She was both barefoot and hatless. The rest of my group was out hunting, I was taking my turn as guard and lookout."Over yonder," she chattered, point...ng west, toward the hills as she fell into my arms, "Hessians."I pulled a black coat out of my bag and gave her my pair of spare, wool stockings and then found some small boots in the pile we had accumulated, and she soon led me back to her small farm house, a half-mile or so away. Four horses were tied out front."My ma and my sister are hiding. "It's time to go, you two. The portal awaits," the unarmed trooper announced. "But first you need to put these on," he concluded, beginning to push fatigues and boots through the leg port of the cell. "The pile on the left there is yours, Robertson," he said, pointing. "The other is yours, Morales." Portal?" Robertson asked with a frown, not bothering to pick up the clothes, but Morales was already changing."Get dressed," the armed trouper said. "Otherwise, we'll trank you and dress you. They were most unfortunate, for not only were their homes wet, half-sunk ships, they didn’t even enjoy the protections of the Guardians. The floating city was battered yearly with storms that didn’t touch Karanas itself, fires could burn half the craft and leave the people even poorer than they’d been, and the stone outcrops to the west were poor protections against the rare but deadly tsunami.In turn, Brakans abhorred the Prince and his Guards, and they hated the merchant families only. The elder son, an executive in one of the most important business in town, was so important that he was granted vacations in Brazil during a saint's day; would spend 8 days in Rio, along with his sons. I used to visit my great-grandmother, and my aunt visited her too, everyday, so it still existed a likelihood we’d meet here soon as she drops by. Yes, somebody had opened the door imprudently on that day I was resting, lying down on my bed after a hard work at college. It was one of the hottest.