As he stalked past her to rejoin the others, Cheyenne stared at the broken shards of stained, dented mirror and frowned. The portal into her torture-chamber dungeon took us through a mirror. Turning swiftly, the halfling followed her father, ignoring the fact that he made her jog to reach him as he moved swiftly with his long, casual stride. “She found where this portal opened on the other side.”
“It would seem so.”
“And she wanted to send a message? Destroyed the entire portal just to show you she knows how we got in?”
“I can only assume the message was meant for both of us, Cheyenne. If it was purely for you, I’m sure the Spider would’ve waited until you returned to offer your terms.” L’zar cocked his head and searched the morning sky, which was filling with golden sunlight. “She knows I can’t return, and she knows her curse extended through the in-between. Maybe not exactly where or how, but she knew she’d hit something other than my physical person with her sentencing me to exile.”
“Other than your physical person? Are you kidding me? She hit a completely different physical person.” They reached the other side of the lawn and the gathered magicals standing and staring in awe at the destroyed portal ridge and the blight Ember had healed and cleared away. The fae watched L’zar and Cheyenne approach, but she didn’t move. “Hey, I’m serious. You need to answer me. If Ba’rael noticed she caught someone else in that curse besides you if she could—shit, I don’t even know, control the in-between to look for Bianca, why the hell would she even want my mom? She’s human.”
“Hmm.” L’zar turned slowly and eyed his daughter. “You know, I think your impressive reasoning skills must have been temporary.”
“Fuck off. What’s going on?”
“I’ll be sure to let you know as soon as I do.” His upper lip twitched in an irritating sneer, then he stalked to the flagstone steps on the side of the house.
Cheyenne turned to look at Corian and Maleshi, ignoring the FRoE agents’ disbelief as they muttered in confusion and bombarded Byrd, Lumil, and Persh’al with questions none of the rebels could answer. The general sat beside Bianca, who still lay unresponsive in the shady grass, and looked up with a questioning frown. “What did he find?”
“A broken mirror and a Nimlothar leaf.”
“And a destroyed portal.” Corian narrowed his eyes at the piles of gleaming rubble in front of the tree line. “Ba’rael now knows how we got in without her picking up on it. New portals tend to do that, I suppose.”
“Yeah, well, now it’s a dead portal, and apparently, she was sending a message.”
Maleshi looked back down at the unconscious Bianca and nodded. “Apparently.”
“Why my mom?”
Corian cleared his throat. “It might’ve taken Ba’rael a few days to realize she had ensnared an additional victim in her curse, but she picked up on it. Then she tried to pull your mother through to the other side.”
“I know that already.” Cheyenne stared at her mother. “What I don’t know is why Ba’rael would want my mom. I mean, seriously. Bianca would be useless there.”
“No doubt. And it wasn’t about your mother specifically, Cheyenne. Merely the extra prize in the Crown’s curse.”
“You’re still not making sense.”
Maleshi propped her forearms on her raised knees. “If anything got caught in her curse for her to grab and bring to the other side, kid, no matter what it was, Ba’rael would try to get it. Because whatever it was, it was something L’zar cares very much about.”
Cheyenne’s skin prickled with a cold chill. “What?”
“That’s how this one works.” Maleshi shrugged.
“Wait. You’re telling me my mom’s been unconscious for almost twenty-four hours because L’zar cares about her?”
Corian glanced at the drow thief standing by the edge of the forest at the base of the steps up the hill. “He can lie about it all he wants. Act like she means nothing and never has. But a curse doesn’t lie, kid.”
“That’s bullshit.” Cheyenne shook her head. “He couldn’t care less about what happens to her as long as it helps him.”
“You’re entitled to your opinion.” Corian shrugged. “I’m telling you what I know.”
“Great.” She scowled at him, then bent over her mom and scooped Bianca up in her arms again. “First time since we met that you telling me everything you know doesn’t help me at all.”
The halfling stormed toward the flagstone steps, refusing to look at her father as she passed him. He refused to look at her or her mother but turned instead to stare into the woods.
Ember floated slowly after the halfling. She tossed a hand weakly in the air and didn’t stop to look at the rebels or the FRoE agents. “Don’t worry about me, guys. I’m good. Just wiped the blight off the face of this planet for now.”
By the time she’d disappeared up the stairs behind Cheyenne, the FRoE agents had recovered from their shock and started moving again, picking themselves up off the ground where the nightstalkers, Cheyenne, and L’zar had deposited them.
“So, I guess that means the assignment’s over, right?” Yurik ran his hand over the yellow braid stretching down the center of his otherwise shaved head and looked at Rhynehart. “We goin’ back to base?”
Rhynehart sat perfectly still on the grass, staring blankly at the wreckage of the portal ridge with his arms wrapped around his knees.
“Hey.” Tate leaned over to their team leader and waved a hand in front of Rhynehart’s face. “You okay?”
The human agent slowly shook his head. “If you don’t get your goddamn hand out of my face, troll, I’ll bite your fingers off. ‘Cause either I’m crazy, or everything that happened was a hundred percent real.”
The tattooed troll straightened and stepped away from their team leader.
