She flipped him the finger and turned her back on that side of the street and the church, stabilizing herself with both hands on the hood of the Jeep. The van’s doors opened and shut again after a little snarling and muttered curses from the cuffed magicals. Cheyenne tilted her head at the sound of some kind of electric current kicking on in the back of the van, then the two agents came back around to head into the church again. They’d pulled their helmets off along the way, and an intensely muscular goblin—his head shaved clean except for a single braid of faded yellow stretching across his head from front to back like a racing stripe—paused beside the Jeep.
“Halfling.”
Cheyenne turned just enough to catch sight of the thick bullring through the goblin’s blue nose before he tossed something at her. Her hand darted through the air to snatch the unmarked silver cellophane wrapper of what could only be one of those nasty magical energy bars.
The goblin nodded. “Never seen anyone move so fast in the field. Those were some pro moves. Try breaking it up with a little cool down in between, and maybe you won’t lose your footing again.”
He nodded at her, then followed the other agent back into the church to take over while the next three agents brought out three more prisoners.
Rhynehart chuckled. “No kidding.”
“What?” Cheyenne ripped at the silver wrapper and didn’t wait to move it completely out of the way before she tore off a huge chunk of the green-black bar of who knew what between her teeth. She spat out the wrapper and eyed the bar. Tastes like rotting asparagus.
“You just pushed yourself a little too hard, looks like.”
She scowled at him. “Oh, I’m sorry. Should I have pushed a little less and let that troll blast the vest right off your back?”
“I’m glad you didn’t. That was good work. And it’s good to know your limits for next time, yeah?” He slapped the hood of the Jeep. “I tell you what, though. My guys have seen some seriously powerful magicals in the field. Long time before I came around. If they’re taking their hats off to you, rookie, you must be doing something right.”
Cheyenne forced the energy bar down her throat and took another bite. Didn’t really matter when that kid was still lying in that church without a pulse.
A low, warbling croak came from the open doors of the first van behind them. It changed in pitch, rising up and down, and Rhynehart rolled his eyes.
“Hey!” He walked back beside the van and pounded on it. “Don’t make me come back there and crank up the voltage. Actually, you know what? Keep singing. I’d like to really hear you belt it out with all that juice running through you.”
The broken crowing stopped, followed by raspy chuckles. But the magicals in the back of the van kept their mouths shut. For now.
Cheyenne munched on the magical energy bar, feeling most of her strength returning. Or maybe it was just the hard-to-control rage flaring up inside her with each new magical the FRoE operatives shoved down the church steps toward one of the waiting vans. When the last one had made it out and was hooked or cuffed to whatever electrically charged parts keeping them neatly locked up in the vans, she crumpled the empty wrapper and shoved it in her pocket.
The crackle of a radio caught the halfling’s attention.
“…unforeseen casualty. Yeah, it wasn’t pretty. We’re bringing him in too. Try to contact his people as soon as possible.”
Two agents went back into the church, one of them carrying a large, empty black bag folded over his arm. Rhynehart cleared his throat. “My guys’ll handle the rest of it. We’re good to go if you wanna get outta here.”
Cheyenne asked herself if she wanted to stay to see those FRoE agents carrying a child out of the church in one of those black bags. She quickly decided she didn’t. “Yeah, let’s go.”
“Yep.” Rhynehart hopped into the Jeep behind the wheel. Cheyenne was already feeling like her regular drow self again—high energy, high rage, heightened senses, and everything.
She closed the passenger door behind her and reached up for the seatbelt, grimacing again when her shoulder protested with another flare of pain. The way I’m going, those holes are never gonna get a chance to heal.
Rhynehart started the engine but paused, watching her as she pulled her seatbelt across her lap and buckled herself in. When she looked up, she saw him staring at the mostly hidden lump of gauze bandage beneath her shirt. He saw her watching him and nodded at her arm. “How’s your sho—”
“Don’t even go there, asshole.” The halfling sat back in her seat and thumped her head against the headrest.
With a grunt, the operative sniffed, cleared his throat, and pulled the Jeep away from the curb without a word. He didn’t laugh this time or smirk to himself either, which probably saved him from getting a blast of drow magic to the face.
I’ll work with him to bring these scumbags down and save all the kids we can, but we’re not friends. If he cared about how my shoulder was doing, he wouldn’t have put a goddamn tracking device in it in the first place.
Chapter Eighty-Two
After driving another ten minutes in complete silence, Cheyenne figured she might as well break it to ask a question she wanted to know the answer to. She shot Rhynehart a sideways glance and cocked her head. “You see those weird pendants those guys were wearing?”
“The what?” He glanced at her in surprise, probably because she’d said something to him. “On those black magic morons?”
“Yeah.”
He shook his head. “I didn’t see any pendants. What did they look like?”
“I don’t know. Some kind of silver bull’s head. Not real intricate, but they were all wearing them.”
“Huh. Probably just part of the damn ritual. I swear, you people put more stock in
