I dived to the right, toward the cave wall. There was no room for swords, not to mention it was still too freaking dark. I drew one dagger in case someone tried to bring death up close and personal, but I kept it by my side. It’d suck to stab one of my own team; well, except for Carnades.
Mychael and Tam were out front. I couldn’t see them, but I could hear them. Imala had enough magic to shield Chigaru, who had none. Carnades had probably crawled into a crack in the wall with his hands over his head. Either that or a Khrynsani had tacked him to the wall on the first volley.
The twang of bowstrings was abruptly replaced by steel-on-steel combat.
The goblins were happy to continue trying to kill us in the dark. Mychael’s shout of a two-word spell killed their happy real quick.
Light, blazing like the sun at high noon, lit the cave. Happy turned to pained shouts and hisses. Tam, Imala, and Chigaru didn’t like it, but each had shielded their eyes with one hand and kept weapons moving in the other.
Amazing thing about survival instinct—when your body realizes it’s in deep and stinky stuff, your eyes find a way to see just a little better than they ordinarily could; your hearing is just a little sharper; your reflexes faster.
I didn’t see the Khrynsani’s lunge at my left side; I felt the air displaced by his movement, and slashed my long dagger across the back of his wrist. With a pained hiss, the goblin jerked his sword back only to instantly close distance with his dagger, giving me a slice of my own. I detected a flash of fang-filled grin right before he stepped in for what he thought was the kill. The Khrynsani froze for a fraction of a second, but it was long enough for me to bury my blade between his ribs.
The last expression on his face wasn’t just terror; it was recognition. The goblin saw me and knew who I was, and for those two blinks, he’d been scared pissless. The way my day had been going, it was nice to be appreciated, even if it was for a power I didn’t have anymore, or at least not right now, when I could really use it.
Two Khrynsani were moving on Tam, and Mychael’s sudden sunlight didn’t stop their forward momentum. I couldn’t throw a knife that far, and even if I could, I’d probably just hit them in the head with the pommel.
Rocks were much easier.
We were in a cave, so rocks were plentiful. No one was charging me, so I scooped up a fist-sized rock, and chucked it hard at the head of the Khrynsani closest to Tam. It took him in the temple, and he went down like the rock that’d hit him.
Unfortunately, some of the Khrynsani had been a little faster than their brothers in adjusting to the light, and I became the center of a lot of unwanted attention.
They recognized me, too.
Damn.
Judging from the number of Khrynsani readying spells and mouthing incantations, Sarad Nukpana had told them that I was to be the guest of honor. Flattered, I did not feel.
All the rocks in that cave weren’t going to save my bacon.
But a volley of bolts to the Khrynsani’s backs did.
I didn’t know how many Khrynsani were in that cave, but the newcomers had put a dead-on-target bolt in each and every one.
They were hooded and cloaked, but I caught a glimpse here and there of gray skin. Goblins. The Khrynsani were dead, but the newcomers had reloaded and held their crossbows at the ready.
At us.
One goblin stepped out in front of the others. Tall and rangy from what I could tell. He stared straight at Tam, then turned his hooded face toward me.
“Nice throwing arm,” he said.
I flexed my hand around the rock I still held. “I stay in practice. You never know who you’re going to meet.” I tossed a rock casually in one hand, and spoke without taking my eyes off the goblin. “Tam, he seems to know you. Who have we just met?”
“My brother,” Tam said, his eyes never leaving the robed figure.
I damned near dropped the rock on my foot. “Your what?”
“His brother, Mistress Benares.” The goblin raised his crossbow and leveled it at Tam. “Welcome home.”
Chapter 4
Brother?
I had questions tumbling all over themselves to get out. Like why hadn’t Tam told me he had a brother, to how did that brother know we were going to be here, and the biggie—what the hell was he doing aiming a crossbow at Tam?
Phaelan had been on the receiving end of some less-than-warm receptions by a few of his siblings before, but none had gone as far as contemplating murder (at least not openly), which looked like exactly what Tam’s brother was doing. He’d seen Tam, identified Tam as his brother, and still had the business end of a crossbow aimed at him. Though with growing up together anywhere near the goblin court, who knew what kind of brotherly resentments this guy had? Just our luck it’d be the seething, bottled-up variety.
