Sergeant Svartsdottir looked around at her squad as they swam. I may never get used to seeing them all as quaggans, but Raven help me, that hylek’s brew is a wonder. I still can’t figure out where my mass goes, though – no! Don’t get distracted. Ah, yes, Rekka’s on our other camouflage here. The local quaggans are sure they know us and are letting us through. All is still according to plan.

She checked again as they swam up and around the bend, aided by Mikk’s hydromancy in pushing so far against the current. This is matching up with the aerial surveillance, though how Lixxa can get so much from a bird’s view over such a distance I’ll never understand. A few clicks of her tongue in the right pattern, supplemented by hand signals once she had their attention, and they silently emerged on the sandstone beach by the refurbished ancient dwelling, with Lixxa and Rekka keeping them visually cloaked now, across multiple spectra. Quaggans with golemagical goggles – the already-vanished sight nearly made her laugh, though that was also partly the tension of keeping six people’s foot-falls silent with her aeromancy.

Pausing to push her hearing with that same air magic, she heard the breathing of the lone, exhausted woman inside, deep in slumber. Pressing on her aetheric signalling device, she gave the go-ahead. Each member of her squad gave the suitable acknowledgement in their assigned order, with Dritta and Reiya going first to ensure that the local monitoring and warding hadn’t changed from the earlier scouting reports. When her time came, she followed precisely in the transformed footsteps of the one before her, keeping it to a single set of damp, flippery marks on the stone. Once they were all inside, she and Mikk worked together, as previously practiced, to dry even that bit of moisture off their feet, and she swept the dust from their planned paths before she gave the next go-ahead signal.

Each of them opened their sealed packs, and again, one at a time, with aetheric signalling between them their only communication, they slipped into the bedroom, laying out the clothing, the chocolates, and the flowers, with the accompanying note. They formed up on the signals once again, leaving in single file on the numbers, taking care not to disturb the drying footprints they’d left before, and this time leaving none on the way back to the water.

Once the last of them had signalled being back in position near the bottom of the riverbed, the mesmers dropped their cloaking illusions. The squad paused, waiting for the pair to recover a bit from that exertion, before swimming back out, once again ensuring that the local quaggans mistook them for belonging.

Only when her squad emerged down-river, far enough away from the Refuge again did the sergeant finally engage her longer-distance communicator, for all that even it was mesmo-aetheric and probably would have been safe enough for the mission proper. But that’s only “probably”, no matter what the captain thinks.

<Captain?>

After a brief pause, <Yes, Sigrid?>

<Delivery made. Exfiltration successful. Proceeding with extraction plan.>

<Excellent! Shadows guard your path, and do please give my regards to the squad.>

The sense that the sergeant picked up through the link told her that her current employer and former commanding officer was well pleased. <I shall, captain. Sneak well.>

The answer over the link was wordless, a strong sense of almost feral amusement with an accompanying nod of respect.

---

When Mirex later awoke, she’d find a bouquet of flowers nearly on her, with a deluxe, large box of chocolates a bit past it, and a circle of flowers around her and that. Laid out and hanging up in their limited wardrobe space in that Refuge dwelling were a variety of new maternity clothes in styles closely related to things she’d chosen for herself, some midriff-baring, and some more covering to help hide burgeoning stretch marks.

As she lifted her head to start taking it all in, she’d spy an unsealed envelope now in view that had been obscured behind the bouquet. When it was finally opened and the note within examined, it would read:

My darling Mirex,

I thought you could use some new clothes in your current size. I miss you terribly, and I love you, no matter our disagreements. I really hope to see you home again soon. You can still contact me whenever you like, you know. I’ll bring Evie to you if that’s what you want instead, of course. And in the meanwhile, I thought some flowers for my lovely redhead might be a good idea, and I know you like your chocolates, too, my love.

Desperately missing you,
Adriwyn