The skaxen scrambled to find a hold on the smoother surface and instead toppled to the floor with a hiss.
Lumil and Byrd took on the goblin together. It tossed small vials at them hand over hand that exploded in mid-air, sending bursts of blue sparks and stinging shards at them in billowing clouds. “Wall!” Lumil shouted.
“Heyup.” Byrd’s palms exploded, and a massive column of green fire roared up between him and the decrepit goblin. The O’gúl servant was blinded to Lumil sliding beneath Byrd’s wall of fire to bring her red-glowing fist up into the goblin’s gut. The chamber filled with a sickening crunch on impact, and the goblin sailed backward to strike the wall with a thump before slumping to the floor.
“Not bad, you backfield greenskin.” Lumil leered at Byrd, then nodded toward Cheyenne, who’d gotten herself pinned against another metal table by the snarling skaxen.
“How ‘bout it, kid?” Byrd called. “Need a hand?”
“Or a fist?”
Cheyenne grimaced at the foaming slaver dripping from the skaxen’s mouth. The orange magical got in a deep slash on the halfling’s upper chest beside her shoulder before Cheyenne finally managed to get a good grip on her attacker’s wrist. She summoned a churning black sphere in the same hand and the skaxen lurched away, clutching the stump of her arm.
“Traitor!” the skaxen shrieked. “The Crown’s fist will have your nilsch úcat’s head on her serving tray!”
Cheyenne sent a roundhouse kick into the side of the bleeding, snarling skaxen woman’s head. Her black Van collided with a crack, and the orange-skinned magical dropped to the dark-stained floor.
“Look at you.” Lumil stalked toward her, nodding in approval. “All agile and shit.”
“Just trained.”
“Not by that guy though, huh?” Byrd nodded at Corian, who’d pinned the gremlin he’d been fighting to the wall, claws extended from both hands, one fistful piercing the gremlin’s throat and the other through the magical’s belly.
With a hiss, Corian ripped his hands free, and the gremlin dropped. Six feet away, Maleshi clamped her black-furred hands around the other gremlin’s head and twisted sharply. The force of it snapped the yellow magical’s neck and sent him flying toward another blood-stained metal table.
“No.” Cheyenne grimaced at the nightstalkers. “I’m not sure Corian knows Earthside martial arts.”
“Ha. Arts.” Lumil stopped beside the fallen skaxen, dropped to one knee, and sent a glowing red fist into her head with a wet, sickening crunch. She stood and shook the blood off her hand.
“Look at that.” Byrd sniggered. “Red spinners, red fist.”
Lumil snorted. “Yeah, I’m accessorizing. Shut up.”
“What the hell?” Cheyenne stared at the skaxen’s broken skull and everything that was once inside it. “I already took her down.”
“No, you put that skaxen bitch to sleep.” Lumil shook another spray of blood and whatever else off her hand. “I put her down.”
“Why is all this necessary?” Cheyenne gestured toward the five bodies strewn around the torture chamber. “That skaxen wasn’t going anywhere.”
Byrd shrugged. “Not yet.”
“Cheyenne.” Maleshi moved swiftly toward her and shook her head. “This is the complete opposite of the day we found the smuggled shipments or even at your ceremony on Thursday. We don’t get to take prisoners here.”
“You don’t get to kill them when they’re down, either.”
“Look, we’re here, no turning back. You can be damn sure that if we left these O’gúleesh alive down here, the minute they came to, they’d be sounding the alarm and bringing the full force of the Crown’s iron grip down on us.”
“You don’t know!”
“Hate me if you want, kid. Hate all of us for what we have to do. Today, it’s them or us, and I promise you things won’t change one fucking iota around here if you martyr yourself because you can’t stomach doing what’s necessary to get us where we need to go. You don’t have to be a part of it on the same level if you have a problem getting your hands dirty, but do not bring this up before you and I are standing Earthside again. That’s an order.” General Hi’et narrowed her silver eyes at the halfling, then brushed past her and headed for the staircase.
“I don’t take orders from you.”
“You do today, halfling. Time to grow a pair. Move out.”
Byrd and Lumil followed the general across the chamber, shooting Cheyenne brief sympathetic looks. Corian paused long enough to make sure no one but the rebel party was moving. Ember drifted quickly to Cheyenne’s side and grabbed her arm to gently tug the halfling forward. L’zar swept his floaty, glazed-looking eyes around the chamber, then approached his daughter and nodded toward Maleshi. “I’ve missed having her around. I have to thank you for finding our general.”
Cheyenne gritted her teeth and stepped after the others. “Yeah, you should be thanking me. All of us. What the hell’s going on with you, huh? Quit standing around and help us fight for once. We need you!”
He turned halfway around to scan the bodies on the floor. “Obviously not.”
“That’s not the point, and you know it.”
“Cheyenne, listen to me.” They reached the base of the staircase and climbed at a steady pace after the others. Ember floated up the steps in a smooth line and tactfully didn’t turn around to watch L’zar’s short heart to heart with his daughter. His golden eyes blazed with the lucidity Cheyenne realized she hadn’t seen in him all day. “If we want any chance whatsoever of getting you to the Rahalma so you can place your marandúr where it belongs, this is how it has to be done. I don’t want to be useless, trust me, but if I play my hand too soon, we’re fucked. I’ve done my part, and I’ll continue to do it until it’s time for you to do yours.”
She studied the intensity of his gaze and hissed in frustration
