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This was all business, though. No time for screwing around or enjoying each other's company. The only reason they Adan and Esai were being given to him for this operation was because of how important it was. The elders knew that if he could free the rest of their people, then the siege of Ridgemark would not be nearly as difficult of a problem to deal with.

A lot was riding on his shoulders here. Arguably, everything was.

And he was under no illusions that everyone was pleased about this situation, about him being the one in such a critical position, right now. In a perfect world, it would be someone else here. Someone stronger. More experienced. More qualified.

But it wasn't. It was him.

And again, he was calm. He had to be. At times, he felt like the world was spiraling all around him, enveloping everything except him in pure chaos. Like he was in the eye of a hurricane. A very small eye. One misstep, and the wind might just carry him off into some distant horizon.

Unable to do anything. Unable to be useful.

He had to keep his head clear. More than anything, he had to.

Their preparations progressed smoothly. Donald Elias knew the area even better than Raul could've expected, and he had old contacts all over the place.

Most seemed pleasantly surprised to see him walk through their door, and hardly any of them used the same name for him. John, Caleb, Fred, Marcus--Raul wondered how the man was able to keep track of so many aliases. It seemed a bit risky to be using so many different ones all within the same country, but if they hadn't been burned over the last fifteen years, then the guy must've been doing something right.