Now that I was back in the safety of the village, I took off my leather shoes and tucked them into my belt pouch to avoid wearing them out. The packed dirt down here hadn't seen rain in over four years, and any stray rocks and pebbles had been kicked to the base of the cliffs long ago.

With the fish and their tell-tale marks now in the hands of the villagers, I could go find Grant, who happened to be the porting coordinator and my adoptive father. I jogged toward the crystal at the other end of the village.

A grass-stuffed, leather ball bounced toward me, and I paused long enough to tap it into the air, bounce it off my other foot, then kick it back to a pair of teenagers, who grinned at me. A scrawny chicken—one of four in the village—took the opportunity to scamper past them.

The ravine was fairly long, although the widest section was only about fifty paces across. The limited space forced the villagers to carve paths going up the cliffside so we could dig enough small caves for everyone, but it was safe, and that was what mattered.

I detoured around animal hides stretched out on tanning racks and ducked beneath a couple of laundry lines where threadbare clothing hung. The cave entrances were covered by leather hides that were almost the same color as the rocks, having been rolled in the desert soil for camouflage in case an airship passed overhead.

I made a mental note to keep my eyes open for more flax for the spinning wheels, although it was hard to bring back that sort of stuff when food was so much more important. We had plenty of furs, hides, and leather, but they weren't ideal clothing in the desert heat.

It didn't take long to reach the other end of the ravine where the main crystal was. Grant was talking to a handful of hunters and gatherers who had just come back.

"Natalie! Over here!"

I smiled at my sister, Merryl, who was laying on a fur-covered stone slab in the sun. She lazily waved a hand before rolling just enough to lean against her partner, Calum. I headed over but picked a seat in the shade, which wasn't hard since the ravine was deep enough that shadows covered most of it, regardless of the time of day.

"How did your day go?" I asked her.

"Boring," she groaned, resting her hand on her stomach. "Grant is already shifting my duties and limiting how much I port."

"Better to play it safe," I reminded her. Despite being three months pregnant, she was only just starting to show. With both her and her partner being porters, the child would certainly develop the ability. That day would be a cause for a huge celebration, but in the meantime, the pregnancy would slow her down and make her vulnerable.

"I know," she muttered. "But I feel bad for always going to the safe zones when I could contribute more elsewhere."

We glanced at the crystal as a group materialized beside it. The porter in his early thirties leaned on the crystal as he recovered. A hunter set down two rabbit hounds, which trotted to the packed dirt in the shade and flopped down, panting happily. Another hunter helped the porter over to a nearby resting rock while villagers helped carry everything away.

"Welcome back, Andre," I said.

He gave a tired thumbs-up, not even opening his eyes as he leaned back on the worn furs to recover from the porting strain. His face wasn't pinched, so it was likely just exhaustion, not the painful aftereffects that built up if someone ported too many times. Just like some people were better at long-distance running, some porters could teleport more than others.

"Were the apples ready?" Merryl asked me.

I turned back to her. "Another village beat us to them."

"Dozens of villages know about that tree, so it's not surprising," Grant said as he came over, having finished his earlier discussion.

"One of the shards I planted finally grew big enough to use," I told him.

That caught the attention of everyone in earshot. Even Andre opened his eyes.

Grant detoured to the side to pluck a book off a shelf. "Which one?"

"It should be called Orange Flower By The River in your notes. Thick forest and a creek a mere thirty paces away."

He flipped through the leather pages as he peered at the age-smudged ink, finally finding the right one and removing the grey bookmark. "Excellent. I'll get you to take a few porters there tomorrow to learn the location."

I nodded and took a deep breath. "You'll want to remove Apple Tree Thicket from the rotation for a while. A Saursune chased me back to the crystal."

He frowned as he scanned the page. "There hasn't been a sighting there in almost nine months." He grabbed a dark red bookmark with a rune that matched the current moon phase and tucked it into the page.

"I know. I was lucky I hadn't wandered far from the crystal." The close call still sent shivers down my spine. He didn't have to ask if I was okay. If it had caught me, I wouldn't have survived.

"Did it get close enough to stick a tracker on you?" he asked, looking me up and down.

I shook my head. "No. It didn't have a gun or anything that looked like a ranged weapon, otherwise I would have gone to the Guard Station to get checked."

"You're lucky," he eventually said.

"I know." No touch of pride or exhilaration touched my somber voice. I was only here because the Saursune hadn't taken the hunt seriously.

He rubbed his chin and opened another book. "Your close call isn't the only one this week; several people from other villages were spotted while out foraging. Irwin Village lost a porter and four hunters last week. They might be trying to locate the villages again."

I shuddered at that thought, and others exchanged worried glances. Calum held Merryl closer.

Grant exhaled heavily and ran a hand through his short hair, stress making the middle-aged man look older than he was. "Be extra careful on your future trips. We haven't touched their fields, but too many villages steal grain and crops every day. Those lizards won't know or care which village we belong to if they get tired of the raids. They usually try sticking trackers on us every few years, and we're long overdue."

"I can try porting to other shards tomorrow," I quietly said. "Perhaps one or two of them have grown large enough."

Grant nodded; his eyes flickered past us, to two approaching men with leather carry bags and large water skins.

"Ready for your shift?" he asked the sentries.

"Whenever it's convenient," one replied.

Grant didn't have the porting ability, but his infallible memory and note-taking skills made him invaluable when it came to organizing the porters, gatherers, hunters, and all of our excursions.

"Natalie, do you mind taking them?"

