THIRTY-SIX.

Friday, December 31.

Afternoon.

"Lord Amory," a male voice said from the entrance of the enormous chamber. "You said to interrupt when we found the creature. It was in the gardens." Amory glanced toward the entryway. At the top of the steps was one of the guards I had met on my way into the manor.

The male held up a squirrel by the tail.

"Angel." Her name was out of my mouth before I could stop myself.

"Oh, shit," came Joshua's whisper from the shadows to my right, startling me on top of everything else. Without my Drow senses, I hadn't even known he was there in shadow form.

The Sorcerer whirled to face me, shock then rage on his features.

"I saw that paranorm while in the Earth Otherworld." I rushed to cover up my mistake even though I knew it was too late. "Her name was Angel. She shifts into a squirrel. Like that one." I realized too late that I'd just made two more huge mistakes. Mistake number two-Bryna would never have hurried to explain anything. She would have maintained her haughty attitude and would have said the information casually.

Not like an idiot, like I just had.

And mistake three, probably the worst of all, I'd just spoken in English.

I'd operated undercover plenty of times and I'd never done anything so incredibly stupid. The only reason I could come up with was that I literally wasn't in my right mind. The shock of seeing Angel had thrown me out of character.

"Who are you?" the Sorcerer bellowed as he pointed his finger at me. "Where is my niece?" I pushed my chair back and dropped to my knees on the floor.

Vibrant, sizzling orange ropes of magic lashed out.

I ducked under the huge circular table.

The ropes wrapped around the chair where I had been. Wood charred and smoldered where the ropes touched the chair.

My heart thundered. I smelled burnt hair. Two locks fell from my head onto the floor beneath the table. I'd barely missed having my head fried.

Then I realized he was only going to hurt me. If he killed me, he might lose his niece in the process.

"Who. Are. You?" The room reverberated with the power in the Sorcerer's shout.

I scrambled beneath the round table. The feet and legs of all of his advisors surrounded me.

Adrenaline pumped through my body. What good could the extra burst of energy do me as a human? Nothing more than amp up the fear that was causing my whole body to shake.

"Get out of here!" Amory bellowed and his advisors started pushing their chairs away.

At the same time I heard a roar that made even the floor shudder.

A Dragon. Colin.

The scream of a jaguar about to attack-Ice.

The shrill call of a bird-Meryl.

Battle cries from Joshua and Mandisa.

A shout from Penrod.

My team was here. And I was cowering under a table.

Feet around the table moved. The advisors were in a mad rush to flee.

Something furry bolted toward me.

I started to dodge it, then realized it was Angel's squirrel Host body.

I lunged for the squirrel and caught her to my chest.

The Sentient inside Angela's Host body fought and struggled, scratching me through my clothing and across my face.

"Stop it!" I managed to get her in a chokehold under my arm, but without actually choking her.

If I could get Angel's stone from Colin, maybe it would work in reverse if somehow I got the squirrel to touch it and then Angel would be back in her own body.

Sounds of shouts and confusion echoed through the Inner Circle chamber.

Blasts of magic made the chamber light up as if a lightning storm was inside instead of out. A flare, then dark, a flare, then dark.

"Kill them all, except the Bryna Host!" I heard the Sorcerer yell as pounding footsteps came from the direction of the entryway. Bryna's Host told me it was Amory's guard come to fight. "Capture her but don't kill her- now!"

Shouts, yells, roars, screams- Complete and utter chaos.

The squirrel struggled as I crawled toward the big Dragon feet I saw behind the now upturned chair where I'd been sitting.

I scooted closer and just as I reached Colin, the squirrel bit my finger.

"Ouch," I cried out and the squirrel dove out of my hold. "Colin!" I shouted as I dove for her and caught her by her bushy tail. "I need Angel's stone!" Colin ducked his massive Dragon head beneath the table and he blinked at me with his big burnished gold eyes. In a bright flash of light and a whirl of golden sparkles, he shrank down in size to his human form and crouched. He dug the cloth covered stone out of his pocket and tossed it to me.

At virtually the same instant he morphed into a Dragon again.

With one hand holding the squirrel's tail, I reached up to catch the airborne stone with my free hand.

The cloth fell away. The stone landed in my open palm.

An explosion of colored lights in my mind. I felt like I was bathed in purple, orange, green, yellow, blue, red.

Sights and sounds twisted and whirled. Images flashed through my mind too fast for me to grasp. A whirlwind of color, light, and sound.

Everything grew suddenly very large around me. Gigantic.

I was shrinking.

And my butt hurt like hell.

I twisted- And found Candace Moreno's Host holding my tail.

My tail?

Oh, crap.

