Maleshi scoffed, shaking her head and tossing her long, wavy black hair out of her face. “At least I know you’re familiar with the specific instance. Now’s the part where we call in everyone we know to clean up the mess none of us made.” The nightstalker kicked at nothing but air with her brown suede boot, except it clanged against the invisible hull of one of the war tanks. “I’ll get hold of Corian, and you call up your frenemy organization.”
“What?” Cheyenne paused with her cell phone pulled halfway out of her pocket. Her trench coat rustled away from her back and hips when she tightened her grip on her phone and turned to face the destroyed strip of VCU campus beyond the front of the building. “Why the hell would I call them in for this?”
“Same reason you called them in for the new portal at your mom’s. If anyone’s mastered the art of containing these Border portals and keeping them hidden from humans, it’s the FRoE.”
“Yeah, and all the other Border portals are way outside populated areas for no humans to see.”
“They won’t see this one either.” Maleshi gestured toward the scarred grass. “Thanks to you. And a little nightstalker magic, obviously.”
“Obviously.” Cheyenne pulled up Sir’s number on her phone and stared at it. No way am I pulling Rhynehart away from Mom’s to come out here. This is gonna suck so much worse than last time. Her finger hovered over the call button, then she looked at Maleshi with a grin. “Hey, good thing we both decided to show up and pretend to teach classes today.”
“Ha. But we do teach classes. We just happen to be more than that.” The general paused to shoot Cheyenne a sidelong glance. “You’re not just pretending to teach, are you?”
“What? No, of course not. Hyperbole.”
“Uh-huh.” Maleshi made the call to Corian, and Cheyenne begrudgingly sent her call through to Major Sir Carson.
I wasn’t gonna have time to grade assignments today anyway.
Chapter Seventy-Six
“What do you want?” Sir snarled into the phone.
“A regular greeting over the phone would be a hell of a start.” He paused for so long on the other end of the line that Cheyenne had to pull her phone away to make sure they were still connected. “You’re not gonna like what I have to say.”
“Tell me something I don’t know, halfling.”
She rolled her eyes. “Found another new entrance.”
“Another?”
Cheyenne braced herself for the fiery explosion of cursing and items thrown across the FRoE officer’s office, but this time, it didn’t happen.
“I swear to every goddamn Dorito flavor, whenever shit starts splattering the walls, there you are, covered in it.”
“All right, is that your way of saying you think this is my fault?”
“That’s exactly what I think! So far, you haven’t done anything to convince me otherwise, and that includes your infuriating proficiency at lying through your teeth.”
“So you want me to just hand this whole thing over to someone else who’d like to use it? You know, I know a nice T-class family who could benefit from it.”
“Goddammit, Cheyenne, you know that’s not what I meant. Where is this fucking thing?”
“On the VCU campus, right outside the building I teach in.”
“Oh, the Halfling Bullshit building. Yeah, I’ve heard of it.” Something heavy slammed down, and Sir grunted. “Did you have to fight little kiddie monsters coming outta this one too?”
“No.” She glanced at Maleshi, who paced six feet away as she spoke softly to Corian, the phone pressed to one ear and her pointer finger stuck into the other. Cheyenne smirked. “I closed it. Shouldn’t be spilling out any monsters for a while.”
“You closed it.” Sir choked out a bitter laugh. “What does that even mean? These things come with a goddamn zipper now?”
“All just part of me being what I am. It’s contained for now.” Cheyenne swiped her hair out of her eyes and gazed at the lawn in the front of the building. “Look, what this new thing needs is someone to show up and reassure people that this was just an earthquake. Maybe keep an eye on it and do a little damage control. Your people are capable of that, right?”
“You have no idea what we’re capable of.”
This isn’t going anywhere. “Will you send someone to VCU or not?”
“Already did. See? I can multitask and waste your time too.”
Cheyenne hung up and slipped her phone into the side pocket of her new coat. At least he took the information seriously.
“How did that go?” Maleshi asked, bending to put her phone back in her briefcase.
“Exactly the way I thought it would.” The halfling turned to face her. “But someone’s on their way.”
“How fun.” The general took a short, discerning sniff of the air, then pointed at the ground beside her. “Come stand over here.”
“What?” Cheyenne glanced around, looking for a reason to move, then slowly walked toward the nightstalker. “Is there a reason for needing to stand by you?”
The air behind her shimmered, and a portal opened right where she’d been standing. Corian stepped through a second later, frowning in his average-human-man illusion.
Cheyenne blinked. “Oh.”
Corian glanced at her briefly with a quick nod, then turned to Maleshi. “Let’s get to work, then.”
“Oh, yes, let’s.” The general raised an eyebrow and stepped away from the back of the building, raising her hands to begin another spell.
When he approached Cheyenne’s side, Corian leaned toward her and waited for Maleshi to work her spell. “You okay?”
“I’m fine. Got attacked, ripped some war machines to pieces, and closed a new portal before it turned VCU into another reservation.” The halfling folded her arms. “Just another day in the life, right?”
He hummed in consideration. “Maleshi said the ridge and the tunnelers showed up at the same time.”
“Yeah. That’s not supposed to happen, is it?”
“None of this is supposed to happen.” Corian stroked his hairless chin. “It raises some serious questions. Most importantly, whether this portal was intentional or just another massive coincidence.”
“Doesn’t feel
