Anora’s heart quickened and she held her breath as Ahllasta eyed her. Her hounds each tensed, their thick legs bending at the ready as they growled low, baring their fangs. The distant murmur of the man’s voice and her hounds’ crackling snarls were all that filled the room.
	Anora exhaled when Ahllasta finally spoke. She ground her teeth when the woman kicked Darsby, enough strength in that simple action to cause him further injury. She tried to not shudder, and to resist the urge to place a barrier between him and Ahllasta.
	Her teeth snapped together at the condition of the woman’s help. That wasn’t a promise she could make and keep. But she didn’t have time to fight it. The red-eyed man’s conversation sounded like it was nearing an end. 
	Her chin lowered as she dropped her gaze to Darsby. Reluctantly, she let two of her hounds melt back into formless mist at her feet. The relief of releasing the two semi-solid forms flooded over her, the draw of her powers lessening. 
	“The van out front,” she began in a near whisper, keeping her voice down to avoid being heard by Ahllasta’s companion. “Keep him,” she nodded in the general direction of the other intruder, “busy, and I can get Darsby there. And the both of us out of here.”
	Some of the mist that had once been the hounds had already begun to creep around Darsby, almost protectively. The remaining hound stood at the ready in front of her, its bulk wider than her, acting like a living shield—so to speak—in case this whole thing was a trick.