Ember’s laughter was so contagious, Cheyenne couldn’t help but join her. Then the fae settled down and shook her head. “Seriously, though. Have you considered that L’zar does just want to protect you? I mean, serving a hundred-year sentence at Chateau D’rahl just to protect his only kid sounds like an acceptable sacrifice to me.”
“He’s not sacrificing anything.” The halfling swung her leg back over the armrest and sat up straight in the chair. “Corian told me the guy’s only interested if there’s something in it for him, and at this point, I’m gonna call that one an accurate assessment.”
“Huh. You really don’t think L’zar would go out on a limb to help anyone but himself?”
“Not if he wasn’t also helping himself at the same time, no.” Cheyenne shrugged and leaned forward. “So, he’s playing it safe until he knows his bargaining chip isn’t gonna drop dead like all the others the second he steps out of that prison, which he could totally do whenever he wants. I’m starting to think he’s having fun in there.”
Ember snorted and pulled her coffee mug out of her lap again before remembering one more time that it was empty. “Any idea what he’s waiting for?”
“Just a guess, that I complete the trials and come into my true power with my very own drow legacy, and L’zar says the coast is clear. He comes crawling out of his little vacation hole, then I’m stuck taking orders from Captain Whackjob instead.”
“Woah.” Ember chuckled. “You’ve got this all planned out, don’t you?”
“Actually, it just came to me.” Cheyenne shot her friend a wide grin before she wiped it off her face a second later. “Honestly, if this whole nightmare-leaking-portal and imminent-O’gúl-war thing wasn’t happening right now, I’d probably stall the trials just to keep him in Chateau D’rahl as long as possible. For fun.”
“You know, I have fun with you, Cheyenne, but beyond that, we have two very different definitions of it.”
“Yeah, tell me about it.” The halfling pulled her phone out of her back pocket to check the time. “And...I just talked your head off for an hour. Coffee’s gone. You look violently confused. Time for me to get cleaned up.”
Ember laughed and slapped her hands on the armrests of her wheelchair. “I had no idea violently confused was a thing.”
“You’re one of a kind, Em.” Cheyenne pushed to her feet and clapped her hands together. “It’s kinda weird that I have to ask, but where did you—”
“Towels are in the bathroom.” Ember nodded toward the second full bathroom below the mini-loft.
The halfling froze and blinked at her friend. “Creepy.”
“You are so easily impressed by me.”
Cheyenne just shook her head and waved the fae off as she turned toward the bathroom.
Ember laughed again and drummed her hands on the armrests. “Go get ‘em, Professor Summerlin.”
When the half-drow opened the bathroom door, she slipped inside and turned to poke her head back out into the living room with wide eyes. “Kill me now.”
Her friend’s renewed laughter filtered into the bathroom until it was drowned out by the rush of steaming water.
Chapter Eighty-Eight
Cheyenne parked in the student lot on the Virginia Commonwealth University campus and glanced at the clock on the dash. Fifteen minutes. No wonder Mattie always looked so rushed.
The halfling turned off the engine and paused. “Maleshi. Shit, I don’t know what to call her.”
She got out of her car and slung her backpack over her shoulder before locking the Panamera with that brilliant little chirp. A kid in a brown suit with an afro closed the door to his restored Ford Pinto and smirked at the Goth chick. “Nice car.”
Cheyenne glanced at him and nodded. “Yeah, you too. Goes with the seventies getup.”
“The Pinto’s mine. This is just a costume.” The kid gestured to the brown suit.
Cocking her head, the halfling gave him a crooked smile. “I’m gonna use that line.”
“No, really. Theater Department.”
“Okay. Break a leg or whatever.” With another nod, the half-drow hurried across the parking lot. The kid’s laugh rose behind her, and she shook her head. I played dress-up today too. We’ll see how my new students handle it.
That made her snort, and she quickened her pace as she stepped onto the sidewalk and took the first path across campus toward the T. Edward Temple building.
She heard the conversation of at least a dozen other students, maybe more, before she reached the medium-sized classroom. Another glance at her phone made her sigh before she reached the door. Nobody thought twice about Professor Bergmann showing up a minute or two late. I’m fine.
No one noticed the Goth chick storming into the classroom, even when Cheyenne stopped to pull the door shut behind her with a soft click. Then a girl with half her head shaved who was sitting by herself on the far right side of the front row looked at the half-drow with a raised eyebrow. The halfling returned the gesture as she stepped to the front of the room. Like looking at myself as an undergrad. Weird.
The conversation didn’t falter at all, even when Cheyenne reached the desk at the front of the room and dropped her backpack on the floor. She counted seventeen students in their seats, most of them laughing and joking, two or three besides the half-shaved-head girl reading textbooks or scrolling through their phones.
For a full two minutes, the halfling waited for more than one girl to notice her standing up there. I could do this for the entire class. Okay, not if I want my master’s.
“All right.” Cheyenne cleared her throat, and the students who weren’t talking to someone else looked at her in surprise. A kid with a curly mop of black hair and as much of a mustache as he could grow before he could legally drink folded his arms and frowned. The halfling nodded. “Hey.”
That didn’t have the desired effect either, and Cheyenne thought, Okay. Gauging the attention