We stared at each other for one moment. The stone lay on the floor between us.

The Host had her mouth open wide. My little squirrel jaw had dropped.

Angel's body must not have been sealed, just like Candace's hadn't been.

If I was in Angel's Host body, then who was in Candace's?

I squeaked out-in squirrel-"Angel?"

At the same time Candace's Host said, "Nyx?"

Someone grabbed Angel-Candace by her feet and dragged her from me.

She shouted and let go of my tail.

I scampered after her. Had to help her. Had to help Angel.

How was I going to do that as a squirrel?

Even as I thought that, I sprawled on the floor. My body elongated, stretched out. Everything started getting smaller again. Long blond corkscrew curls bounced around my face and I felt myself suddenly in a petite, perky, compact human body.

I'd just shifted into Angel.

"Angel!" I shouted. I started to crawl from beneath the table when I spotted the stone Angel had been in. I snatched up the cloth and wrapped it around the stone, which now had a mousy-looking woman staring out from it. Aela was her name, according to the remnants of her essence in Angel's Host body.

I shoved the stone into the pocket of the jeans I was wearing and crawled out from beneath the table.

Two guards were dragging Angel-Candace away.

"Help save Nyx!" came Joshua's shout.

Ice as a jaguar launched himself into the air and over the table.

I thought he was coming to help me then realized he was going after Angel-Candace, thinking it was me.

Knowledge came to me from Angel's essence-of the power and strength she had as a Doppler and as a Tracker.

Ice went for one of Angel's abductors and I dove for the other.

I slammed my shoe into the back of his knee. It buckled. As the guard came down I grabbed his head, turned it. Rammed my knee into his nose.

He screamed as blood spewed from it. I stomped on his wrist and ground it against the floor.

The guard screamed again and sagged.

It gave me just the right angle. I was operating on pure Angel-Nyx-drive.

I clasped his skull in my hands. Braced my knee. Then twisted his head and snapped his neck. I glanced at Ice who'd taken equally good care of the other guard.

Ice shifted into his human form and we dragged Angel-Candace up the stairs of the huge chamber and out into the hallway.

"Damn," she said and held her arm to her chest. It was broken, twisted into an odd angle. "A human? How'd I end up in a freaking human body?" She pointed back toward the chamber, which was illuminated with more flashes of light. "Go. Just go!" Ice transformed into a white mouse and darted through the entryway.

Despite Angel's essence I was afraid to intentionally shift into a squirrel because I didn't want to get stuck in that form. I needed to fight in human form anyway.

I hurried to the entryway and peeked inside to see the battle going on.

Dead males and females, wearing the same uniform as the twins who had been at the front gate, sprawled across the floor of the chamber.

My heart dropped to my toes when I saw an oriole lying completely still on the floor between the Dragon and the Sorcerer.

Meryl. Was she still alive?

Amory whipped ropes of orange magic out at the Dragon who blasted them away with fire every time one of them neared him. Walls were scored with tracks of fire from Colin.

Mandisa was in glamour and I guessed that Penrod was close by, both trying to edge their way toward the Sorcerer. He wasn't looking toward Mandisa, as if he didn't know she was there, but Angel's senses told me Amory was not only aware of Mandisa but of Penrod, too.

The Sorcerer was entirely aware that they were there and letting them close in on him.

Ice as a white mouse was scrambling over rocks and debris toward Amory.

"It's a trap!" I shouted, my mind racing as I tried to come up with a plan. "He knows you're there!"

The Sorcerer flung out his arm toward me. An orange rope snapped in the air.

I reached up and grabbed the magic rope before it could wrap itself around me. I jerked it away from the Sorcerer.

My hand burned with fire, the pain shooting through my arm. I smelled sizzling flesh and I almost dropped the rope from the strength of the pain. Angel's hand would heal when she shifted but right now it hurt like hell.

Amory looked at me in shock as I snapped the rope in the air. Angel was an expert with a whip, her choice in weapons, and my choice to fight with now.

The magical rope sizzled and crackled as I whipped it back at the Sorcerer. He had to fend off Colin's fire and my whip, and he knew the others were closing in on him.

As I snapped the whip at Amory, it hit something hard, solid, just inches from the Sorcerer's face. An orange shimmer in the air told me that he'd just thrown up a shield between himself and all of the Trackers.

"He's shielded," I shouted. Desmond had said it was impossible for any of the Trackers to truly defeat the Sorcerer on our own. I didn't know for sure if that was true, but I did know we needed to recoup and make our escape before more of Amory's guards showed up. "Get out of here. Now!" I screamed over the noise.

But everyone kept their places and continued to advance on the Sorcerer.