“Does that stuff heal everything?” Ember stared at the brown jar in Corian’s hand before Cheyenne snatched it away.
“Short of a knife wound, yeah. I’ve had plenty of opportunities to test it.” The halfling lowered into a squat and grimaced.
“Wait.” Ember bunched the comforter under her chin and swallowed. “Can we get the hell out of my room first?”
Corian pointed toward the kitchen. “I’m still happy to step out and give you a minute.”
“Don’t. I just realized I like having a nightstalker around too. It’s just, the mess in here gives a whole new meaning to ‘don’t let the bedbugs bite.’ This is suddenly the last place I wanna be.”
With a snort, Cheyenne stood from her crouch and nodded. “You need any help?”
“No, I can handle the chair.” Ember tossed the comforter off her lap and pushed herself toward the edge of the bed. “Just stand watch.”
“As reassuring as I’m sure that would be for you, Ember, we can’t stay here all night on the off-chance that something else might show up in your bedroom.”
She snarled in frustration and looked up at him, propping herself on her hands and pausing on the verge of transferring into the chair. “I’m pretty sure you can spare five goddamn minutes.”
Cheyenne raised her eyebrows and glanced at the floor, trying to hide her smirk.
Corian hummed and shot the halfling a sidelong glance. “I’m starting to get why this fae is your best friend.”
“Yeah, I might be rubbing off on her a little.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“This makes me want to kill someone.” Cheyenne was stretched out on the couch, her leg out straight in front of her and all the muscles taut as she forced herself to breathe through the pain.
“That is so cool.” Ember leaned forward to watch the wound in the bottom of Cheyenne’s salve-covered foot seal itself from the inside out.
“Which part?”
“The instant healing part.” Ember shook her head. “Please don’t kill someone. I mean, unless you need to.”
Corian lifted his phone to his ear and eyed the girls as he waited for Persh’al to pick up. “If we handle this correctly right now, that won’t be a choice you have to make any time soon.”
Cheyenne sucked another sharp breath through her teeth, then the unbearable sting flaring through her foot receded. “Handle it how?”
He lifted a finger for her to wait and turned away. “Hey. Yeah, we found something, all right. Nope. All good. We just need to double down around here for the time being. Yeah. What about Lumil? Does she know how to cast without blowing anything up first?”
Ember and Cheyenne exchanged wide-eyed glances, and the halfling whispered, “I have no idea.”
“Fine,” Corian continued. “No, it can’t wait ‘til tomorrow. If she doesn’t get her ass through the next portal that shows up in that warehouse, I’ll pull her from interrogation duty. Yeah, that’s what I thought. Just be ready.” He hung up and slipped the phone back into his pocket.
“So, everyone’s coming over to my place now, huh?”
“Not everyone.” Corian scanned the apartment’s high ceilings. “Obviously, one of us won’t be leaving the warehouse to go anywhere. Well, for as long as his patience holds out.”
“You mean, L’zar,” Ember muttered.
He looked down at her and narrowed his glowing silver eyes. “Right. He mentioned meeting you.”
She gave him a thin smile and spread her arms. “You don’t have to talk circles around the fae girl. I know pretty much everything Cheyenne knows at this point.”
“I see. We’ll talk more about that in a minute.” The nightstalker opened a portal and stepped into his basement apartment.
Ember stared at the dark circle of light and the magical disappearing through it. “That doesn’t get old.”
“You get used to it pretty fast.” Cheyenne pulled her healed foot in to see for herself. “At least when there’s a nightstalker around who just can’t get enough of casting them. Speaking of which, why are Persh’al and Lumil coming here?”
Corian rummaged through the junk on his shelves. He pulled out an open cardboard box, dumped its contents on the floor, and used it to hold his more carefully selected items. “Because, Cheyenne, I can’t build the kind of wards you and Ember need to protect you at home by myself. Persh’al might seem like he only has an eye for computer stuff, just like you.”
The halfling snorted. “Yeah. I love computer stuff.”
“But he has a wide range of spellcasting experience and practical application when he gets out of that chair to use it.” More items clunked into the box tucked under his arm, and he stood back to scan the shelves for the next hidden thing he wanted. “And Lumil is, well, at the very least, she channels one hell of a support.”
“So Byrd drew the short end of the stick and gets to stay behind to babysit L’zar?”
“Not really.” Corian bent over to pull a thin square shape from beneath a pile of smaller items on the bottom shelf. “Byrd’s skills with wards are right on par with your spellcasting ability.”
“Oh.”
Ember frowned through the portal. “Why do I get the feeling this guy’s dissing your spellwork?”
“Probably because he is.” Cheyenne crossed her legs beneath her on the couch and shrugged. “I guess the goblin and I are both useless in this arena.”
“No, you’re not. You made me that ring.”
Corian stepped back through the portal, the half-full box tucked under one arm and the thin, square piece of hardened leather clenched in his other hand. “I thought you made that for yourself?”
“The Heart of Midnight’s useless now, so it turned into a gift.”
“And it works?”
“Oh, yeah.” Ember grinned. “Perfectly.”
“Huh.”
Cheyenne shot Ember an exasperated glance and gestured at the nightstalker. “See that? That’s the kind of reaction I get for pretty much everything.”
“When we have the time for me to throw you a party, Cheyenne, I’ll get right on it.” Corian set the box on the coffee table and lifted the square of hard leather. “Remember this?”
“You mean, the O’gúl hornet’s web I bought
