“People who don’t have anywhere or anything else to turn to can’t always afford to leave,” Kire said about the camps. She and her family had the luck of their status and existing resources to afford to go on exile, but without this support, she wondered how they’d have survived during the war. She listened as Ruli asked Ysaryn if she could sense anything from this vantage point. 
“Most of the residents reported the voices and shadows,” Myka replied. “Not all of them had the more vivid visions or hallucinations or whatever you call it—let’s say a tenth of the total population. There might be people trapped inside, too.” 
Kire thought this over. “We don’t really know what we’re dealing with. Best thing to do would be to just walk in and see what they saw, I suppose. If it was a temporary effect, we should, in theory, come out alright at the end of it.” 
“In theory,” Daryll muttered, though admittedly he was particularly excited. “Shall we?” 

Myka and Ysaryn were right about the heat. It was humid, worse than Pokos.  When they got close enough to the border of the forest, Kire inhaled, then coughed. The magic permeating the air was sweet, cloyingly so, sticking to the back of her throat, like she had drank pure syrup. A buzzing filled her ears, like being attacked by a swarm of bees. “Give—give me a minute,” she said, frowning as she shut her eyes and tried to drown out the sounds in her head. The buzzing subsided, the forest’s sweet signature lingering in her mouth, not as overwhelming as in their first approach, but just on the edge of tolerable. “Alright. Let’s go in.”
For the first several paces, nothing assailed them yet. Kire, Daryll, and Myka looked around at the trees that had grown in the middle of streets, gardens, homes. It was also eerily quiet. Kire kept swallowing, every now and then taking a gulp from her waterskin. “There’s so much raw energy flowing through here,” she commented. “But I don’t know where it’s coming from. How—"

She was walking on sand. Kire’s lips parted in surprise. It felt so real. She remembered feeling this dry, searing heat in Ziad. When she bent down to grab a fistful of sand, she could feel how hot and course they were against her calloused and scarred palm, could feel the grains running down from between her fingers. “Daryll! Ruli! Ysaryn! Myka!” she yelled, but for the moment she was alone. She could try portaling out of the desert, back to their starting point, but as insufferably hot as it was, Kire wanted to see what else was in this desert, if there were other clues. She was about to turn around and walk, try to get to one of the nearby sand dunes and, perhaps, some shade, when a great shadow passed overhead. 

Kire looked up, and her heart almost stopped then and there.
Its hulking body shone with emerald and gold scales, a glittering, serpentine body, with great, leathery wings and a tail that ended in an arrow shaped tip. [i]Dragon,[/i] she gasped. Its wings whipped up the sand around her and she shielded her face, coughing, running towards the direction of its flight while blind. When she felt the small sandstorm subside, Kire uncovered her face and looked around. 

She was on top of a hill. No, not just any hill. She knew this hill. She could feel her skinned knuckles after she had punched a hole through the temple that sat on top of it, the night she met Ruli. The temple, now whole, cast a shadow over her, and despite the desert heat, she found herself shivering. The dragon was nowhere around. Why was she cold? Why did this temple fill her with dread? Kire frowned, backing away, her hand on her sword but afraid to draw it here. Unaware of her surroundings, she backed all the way to the slope of the hill and tumbled backward, crashing into a tree in the forest-town, back in Amria. 

Kire panted, keeping on all fours. “[i]Gods…all my gods….[/i]” When she finally looked up, she saw Daryll nearby, his back turned to her as he stared at something. “[i]Daryll! Daryll did you see that?[/i]” 

But Daryll wasn’t paying attention. 
There was a woman in front of him. Small, draped in a tattered dress, with white and red roses embroidered all over it. She had a despairing look on her face. Or was it terror? The woman glanced down at her hands, then covered her face, sinking to her knees. 
“Hello?” Daryll called, stepping closer. The woman could not hear him, did not register his call. “Do you need help?” 
The woman looked up from her hands and wildly around her, not seeing him. Or not seeing any of it. Tears of fright streamed down her face, and she stood abruptly, running away.  

	“Wait!” 
“Daryll!” 
Kire grabbed him and shook him just as he was about to lunge forward. Daryll blinked, taking several moments to realize who she was. “[i]I…I saw someone[/i]…”
“[i]I think we’re all seeing things[/i],” Kire said, looking around. “Where are the other three?” Their signatures were somewhere nearby, but her senses were confused, couldn’t pinpoint where exactly. Everything was confused in here.