high alert. Danny's group was stopped at the entrance by military personnel, before being allowed in the city. The soldiers posted there asked Danny a lot of questions. He was worried as they were all about his background, and thought they might expect who he worked for. Finally Ivy rushed them along, explaining that they were late for a meeting. He was confused as to why the military was stopping humans, especially wizards. Maybe it was just to instill a sense of security.

They made their way to an inn that was listed in their orders. The inn itself was nothing fancy, but also not a hole-in-the-wall. The ground floor housed a tavern and the two floors above that held the rooms for rent. As they entered the inn there were only a few patrons in the tavern. They all stopped and stared, like something out of a bad western movie. They didn't seem threatening, just curious. Maybe they were wondering why a group of young people would be coming in to the tavern.

The woman behind the bar greeted them as they entered, introducing herself as the owner. They inquired after a room with two beds, baths, and meals. Nodding, the woman haggled with Ivy briefly over the price and they made their way upstairs. Danny said he would be fine paying for a room of his own. He received a monthly wage from the Order, and had developed quite the savings over the years. The girls wouldn't hear anything about it. He tried to argue again, but they said it wasn't safe to be alone anywhere in these border towns.

They asked about a group waiting for them and was told no one matching that description had arrived, so they went upstairs and dropped off their things. Locking the door, they left to visit the town’s marketplace.

The marketplace was packed. Stalls were crammed in every available place and stores lined the outskirts. There seemed to be no order to what type of stall went where. Everyone was either talking, or yelling to be heard above the talking.

As he was walking next to Brooke, people in the crowd kept brushing up against Danny, and he couldn’t figure out why. He had a death-grip on his coin purse, as he had only read about these kinds of situations. Strangely, no one was running into the girls. Without anyone saying anything, the girls took up positions around him. Danny couldn’t help but feel emasculated.

They visited a few weapon and armor vendors, but nothing in their price range could match the equipment they received from the Order. The girls started looking at clothing and Danny felt a strong case of déjà vu. A memory of him as a child, holding his mother’s purse while she looked through racks of clothing. Then another memory, him as an adult, holding his girlfriend’s purse while she looked through racks of under…clothing. Danny looked down and smiled. At least this world didn’t require purse holding.

They were on the edge of the market, and Danny saw a book store. If it wasn’t for the symbol of the book on the sign over the door, he would have thought it was a pawn shop back on Earth. Metal bars covered the windows and the door looked like it was made to take a beating. Confused, Danny didn’t see any of the other store fronts receiving the same treatment. The girls were still distracted, arguing over which whatever looked better on Jade. Danny really wanted to get out of the crowd and get some time to himself.

Quickly ducking into the store he found himself one of only a few customers. An impressively-muscled woman stood right inside the door and sized him up before giving him a creepy smile. Not questioning why she was not put in charge of sales, Danny quickly walked farther into the store. Expecting it to look like a library, he was surprised to find all the books behind long glass cases in the center of the room. The walls held glass cabinets filled with even more books. Every book in the store was turned so their covers faced outward.

One book was not under glass, but on a podium. When he walked over to it and started reading, he quickly realized it was a catalogue of all the books the store sold. Reading through the lists, he quickly found his two alchemy books, but was confused because that was all there was.

An older woman who appeared in her fifties walked over and greeted him, “Hello young wizard, can I help you find anything today?”

Danny smiled up at the woman, “Yes, I was looking for the other volumes to these two alchemy books.”

The woman frowned, “I am so sorry, those books are not in public circulation and can only be read by joining the alchemist’s guild. Though, I suspect there are some influential families that have managed to grab them for their own private collections. Again, my apologies.”

Wishing he had gone in a bookstore before, he thank the woman before walking around the store and just looking at what was available. This was one of those moments where a lot of useless jumbled up information all came together in Danny’s brain to form insight.

In this world, knowledge was literally power. Just by reading something, one could later use it whenever they wanted to. Of course, they had to comprehend it, but still. His knowledge of the elements alone would be priceless. Was it merely a case of the powerful wanting to stay in power?

Danny asked about some of the prices for the books and instantly felt guilty. He swore to save up enough of his wages to pay his family back for the fortune they spent on his two books of alchemy.

