Page 38 of Deadly Little Games
My blood went cold. Gladiola. If they hurt her, it would be my fault. I had been an idiot to leave Sebastian’s calling card behind.
Gabriel flexed his large hands, but he didn’t move away from me. Things were about to get very ugly.
The fae woman took another step, then suddenly Gabriel was crushing me against the wall behind him. The woman cried out, and I managed to bend to one side enough to see an arrow now sticking out of her leg. My eyes followed the path the arrow would have needed to take to find Elena and two male elves standing atop of the nearest roof.
“You would dare defy a direct order of protection from the elf king?” She effortlessly hopped from the roof onto the closed lid of a dumpster, barely making a sound with her landing. Shelifted her bow again, aiming it at the woman’s heart. “You do know this grants me permission to kill you?”
“Stay behind me,” Gabriel muttered.
As thrilled as I was to see Elena—andseveral more elves appearing on the nearest rooftops as others climbed down amongst us—I couldn’t forget what Marcie had told me. The elf king knew the Realm Breaker existed and was up for grabs. His order of protection had not simply been a favor to his daughter.
In an instant, the fae all looked exactly like the elves surrounding us. All except the one who had been shot. Her face now looked like Elena, but she seemed unable to glamour the arrow sticking out of her leg.
“You can still sense their magic!” I called out to Elena.
Elena stayed on the dumpster with her bow drawn. “Is that you back there, Eva? I can hardly see you behind that massive brute.” To her people, she called out, “Make sure you are close enough to sense their fairy magic before you make a kill!”
Her words made everyone move. The glamoured fae ran toward the elves, producing perfectly replicated elven blades. The clang of metal had me huddling back behind Gabriel. He started edging me along the wall toward the opening of the alley, but before we could retreat, Elena reached us.
With her back to the wall and her eyes on the fight, she spoke to me. “I have a car out front. Come with me, and we’ll keep you safe in Emerald Heights.”
Gabriel edged me further along. He lifted his hands as an attacker came near, then an elf darted between us, fending off the glamoured fae. “She will be coming back to the Bogs,” he said through gritted teeth.
Elena snorted. “We can argue about that in the car.”
We could argue, but I wasn’t going back to Emerald Heights without a pretty damn good explanation. Regardless, being in a moving vehicle away from the fae sounded like an excellent idea.
We reached the corner of the diner, then slipped out of the back alley. Gabriel shoved me ahead of him to start running, but someone else was standing right there to grab me.
“How many times do I have to tell you to stop leaving your card in your apartment?” Sebastian yanked me against his chest.
A few beaten and bruised goblins staggered into the side alley behind him, Gladiola amongst them. Something tight released in my chest upon seeing her, but my relief was short-lived.
Gabriel yanked me away from Sebastian. “Your help is not needed here, devil.”
Sebastian’s lip lifted in a snarl. “Is this the thanks that I get for rescuing your people?”
My jaw dropped, then I realized he had probably only rescued them to figure out where I was. How he’d known to come to the diner was another problem entirely. A problem for another time.
Not appreciating being yanked around, I pulled away from Gabriel, straightened the strap of my bag, then looked at Elena. “You said something about a car?”
She flashed me a grin, then gestured toward the street. “Right this way.”
Gabriel fell into step right behind me like a giant angry storm cloud. “Return to the Bogs,” he said to his people as we passed them. “Tell Mistral what has happened.”
The sounds of fighting were dying down behind us. I was pretty sure the elves had won—they outnumbered the fae three times over—but I wasn’t going to return to find out. I would probably see something that would give me nightmares, and I had enough of those already.
“There are other fae about.” Sebastian fell into step at my other side. “Be on your guard.”
Despite his words, we made it out to the street unhindered. A shiny black car waited with its engine running, parked amongstall the others along the street. I did a double take when I realized Crispin was in the driver’s seat.
He rolled down the window when he saw us. “Dear Eva, how lovely to see you again!” He didn’t seem put off by Gabriel and Sebastian both glaring at him in the slightest.
Elena opened the back door for me, and I had one last moment of hesitation before climbing into the car. Not because I was afraid she was going to kidnap me, not with both Gabriel and Sebastian around, but because Crispin was the one driving.
If he drove a car anything like he drove paths to other realms, we were all doomed.
14