Fiona floated through Biloxi, invisible to everyone. She remembered the guard's face and she was searching for him. It was more difficult than she realized to find one guard in this large city. After randomly searching around the Bazaar and near the outskirts of the city, she came up empty.

She was also keeping an eye out for anything odd, too bad she found most of what the humans of Paul's world did, odd.

She needed a different approach, her current one wasn't panning out. She decided to head back toward the city entrance. Eventually, she found what she was looking for. She followed the group of guards, throughout their entire patrol. It seemed at least one of them was aware something was following them as they kept scanning the area nervously. She felt bad for the man, it wasn't her goal to frighten them.

She pulled farther back as to not trigger whatever ability the man was using. It was a long six hours, following the group of guards around before they returned to a building with groups of guards coming and going. This is exactly what she had been looking for. She found a dark alley where she could watch people coming and going. She was taking Paul's warning to heart.

It was another full day of waiting in the dark alley before she spotted her target. It was a good thing she was undead, unending patience kind of came with the package.

The man was with two others. After making sure nobody noticed her, she followed them. She watched as the men entered a large single-story building. Paul had told her about these, apparently, it was a strip mall.

Other men were guarding the building in the front. She kept her distance but floated past. She wanted to see if anyone spotted her while she was invisible. Nobody looked in her direction, still, she didn't enter in through the front. Fiona circled the building, making note of more guards. Nobody glanced her way so she figured she was safe to try and see what was inside the building.

She approached a wall that had no entrance on it and floated through.

***

Frederick was discussing plans with a few of the men he had wooed toward his side when a glow caught his eye. He raised his hand and smiled at the ring he had purchased.

"It appears that our guest of honor has arrived. Go outside and tell the men to activate the enchantment."

"Right away, sir," the man replied with a curt nod.

Frederick waited in the office until a flash of light passed through the building. The enchantment had cost him plenty but it was worth it. It prevented anything from passing through the walls, be that ghosts or people with phasing abilities.

Frederick stood up and straightened his clothing. It wouldn't do to greet his guest looking like a slob.

***

Fiona knew she had screwed up as soon as the light flashed through the building. Well, more like when she tried to phase through another wall only to be stopped dead. She needed to take physical form to exit the small room she had found herself in.

Now she had a problem. She could try and wait out the enchantment or try to escape through one of the entrances. Since she didn't know how they powered the enchantment waiting wasn't an option. She knew that enchantments could last hours or months depending on what powered them. She didn't like those odds.

***

Frederick waited by the main entrance, the other entrances had been sealed shut. It was only a few minutes later when a ghostly form opened a door and stepped into the entryway.

Frederick cleared his throat and smiled. "Greetings lady, may I inquire as to why you came for a visit?"

At first, the ghostly woman didn't reply, looking at him then at the other men standing near him.

"Release me," she said, a pale white sword flaring into existence in her hand.

"I'm afraid I can't do that. You see you and your friends have something that belongs to me. Plus I have taken a liking to your quaint little village." he said, walking toward the woman.

His men remained motionless by the doors.

"Then I have no choice but to kill you and escape on my own."

Frederick felt a flare of excitement. It had been far too long since he had been in any sort of real danger. The ghost woman rushed at him, fading from view. He smiled and quietly activated the other trinket he had purchased.

He felt a chill pierce his back or start to, this was followed by the woman screaming as her soul was sucked into the soul trap. The little clear gem now contained a swirling grey mist. He let out a small sigh or relief, the spirit would have been the biggest issue but now that problem was resolved. Frederick pulled it up toward his eye. "One down, two to go," he said with a wicked smile.

***

I was pacing back and forth worriedly. Fiona was still not back, it had been over a week. Something must have gone wrong but there was no way to tell what or even where. The only thing we could do now was to wait. The enemy would make his move eventually, I only hoped that Fiona was still alive.

I wanted to ride Bella straight to Biloxi to deal with this Psion but I knew doing something like that would be a death sentence. I cursed myself for letting Fiona talk me into letting her go. The waiting was killing me. Martin had come by each day asking if Fiona had returned. I wasn't sure who was more concerned about her, him or me.

To keep my mind off of the problem I tried to practice my rune crafting and tattooing. It didn't help. My thoughts kept returning to Fiona. I gave up on trying to distract myself and decided to spend my days watching the entrance that they were likely to take when they showed up.

People in town could tell I was on edge. They would whisper as I passed, when I looked their way they would avert their gazes or stop talking. I would like to say it didn't bother me but it did. After all the help I had given the town nobody had stepped up to assist, other than Martin.

I know that it was mainly due to Constable Jenning's influence. But still, her brother was man enough to step up and help. I couldn't help thinking that this was why the town had been taken over by the cartels prior to the System in the first place. Their attitude that anything beyond the city wasn't a concern was idiotic. The world had changed, keeping to themselves would not keep trouble from coming to them.

Speaking of trouble, I saw one of the town's scouts coming back on a quad. Martin had trained up a couple of new individuals to replace the void left by Joshua and Clem's deaths. I waved the man down before he drove off to report to the Constable. He was forced to slam on his brakes, skidding to a stop or he would have hit me.

"Geez, Paul, I could have injured you."

I snorted at that, "Why are you in such a hurry?"

"Oh... um, I should probably report to the Constable first," He said, looking nervous.

I rolled my eyes. "Look, I won't tell her if you don't."

He deliberated for a few seconds before finally sighing. "Fine, I spotted a large group of people heading this way. They are a few hours out."

I nodded to the man, stepping aside to let him continue. 'So, he's finally making his move.'

I needed to find Martin, while I didn't think one man was going to make a difference, he would never forgive me if I didn't.

It wasn't hard to find Martin, he had stuck close to town, knowing the attack was going to come eventually.

"It's time?" he asked.

"Yeah, one of your new scouts saw a large group heading our way."

"Shit, any idea how many?"

"No, but probably more than we can handle," I added, truthfully.

"You think their leader will show?"

"I would bet on it."

I could see the man was struggling with something.

"Look, Paul... I don't want to throw my life away in a fight we can't win."

"I understand, don't worry. If it comes down to it I'll fight them myself. It was my fault they came here, it's only right that I deal with it."

The man looked ashamed for even having to bring this topic up. I set my hand on his shoulder and gave him a reassuring squeeze.

"Let's go meet our new acquaintances."

Martin nodded and we started walking towards the outer wall entrance.