A communal shout of surprise and admiration rose from the FRoE operatives when they saw three of their targets taken out in the blink of an eye.
“That’s what I’m talkin’ about!”
“Grab the rest.”
“I swear, if you throw another goddamn thing at me, you Skaxen dirtbag, I’ll empty every fell shot I have into your weaselly face!”
Cheyenne staggered back against one of the pews. For the first time in her life, she couldn’t see straight. The church spun madly around her, flashing with different colors and filled with shouts, snarls, roars, and the crash of spells missing their marks.
Chapter Eighty-One
“Hey!” one of the operatives shouted and raced toward her as she slithered against the side of the pew toward the floor. “What the hell happened?”
That was Rhynehart, or all three of him, when she tried to focus on the giant, shiny black helmet. A wave of dizziness washed over her, and Cheyenne might have tried to say she was about to puke all over his boots. Fortunately, she didn’t do that.
“Okay, rookie. Come on. Back on your feet.” A gloved hand reached down toward her, and a blue flash lit up Rhynehart’s silhouette.
With a shrieking roar, Cheyenne thrust her hand out and flung the lashing black tendrils just past Rhynehart’s legs. He jumped back and cursed, and the troll who was just about to fry him with another attack at close range let out a warbling scream when the half-drow tossed him across the church. Rhynehart’s helmet moved slowly as he watched the arc of the flying troll, then he slapped his vest and offered her his hand again.
“Thought you were going to take me out for a second there, rookie.”
Cheyenne blinked heavily, trying to see only one of him again, but she did take his hand.
He laughed as he pulled her to feet. “Looks like I got you to shake my hand after all.”
She shoved him back and swayed on her feet. “That’s not a handshake. That’s a-a desp…desp…”
“Woah, woah. Jesus. What got into you?”
Cheyenne’s head wobbled as she found her balance and glanced around the church. The spell-throwing had stopped, as had the bursts of green fell-fire from the FRoE weapons. The magicals they’d come to round up still snarled and shrieked and hissed, bucking against the dampening cuffs the operatives were clamping around the wrists of those with the most fight left in them. A few of the criminals moaned and tried to stand, but Rhynehart’s men quickly got on them to cuff them all too.
One of the closest agents shoved an orc’s cheek back to the hardwood floor, then trained his firearm on the magical and stepped back. “Looks like we got ‘em all.”
Rhynehart studied Cheyenne a little longer in concern, then nodded and glanced around the room. “What about that one?”
Nobody had touched the fourteenth body Cheyenne hadn’t seen with her drow sight, because that body hadn’t moved. “Dead,” she muttered.
“Are you serious?” Rhynehart turned on his men. “Okay, which asshole opted to bring in a body bag against orders?”
None of his agents answered, their focus split between waiting for a confession and keeping their rifles trained on their targets restrained in cuffs all over the church.
“No, dead already.” Cheyenne huffed out a sigh and shook her head. At least she was only seeing two of everything now, and that was just half the time. “When we got here. That’s why I didn’t see him when I looked.”
“Shit.” Rhynehart pulled off his helmet and glanced around at his men. “Anybody check to see who it is?”
“No.”
“Wasn’t paying attention.”
“I’ll do it.” Cheyenne stumbled forward and brushed Rhynehart’s hand aside when he tried to grab her and help steady her. Her footsteps felt way too heavy as she crossed the wooden floor, but she managed to keep from falling flat on her face before she reached the body in the center of the church. She dropped to one knee and slowly pulled the black-robed body by the shoulders to turn the magical over onto its back.
The black hood fell away from the magical’s face, revealing the light-blue face of a goblin with a shock of floppy yellow hair spilling into his open, glassy eyes. She swallowed thickly when the small size of the body and the youth in that face came together.
“Shit, that’s a kid,” one of the agents muttered.
“Dammit.” Rhynehart chucked his helmet on the ground and slapped a gloved hand against his head. “We were too late for this one.”
Cheyenne’s fists clenched so tightly, she stopped feeling her nails biting into her purple-gray flesh. They were killing kids with those potions, and then they killed a kid for whatever fucked-up ritual they were doing in here. The black robes. Candles. All the whispering.
“All right.” Rhynehart sighed again and nodded toward the open church doors. “Let’s get these assholes outta here and—”
The drow halfling’s fists slammed on the wooden floor with a huge thud and a splintering crack. Without thinking, she launched herself at the closest orc, his wrists in dampening cuffs behind his back and his cheek still smashed against the floor. In a second, she was on him, jerking him up by the scruff of his stupid black robes before she slammed his face back down onto the wood.
“Did you do this?” she screamed and smashed his face into the floor one more time.
“Woah, rookie!”
“Brought a kid in here for a sacrifice!” Slam.
“Hey, halfling. Take it down a notch.”
“A fucking kid!”
“Cheyenne!”
Hearing her name here jolted her back into herself, and she dropped the orc’s face before snarling at him. Thick red-black blood pooled at the corners of his mouth around his tusks and ran freely from his squashed nose.