"Sure. Just give me ten minutes to rest." I could have ported at least three or four more times before I truly needed a break, and Grant and the other porters knew it, but it was never wise to port to the ends of one's limits in case trouble came calling.

I also wanted to avoid causing hard feelings since most porters were hard-pressed to port six times in a single day. Roxanne had once hit sixteen ports, and my record was twenty-one solo ports, which no one else knew about. Flaunting our skills wasn't proper teamwork when a short rest would smooth things over.

Grant nodded amiably and went to check on a porter who had just appeared by the crystal. The two sentries chatted with Andre as they waited for me.

"Where's Callie?" I asked Merryl as I tried to spot my five-year-old niece.

"On the second ledge somewhere," she replied. "I think she was helping Fran grind flour."

Grant's comments immediately sprang to mind. I asked, "Someone found grain?"

"One of the tiny patches we planted at Zebra Plains," she reassured me.

I relaxed. We didn't dare plant much grain, usually just a handful of seeds in one spot. Anything more might be noticed by the Saursunes. Our village well only produced enough water for us and a handful of small plants, hence why we had to go out and search for food every day.

After waiting a while longer, I got to my feet and stretched.

"Ready?" I asked the two men, although they were already coming over.

Both rested their hands on my shoulder, and I touched the crystal as I murmured, "Sentry Point."

Even though I could have ported without the location phrase—a subtle sign of how powerful my porting abilities were—it was only polite to use it around other porters since most of them couldn't port without it. It was another attempt to keep the peace, and being considerate of others had worked well so far. I preferred to support others instead of tearing them down.

Together, we'd survive. Divided, we'd fall.

The contact allowed the men to come with me. The world around us hazed over, and there was a slight dragging sensation caused by my passengers. The energy drain was more notable than a solo port, and I kept tabs on it, but this was well within my abilities.

As our view cleared, all three of us quickly glanced around even though we knew this location was just as safe as the village. We could never be too careful. Some villages hadn't been cautious enough, and they had paid for it dearly.

The two current sentries waved us over. I sat on a fur rug near the crystal while the current shift brought the new ones up to speed, which took all of one sentence. Nothing had moved other than sand blowing in the wind. As was their habit, they played a quick game of cards on a large rock.

I gazed around the outpost, which was basically a shady area under a massive slab of rock that rose out of the sand at an angle. The sun-sheltered area was only about forty paces wide.

The location gave the sentries a good view of most of the desert and sky. A hole had been painstakingly chiseled through the slab so they could watch the other part of the sky as well. If any Saursune airships were spotted, the sentries would blow a warning horn. The village was close enough to hear it—I could see the ravine opening in the distance—and the villagers would hastily hide any human objects in the caves and hope we'd remain undetected.

It had been over eight years since the horns had been used, and that airship hadn't passed close enough to notice the village. I fervently hoped the horns would never have to blow an evacuation alarm. If the airships were that close, there was no way thirteen porters could get two hundred villagers to safety in time.

By the time the sentries finished their game, I was bored out of my mind and more than ready to head back. Had I been an average porter or had ported more, I would have needed the rest. Today was not that day.

When we got back, food was being handed out, and I was delighted to see that I had a slice of bread and a big bowl of stew with fish, greens, and tubers. Porters were fed better than most; a porter too weak to run didn't last long, and our abilities were necessary to transport the food in.

The stew might be mostly greens, but I wasn't about to complain since I'd gone to bed with a hungry stomach before, and I was sure it would happen again. But not tonight. Tonight, there was enough to satisfy everyone.

Grant sat next to me as I ate. I groaned internally, but I had known the consequences even before drawing my flint knife to carve the fishing spear.

"I saw the marks on the fish," he quietly told me. "You could have come back and gathered some volunteers instead of spearing them yourself. Even if they weren't hunters, they would have helped. You and I both know that porting a few times isn't a challenge for you. There are nearly two hundred people here who need you."

I ducked my head, but what could I say? I knew the rules, and I knew why they existed. My initial reasoning, of the hunters not being back yet, now appeared flimsy after being reminded that there were others who could use a fishing spear or net. The loss of a hunter was devastating enough, but a village could be crippled if they lost someone with the porting ability.

All I could guess was that some bit of hidden pride had prompted me to push the boundaries and bring back a tasty treat, or perhaps I hadn't been ready to return and admit my close call so soon.

"Remember to take a fishing net if you feel like fishing," he continued as calmly as if he were discussing which location I'd try tomorrow. "The Saursunes don't seem to count those as weapons."

"I'll remember," I mumbled.

"Thanks. I'll get you to show Calum, Derek, Belle, Ariel, and Roxanne the new crystal tomorrow. We can leave one group there for the day. My notes say you buried another shard a few weeks prior to that one, near an abandoned apple orchard?"

The crystals rarely shed shards, and I never wasted them by burying them anywhere near Saursune habitations or activity. But three years was a long time, and they might have returned to the orchard as suddenly as they had left it.

"I planted the shard about two hundred paces away, just in case a bear or something was after the fallen apples."

Grant hummed faintly in approval, still thinking. Eventually, he asked, "Do you mind trying to port there tomorrow after taking the group to the other crystal?"

"I'll be ready to port away in a second's notice if anything is amiss," I promised him.

My imagination was already painting images of finding the orchard in full fruit. There would be enough for everyone to have an apple! Such a thing hadn't happened in my lifetime. My eyes drifted to some children playing, letting my mind dream of a day when they wouldn't wonder if they'd go to bed hungry that night.