by Martha Carr
Apparently, she wasn’t supposed to get a decent night’s sleep. Her dreams kept her tossing and turning, aggravating her shoulder even more. She kept seeing the copper puzzle box, her drow legacy, neatly bundled up in that infuriating package of runes etched in thin lines. She dreamed about the damn thing glowing again, spinning in every direction while some mechanism whirred and clicked inside it.
Things got really weird when a face materialized behind the puzzle box—old, wrinkled, deathly pale, and covered with painted symbols in black and deep blood-red. The eyes were nothing but empty black pits, smoking around the edges, and the mouth when it opened with an expectant slowness looked like it might have been filled with blood. It had only four sharp, stained teeth.
“The Cu’ón will be doomed to lose his bloodline time and again. The endless search for an heir will bring each of them to death’s door. Only the scion never pursued will rise to their destiny. When the shackles of the old laws crumble, their purpose will be fulfilled.”
The copper box flashed with that golden light like a strobe, growing brighter and brighter before that grotesquely wrinkled face let out a high-pitched, grating cackle.
Cheyenne jolted upright and groaned. The first thing she did was check the bedside table for the drow legacy box, but she found only her cell phone and the lamp. She sighed in relief, then shook the grogginess and confusion out of her head. What the hell kinda dream was that?
Her hand slapped sleepily down on her phone so she could check the time—6:23 a.m. “I could’ve slept another forty minutes. Great.”
She tossed her cell phone onto the sheet beside her and grimaced at the sharp pain shooting through her shoulder. Gritting her teeth, she jerked off the gauze taped over the wound, grunting when the dried, crusty layer of blood stuck to the bandage and ripped away. The tracking device was gone now, sure, but the two black-magic-acid burns in her flesh looked almost as fresh as when she’d gotten them.
“Should’ve let Dr. Andrews patch me up. Shit.”
Pushing herself out of bed, Cheyenne went into the bathroom and grabbed the bottle of hydrogen peroxide from her personal attempt at home surgery. The liquid splashed onto her shoulder, in and around the wounds, and into the sink. She gritted her teeth against the pain. If things got bad enough, she might have to make another phone call to her mom and ask if that offer for one of Bianca’s personal physicians was still on the table.
With a fresh bandage taped to her shoulder again, Cheyenne got dressed, added more heavy eyeliner over what was left from yesterday, and ran a brush through her black hair. She had plenty of time to stop by the gas station for breakfast before an entire day of wanting to gouge her eyes out in all her boring classes.
TGIF, right?
Rolling her eyes, she stepped out into the living room and turned on her computer. No new messages from Todd or anyone on the Y2Kickass server, but she knew the guy would find a way to sweeten the deal for anyone willing to take a look at her file from gu@rdi@n104. There was a chance nobody there even wanted to help her after how long she’d been silent on the server. Taking on magical crime rings and living a double life could take all the credit for that. I just need a mask and a skin-tight costume, and I’d have an in with the Avengers.
She snorted, turned away from her desk, and grabbed her things for school. Screw that.
With her backpack slung over her good shoulder and the wounded shoulder still screaming at her beneath the new bandage, the half-drow slipped into her black Vans and reached for the doorknob.
Before her fingers touched the cold metal knob, an image of that wrinkled, almost-toothless face from her dream burst into her mind. The shrieking cackle was so loud, she staggered away from the door with a growl of surprise. Then it was gone, and the drow halfling stood in front of her door, feeling like she stood in front of an open furnace.
“What the actual—”
“Only the scion never pursued will rise to their destiny.” Cheyenne shook her head. “Worst dream ever.”
She reached for the knob again and saw her fingers, purple-gray and tipped in black fingernail polish instead of her normal ridiculously pale skin. That hand went up to her ears to check for the tell-tale points of her drow side fully unleashed. Sure enough, there they were.
With a hiss at such a close call, Cheyenne dropped her hand again and closed her eyes.
