The halfling took in a shuddering breath and let out a long shout of frustration and pent-up chaos. The black flames racing across her purple-gray flesh and her bone-white hair receded and snuffed out. She lowered her fist with a trembling arm as the agony of the two black magic acid burns in her shoulder returned with full force.
Jamal stood and moved back, clasping his huge hands behind his back.
Rhynehart stepped away from her too, nodded, and lowered the fell pistol. The high whine and the green glow cut off the minute he reactivated the safety, and then the weapon went right back into its holster at his hip. “That was your last test, rookie. Now we’re done.”
That brought Cheyenne out of her anticlimactic frustration. She blinked and turned her head toward the operative. “What?”
“You showed me exactly what you would do. What you could do. I’ve seen all I needed to see here.” Rhynehart shrugged. “That’s all. Now get out.”
“Wait. You just—what kind of test?” The halfling stepped back when Jamal headed toward her, but he moved around her and went for the goblin woman tied to the chair. “Don’t touch her—”
“Relax, halfling. It’s over.”
Only after he’d said it did she realize what was happening. The ogre untied the rope strapping Anasz to the chair and tossed it on the floor with a thump. Then he disengaged the dampening cuffs around her wrists and hooked them back onto the loop at the waistband of his black fatigue pants.
The goblin woman had stopped wailing and muttering now. More than that, she looked calm, the hint of a smirk lifting the corner of her blue-green mouth as she met Jamal’s gaze and nodded. She stood and rubbed her wrists, but that was it. Both the goblin and the ogre just stood there, facing an expressionless Rhynehart and a completely baffled drow halfling.
“This was a test?”
“That’s what I said.”
Frowning, she glanced from Rhynehart to the two stoic, unaffected magicals standing side by side like best buds, and couldn’t let herself believe this was happening. She moved away from Rhynehart and stared at him with wide eyes. “Are you at least gonna tell me if I passed?”
That was the most ridiculous question she could have asked, but it was the only thing that came to mind.
“Listen, rookie. We have work to do now, so unless you wanna pitch in and hop on the cleaning crew, get lost.”
Her mouth opened soundlessly, and she realized that no matter how long she stared at the FRoE operative who was raising his eyebrows at her, he wasn’t going to give her any kind of answer. Not now.
Without another word, she spun on her heel and stormed out of the dining room. The busted-in front door and splintered shards crunched under her Vans as she marched out of Anasz’s olive-green bungalow and down the flagstone walkway toward the street.
The cool evening air washed over her skin, reminding her that it was time to call off the drow berserker and start looking like she belonged here. Cheyenne took a deep breath, let herself feel the wind on her face in the receding light at the end of the day, and dropped back into her human form mid-stride. She stopped beside the black Jeep at the curb to double-check her reflection in the tinted windows. She looked like Cheyenne, human daughter of Bianca Summerlin and graduate student at VCU. With some added wear and tear, of course.
Forcing herself not to punch out the Jeep’s windows, she stalked down the sidewalk through the neighborhood and headed back toward the first false address Rhynehart had given her, where she’d parked her car. She didn’t even care about the walk. In fact, she needed it. Otherwise, she thought she might explode.
If that really was a test, I definitely failed. No meeting with L’zar Verdys now.
A small, humorless chuckle forced its way up her throat. At least I’m finally done with those FRoE assholes and all their mind games.
That realization felt pretty good. As Cheyenne moved quickly down the sidewalk, she figured this was the perfect time to focus all her energy on her real goal, which was what had gotten her into this mess in the first place. That had always been more important.
Now she could spend her time finding Durg and making him pay for what he did to Ember. Whatever was in that brown bag in her car had better be worth the trouble of gu@rdi@n104’s shitty scavenger hunt.
Chapter Ninety-Two
Half an hour later, she reached her car. Fortunately, it was untouched, and also fortunately, the walk had given Cheyenne plenty of time to cool off and get her head back on straight. Focusing on finishing up this scavenger hunt and finally getting her hands on whatever Gu@rdi@n104 wanted her to find would be a lot easier without any more FRoE interruptions.
Just the way I like it.
She unlocked her car, sipped behind the wheel, and started the engine. Her shoulder felt like someone had poured more of Q’orr’s nasty black sludge all over it, but she ignored the pain for now—or however much longer that would be possible—and reached for the brown paper bag on the passenger seat.
The thing inside, wrapped up in thin, crinkly white butcher paper, was just as heavy as she remembered it. Written across the top in bright-blue pencil was one more message. This one also started with yet another address, followed by, Deliver ASAP and do not open. He’ll know.
“Wow. Now I’m a delivery girl. Fan-freakin’-tastic.”
The halfling typed this new address into her phone’s GPS, then slid the heavy, wrapped item back into the paper bag and buckled up.
The new address was about a twenty-minute drive back toward downtown Richmond. It led her to a huge three-story house with a rickety-looking staircase leading to apartment doors on both the second and third floors. The whole place needed serious repairs, from the crooked rail to the peeling paint to
