“Huh.”
Cheyenne firmly pressed the glowing point in the wall, and a shuddering jolt of energy raced up her arm and into the side of her neck. Her eyelids fluttered rapidly, and a surprised chuckle escaped her. “Oh, man!”
“See? Weird-ass drow stuff like that.” Byrd pointed at the halfling. “If anyone else walked in on this, they’d think she’s over there gettin’ it on with the wall.”
Lumil lunged toward him and raised her fist.
He shrank away and laughed, raising both hands. “Hey, hey. Not with the runes, huh? Come on. It’s not like the rest of us haven’t seen L’zar in his freaky fetish stages.”
“You know what?” Lumil’s open mouth closed when Corian cleared his throat. She stepped away from Byrd and slowly lowered her fist. “I’m dropping this.”
“Okay, I’m in.” Cheyenne stood there with her finger pressed to the wall, tapping into the massive mainframe of blended tech and magic coursing through the entire blueprint of Hangivol. “What’s the message?”
Corian studied the halfling’s blank stare and frowned. “Last-minute change unavoidable. New doorway in Heart lower pit. En route to the heart via…”
“Just put in our current location, Cheyenne.” L’zar clasped his hands behind his back, his lips pursing in rhythmic twitches like he couldn’t decide whether to frown or grin again. “That’ll do.”
“Yep. Then what?”
“Hurry. And that’s the end of it.” Corian glanced at Maleshi, who shrugged and went back to watching Cheyenne communing with the system disguised as a building. “The next part is a little trickier, kid. You’ll want to encrypt this.”
“Done.”
“What?”
Byrd burst out laughing.
Cheyenne slowly removed her finger from the not-stone wall, sucking in a sharp breath when the river of energy seeped away from her neck and arm and left through her fingertip. Then she looked at Corian and shrugged. “Sent it.”
“But did you encrypt it?”
“Yeah, triple-layered. I left a few clues, so they shouldn’t have any problem figuring out the lock.”
L’zar hummed in fascination and continued his pacing around the room. “Which is what?”
She glanced at him sidelong and tilted her head. “Thief.”
A low chuckle came from L’zar, but he didn’t say anything else.
Corian scratched the side of his head beneath a twitching feline ear. “This is something for the record vaults, Cheyenne. Which, if there were any pre-existing records of those attempting to do even half of what you just accomplished in two minutes, would be blown to pieces at this point. Well done.”
“I mean, thanks. I didn’t really try.”
“Yes, and that’s my point.”
“Okay, so the Four-Pointed Star has our message.” Maleshi eyed L’zar as he made another circle around the chamber. “Or they will, hopefully. That part’s out of our hands. We need to keep moving.”
“Ready to head out, General.” Lumil gave Maleshi a weird, slanting salute.
General Hi’et eyed the goblin woman and shook her head. “Don’t ever do that again.”
Byrd chuckled, and Maleshi’s silver gaze settled on him.
L’zar stepped into the middle of the chamber and turned in a slow circle, eyeing each of the metal doors. “This way.”
“After you, then.” Maleshi motioned for him to lead the way, and the group converged behind L’zar.
Ember joined Cheyenne with a curious frown. “That was some trick with the walls.”
“Tell me about it. This’d blow your mind, Em. After all this is over, you should give it a try at least once. With your own activator, obviously.”
“Oh, yes, obviously. I have no desire to come between you two.”
“Very funny.”
L’zar reached the door he wanted and waved his hand in front of it. The metal flashed a muted gray light, then rumbled open and slid sideways into the wall. Before it had finished opening all the way, the drow darted into the corridor, and everyone else filtered through after him.
He led them down one twisting passage after another, all of black stone. Only half of it in the narrow hallways was disguised magic-tech panels, and Cheyenne let herself take fleeting glances at the system code running through it all. At least this way I’ll be able to tell if someone sounds a silent alarm.
Ten minutes later, L’zar held up a hand for them to stop.
“What’s going on?” Ember asked as they pressed their backs against the wall and waited for L’zar to keep moving.
Cheyenne’s drow hearing picked up different voices screaming and wailing somewhere in front of them. “You can’t hear that?”
“No.”
“Good. You don’t want to.” She grimaced and shook her head. Sounds like the torture chamber in the basement isn’t the only one they’ve got in this place.
“We’re about to walk into a rather large private gathering.” L’zar looked over his shoulder and raised his eyebrows at Corian. “And it won’t be pretty.”
“No other route?” Maleshi asked.
“Unfortunately, no. This wouldn’t be an issue if we’d come in where we were supposed to.”
“It’s not worth arguing about anymore, L’zar.” Corian gestured at the branching corridor ahead of them. “Focus on what’s possible now.”
“One way into the courtyard.” L’zar wrinkled his nose. “Through two walls, that entire joyous-sounding gathering, and the corridors branch off from there after that. If we get separated or anyone ends up losing their mind over what we’re about to see, just remember that from here on out, keep turning right.”
“That would just take us in circles,” Ember muttered.
He leaned forward to meet the fae girl’s gaze and smiled. “Not in Heart.”
“Just say the word, then.” Byrd nodded.
“Hmm.” L’zar glanced down the hall again. “Lumil, you might be the better choice for getting us through.”
“Oh, yeah.” The goblin woman pounded her rune-encircled fist into the other hand. “I got this.”
“Then stay close.” L’zar took off down the next corridor.
Cheyenne’s drow hearing picked up the growing volume of agonized screams ahead.
Ember swallowed, breathing faster as the group sped up. “What did he mean by ‘lose our minds after what we’re about to see?’”
“That wherever we’re heading, it looks worse than it sounds, and it sounds bad.”
“Fantastic. Too late to get off the next stop?”
“Nice try. The next stop is the last stop, Em.”
Chapter Ninety-One
By the time