In a moment, she’d gotten her drow magic back under control where it belonged. The next time she reached for the doorknob, her pale human-looking hand had returned.
Having locked the front door behind her, the halfling shook her head, readjusted her backpack, and took off down the hall. She hadn’t gone more than a few feet before an electric-blue light flashed and sputtered from beneath the door three apartments down. Cheyenne kept walking.
Then someone screamed, shouts rose from inside that apartment, and she slowed with a sigh and stared at the door.
“Stop! You can’t just show up whenever you want and—”
“Shut it, Earthside-lover. You gave up your rights when you turned your back on the O’gúl Crown.”
“What about you, then? You came over here just like the rest of us—”
“I said, shut up!” Another blue light flashed behind the door, followed by more green bursts and a subdued scream. It sounded like another orc.
Not even a minute after drawing her drow magic back inside, Cheyenne let the flare of heat burst at the small of her back and wash over her. By the time she knocked on the front door of the apartment, which belonged to neighbors she hadn’t bothered to meet, her skin was purple-gray and her hair bone-white.
Time for the friendly neighborhood half-drow to show up and lend a hand.
Chapter Nine
“Get lost!” the orc shouted from inside the apartment.
“That’s gonna be a little hard,” Cheyenne replied, trying to keep her voice as neutral as possible. “I know the area pretty well.”
“We’re handling business in here, and it’s none of yours.”
“Anyone wanna open up and let me take a look for myself? Flashing lights and screaming before eight in the morning are bound to draw attention.”
The pissed-off magical inside the apartment growled in frustration, then stomping footsteps approached the door. Someone else let out a whimper, then the apartment door burst open. Sure enough, a gray-green orc with more fat on him than any of the others Cheyenne had seen stood on the other side of that door. He snarled at her, summoning a ball of sickly green magic in his beefy hand. Then he noticed he was staring at—for all intents and purposes—a drow. His eyes grew wide, and he lifted his green magic toward her.
Cheyenne was faster. She let off a churning, crackling orb of black energy with purple at its center. It struck the orc in the chest and launched him back into her neighbors’ apartment. Someone else squeaked in surprise, and the drow halfling stepped in before closing the door behind her.
The orc grunted and picked himself up from the crunched radiator beneath the window where he’d landed. Cheyenne took in the apartment scattered with toys, crude drawings, and a whole bunch of weird tchotchkes before her eyes fell on the family of trolls huddled together just off the kitchen.
“Hi,” she told them. “I noticed you have an orc problem this morning. If you tell me he’s right and it’s none of my business, I’ll take off.”
The taller male troll with much darker purple skin than his wife couldn’t take his wide, shocked eyes off the half-drow. His wife sucked in a sharp breath and glanced anxiously at the orc, who was now back on his feet and summoning more attack spells. The troll woman shook her head but didn’t say a word.
“I’ll take that as a—”
The orc’s ball of green magic hurtled toward Cheyenne, and she ducked. The spell hit the top of the door behind her, and then the orc was roaring and charging at her across the tiny living room.
She let her backpack slip off her shoulder and onto the floor, then fired two more black orbs of siz
zling energy. The first struck the orc just off the center of his chest again, jerking him sideways as he kept charging. The second hurtled into a collection of hanging plants beside the windows. Plastic planters and dirt and shredded greenery exploded in all directions. Cheyenne turned toward the troll family. “Sorry about that.”
And then the orc was on her, crashing into her body and knocking her into the wall beside the door. The halfling hooked her arm around his neck and brought her knee smashing up into his face. One tusk dug painfully into her thigh, and she both heard and felt a crunch. Roaring again, the orc let her go to bring his hands up to his possibly uprooted tusk.
At the same second that the lashing black whips of drow magic burst from her fingers, the slavering orc let off two more electric shocks of green magic. Cheyenne leaned sideways to avoid them, watching her opponent’s magic slow with the rest of the world as she moved ridiculously fast. The first shot exploded in slow motion against the wall just behind her head, knocking down some framed photos. The halfling stepped toward the kitchen and noticed too late that she’d set her backpack down in the perfect place to trip herself.