Unfortunately they had nothing else that was useful to him, not that he could have afforded it if they had. Thanking the woman, he left the store.

He hadn’t thought he had been inside long but the girls were gone. At first he questioned why they didn’t think to look in a bookstore for him. Then he remembered the prices and started looking around. He decided the best course of action would be to go back to the inn and wait for one of them to show up.

As he weaved his way through the crowds he was constantly stopped by different women asking if he needed help, or if he wanted them to help him look for something to buy. At first he was polite and begged off, but then by the fifth interruption he just started ignoring them. As he got closer to the inn, his air scan, which was seriously hampered by the crowd, had managed to pick up a few people consistently following him. If it had just been one person, he probably wouldn’t have been able to tell, but there were four of them.

Looking back, he saw four women. None of them in his shadow. Three of them were nothing to write home about, but one of them was gorgeous. The pretty one smiled and waved at him. Something about it seemed off and his left hand jerked towards the inn making him turn back around.

His air scan told him they were moving faster to catch up to him, so Danny started trying to lose them. He was about as tall as most of the women in the market and ducked down as he moved. He slowly made his way back towards the inn, but stopped short at the edge of the market. Two of the four that were following him were waiting on the street leaving the market, towards his inn. Not sure where the other streets led, he turned back to try and see what his best option was.

Danny was passing by a man and (what he assumed to be) two of his wives haggling with a vegetable merchant, when Danny was yanked back by the arm.

The beautiful woman from before loomed in front of him. He tried to jerk his arm away, but could instantly tell from how her grip didn't change that she was definitely augmented for strength. She pulled Danny into her arms and he had to look up, but found it a little difficult due to the size of her chest.

A smile crossed her full lips and Danny found himself looking into her big brown eyes. “Hello there cutie, you look a little lost. How about I help you out? Maybe I could take you out for dinner first?”

Danny's tried to wiggle out of her grasp, but that only seemed to settle him further into her embrace, "Please, let me go..."

The hand holding him started rubbing his arm as the woman tried to sooth him, "Shhh, don't be like that, we can have a little fun if you want." Danny couldn’t deny part of him was enjoying everything he was feeling. By the extreme degree of his body's reaction, Danny thought she must have used some sort of lust magic on him. He never remembered having it this bad... wait. Then it hit him. It wasn’t that long ago that he hit puberty… stupid teenage hormones!

Danny’s left hand snaked out and grabbed somewhere highly inappropriate for such a public space. The woman’s eyes opened a little shocked at this, but then she smiled like the cat that had just caught the canary. Danny wasn’t sure if what he had just done had been Cranny or not, but he was going to go down swearing it had been his former self’s fault.

Danny couldn’t help himself, “Damn girl, is it hot out here or just you?”

The beautiful woman's face lost some of its confidence, as the phrase didn't translate well to this world's human language.

Remembering what he had been told, he used a spell normally meant for lighting candles or fireplaces. Suddenly small flames erupted around his hand and caught her shirt on fire. A wicked grin spread across Danny's face, "Yep, it's just you..."

A scream of panic erupted behind him, and Danny turned to face one of the woman he had seen with the beauty before. He hadn't noticed her, and suspected she had been sneaking up on him. He was caught a little off guard when the sneaky woman ran past, completely ignoring him. Danny stood there dumbly for a few seconds, watching the two panicked women try and put out the fire. Maybe his hormones affected his control over his magic.

Then Danny laughted as he took off running down the closest side street. His laughter stopped when his air scan told him it was a dead end up ahead. Turning around he could sense four people approaching. Looking about, there was nothing but residences, tightly packed next to each other. There were no yards or small gardens he could use nature affinity on. He didn’t want to fight them and decided to escape further down the alley to buy himself enough time to use earth affinity to escape. He really should find a way to safely fly without fear of breaking something.

He sensed another person moving on top of the roofs of the homes behind him and to his left. Then new arrival intercepted the four following him.

Air scan showed the five people moving around erratically and then they all stopped. A lone figure moved quickly towards Danny, and he could immediately tell he didn’t have enough time to flee.

Preparing a fireball, he didn’t have to wait long for Jade to come into view. Seeing him, her face lit up with a huge smile. Danny sighed in relief and smiled back. Then Jade stopped smiling.