She lost her enhanced speed, everything moved normally again, and the orc’s second attack smashed into the wall too. Cheyenne stumbled forward and caught herself on the half-wall of the family’s apartment, although she wasn’t fast enough to keep the ceramic bowl of fruit from flying off the counter onto the kitchen floor.
“Sorry!” she shouted over the sound of shattered pottery.
The family shuffled away from her and farther into the apartment, the male troll hugging his wife and child close and still trying to put himself between them and the chaos in his living room.
Cheyenne lashed out with the black tentacles bursting from her fingers again. Two of them struck the oncoming orc across the face. He stumbled sideways, and the other black whips wrapped around his waist, ankle, and bulging gray-green bicep. She whipped him against the ceiling, bringing down a shower of drywall and dust, then slammed him onto the ornately woven rug. His shoulder smashed into an old armchair that was a little lopsided to begin with. Its leg now broken, the chair toppled over.
The coiled black vines of magic around the orc’s body tightened and constricted. With a grunt and dark, almost black blood oozing from the crooked tusk in his lower jaw, the idiot tried to summon another attack spell.
Cheyenne used her other hand to send a burst of purple sparks at his fingers, which was as close as she could get to hitting a small target without blowing his hand off. The orc’s frustrated growl choked off when her black tendril tightened around his neck.
“Don’t try that again. We’re done.” The halfling summoned a churning sphere of black and purple energy to show him she meant it and stepped forward. “If you can play nicely after this, I won’t have to make it any more painful.”
The orc sneered up at her, tied tightly by the black tendrils stretching from her left hand. Then he growled something in a low, guttural language she wouldn’t have understood even if it hadn’t been muffled and thickened by his swollen lip and the crooked tusk.
Whatever he said, it didn’t sound like he would be playing nice.
She dropped into a squat in front of him. “It’s pretty clear you’re not welcome in this family’s home, so why don’t you tell me what you were trying to do?”
Those green-gold eyes within the scarred orcish face studied her, then fell to something on the floor behind the halfling. She briefly glanced back to see that the copper puzzle box spilled out of her backpack when she’d tripped over it.
“That’s not yours,” she snarled.
The orc chuckled, choked in the strangling grip of her black tendril, then spat a thick, dark-red glob onto the carpet between them. Cheyenne jerked away from the nastiness. “It’ll be easy as shit to find you now, mór úcare.”
With a sigh, Cheyenne gritted her teeth and smashed a right hook into the orc’s beefy face with the full force of her drow strength. His head hit the rug, and her tendrils released him before disappearing. The pain ripping through her shoulder after a punch like that brought a sharp growl of pain and frustration from the half-drow, and she fell backward out of her squat to sit on the rug in front of the orc, who apparently knew something about that puzzle box.
“Thank you.” The word was soft and timid, but without any fear now.
The halfling pushed herself to her feet, forcing herself not to grab her shoulder because it burned too much now. Then she turned slowly around to face the troll family staring at her with wide eyes. “Sorry about the mess. I’ll pay for the damages, so just let me know about the plants. And the chair.” She gazed around the small apartment and shrugged. “The walls too, probably.”
“None of that matters,” the female troll said, stepping forward while her husband wrapped his arm around their daughter. “We owe you for what you just did.”
“Okay. Glad it wasn’t just a misunderstanding, at least.”
“That one’s been trying to get more out of us for the last few months.” The male troll nodded at the unconscious lump of orc in his living room. “I stopped paying him when he found me at work, so he came here. To my home, you understand?”
“I do.” Cheyenne rolled her shoulder and shook out her right hand, which only now had started to protest how much power she’d put into socking the orc’s thick jaw. “I hope you don’t mind me stepping in. I didn’t even know there were other magicals in this building.”
“Please don’t apologize.” The female troll gestured toward her family. “We’ve been here only a year. It’s difficult to know exactly how to meet others when none of us is allowed to show who we are once we step out that door. Thank you for stopping to help us.”
A year? That’s what I get for not being friendly with the neighbors.
“Yeah, well, I had some extra time.” Cheyenne glanced down at the unconscious orc and frowned. “Obviously I can’t call 9-1-1 for this. Is there some kinda number or something you can call for someone to come grab this guy?”
The troll couple blinked at her and exchanged confused looks before shaking their heads.
“Right. Of course not. Look, I don’t know how to clean this mess up without dragging an orc through the apartment building. Not the best idea with everyone else heading out at rush hour too, so…”
“Of course. We have something to help you with that.” The male troll nudged his daughter forward to stand beside her mother, then took off down the hall toward one of the bedrooms in the back. Cheyenne was left with mother and daughter in the living room, plus an unconscious orc beside a puddle of bloody phlegm. The child held onto her mother with violet-tinted hands, her scarlet eyes wide and glassy as she took in the half-drow’s appearance. Cheyenne tried to smile. “Sorry if that was a little scary, kiddo.”
The girl shook her head, one long braid of scarlet the color of her eyes swinging back and forth. “I wasn’t scared.”
Cheyenne smirked. “Yeah, you look pretty brave to me.”
“Like you.”
The halfling had to look away, rubbing the back of her neck and letting out a wry chuckle. I just ripped up their entire living room.
“She’s not wrong,” the girl’s mother added. “We haven’t seen… I mean, a drow Earthside is not something most of us can say we’ve seen. And you live right down the hall?”
“Yep.” Cheyenne nodded, and the awkwardness reappeared while mother and daughter troll gazed at the halfling with admiration and gratitude. Then the dad walked swiftly back down the hall toward them.
“Here we go. Had to look through the drawers to find it. Just for special occasions, you know?” He shifted from foot to foot as he approached Cheyenne, weaving self-consciously, and held out a glass vial with a shimmering clear liquid inside. “Has about an hour in there, I think.”
“Um…” The halfling gingerly took the vial, making the troll dad bob his head eagerly, and raised an eyebrow. “What is this?”
“To make t
hat one invisible.” He nodded at the sorry sack of orc on the rug. “So no one will see you with him.”
“Oh. This is a potion.”
The trolls all nodded vigorously. “Just throw it on the body, and it will disappear.”
The mother clasped her violet hands and smiled, showing slightly crooked teeth that didn’t make the expression any less genuine. “We are indebted to you, thanna—”
“Cheyenne, actually.” The halfling wrinkled her nose as soon as she’d given her name.
“Cheyenne.” The male troll placed a hand over his head. “I am R’mahr. This is Yadje and our daughter Bryl. Please, if you need anything, we will do what we can. We’re still learning how to follow the Accord on this side, but we brought plenty with us from home. Whatever you need, it’s yours.”
“Right.” Cheyenne turned the potion over in her hand and licked her lips. “Well, thanks for that. Getting that jerk outta your hair is pretty much all I need right now, so I’ll just finish that.”
She gave the grinning troll family another hesitant glance, then headed back across the living room. The first stop was beside her open backpack and the puzzle box lying beside it. The orc knew what this is. Hopefully that’s not a massive mistake I’m gonna regret.
After stuffing the box back into her backpack, Cheyenne took a deep breath. Her skin prickled under the awestruck gazes of three silent trolls, but what else could she do at this point? With her backpack zipped, she slung it over her good shoulder and pushed herself to her feet. Then she headed for the orc.
The cork came out of the vial quickly and easily, and she paused to turn back toward the family. “Just dump it on him?”
R’mahr nodded and gestured toward the body.
“Okay.” Cheyenne glanced back down at the thug she was about to make invisible and stopped. The thick silver chain around the orc’s neck had fallen out from beneath his stained shirt, now on the floor beside his neck. At the end of it was a silver pendant about three inches long, cut in crude, jagged lines in the shape of a bull. She frowned at the unexpected orcish jewelry, shrugged, then upended the vial and shook it all over him.