The rock in my hand had this guy’s name on it—whatever it was—if he brought that bow up to his shoulder. When it came to talking sense into his brother, I hoped Tam knew what he was doing.
Tam held up a hand to stop any of us who might be thinking what I was thinking, namely bounce a rock or spell off this guy’s hooded head. Tam’s other hand dropped to where he kept his favorite throwing dagger. That confirmed there wasn’t going to be a hug of brotherly welcome in the immediate future. Other than that, Tam didn’t move; I thought it prudent to follow his lead. None of the goblins were moving, either. Their weapons weren’t aimed at us, but they weren’t lowered, either, though the same was true for us. Distrust was just as contagious as betrayal today.
There were ten goblins that I could see, with a couple probably standing watch outside the cave mouth. They were armed and armored in a mismatched kind of way. Their armor wasn’t bad and their weapons were slightly better, but it all looked like they’d used what they’d found or taken. Uncle Ryn’s and Phaelan’s crews operated the same way. But these people weren’t pirates. Some of them had the look of experienced fighters; the others held themselves and their weapons like staging an ambush was relatively new to them. They outnumbered us, though surprise had been their only advantage, but it had worked well enough. The cave floor littered with dead Khrynsani was proof of that.
However, at least six of them were mages. Good ones. Without my magic, I couldn’t sense their power, but I didn’t need to sense it when I could see it with my own two eyes. Experienced mages often left a hazy shimmer behind for a few moments after they’d worked some form of magic, whether defensive wards or offensive spells. Mychael and Tam could take this group on, and probably take them out, but their level of battlemagic combined with enclosed spaces would have fatally unintended results. Carnades’s possible contribution didn’t even enter into the picture. If the spells started flying, the only side Carnades would be on was his own.
Tam’s brother reached up with the hand not holding the crossbow and pushed back his hood. Oh yeah, he was Tam’s brother, no doubt of that. He wore his black hair long, and, like his brother’s, it was tightly bound down his back in a goblin battle braid. He looked slightly younger, and his features were a little sharper than Tam’s, but they’d be no less swoon inducing to the general female population.
Tam was utterly, preternaturally still. “What are you—”
“Doing here?” his brother finished. “It looks like we’re pulling your ass out of a very large fire.” The goblin paused, his expression card-shark blank. “Or did we interrupt a business meeting?”
“Business?” Tam hissed. He gave a sharp kick to the Khrynsani corpse at his feet that had died by his hand. I had to wonder if Tam would’ve preferred it if his boot had connected with his brother instead. “How dare you imply that—”
The goblin shrugged. “Well, you might not be who you say you are.”
“What?”
“You might not be who—”
“I heard what you said,” Tam snapped.
Talon was standing right behind me. I heard him draw breath to make his own contribution, and I reached back and pinched the hell out of whatever skin I could latch onto. Talon squeaked, but then he did exactly what I’d intended—kept that mouth of his shut and didn’t give his dad any more trouble than he might already have.
I didn’t know the circumstances behind this tit for tat, but I’d seen Phaelan and his brothers engage in it often enough that I knew where it was going. Phaelan and one brother or the other usually ended up on the ground in a messy wrestling match. Tam and his brother were both heavily armed, and Tam was heavily magicked. This would just be messy.
Anyone who ambushed and killed Khrynsani waiting to ambush and kill us might not be our friends, but I couldn’t see them being our enemies. Just about the last thing I thought we’d be doing was standing in a damp cave with dead Khrynsani while Tam and his brother engaged in some kind of alpha male sibling rivalry.
Tam’s brother shrugged. “You were recently possessed by Sarad Nukpana. You let Raine Benares over there kill you rather than stay that way.” He made a sound that was somewhere between a snort and a laugh without the humor. “You getting yourself possessed by someone else wouldn’t be the strangest thing I’ve seen this week. And a possessed man certainly wouldn’t hesitate to kill a few of his lackeys to make a disguise more believable.” He paused meaningfully. “I need proof that you’re my brother.”
Just proof? That didn’t sound like a man about to kill his brother out of rage or vengeance. Maybe Tam hadn’t pissed him off after all. That’d be a pleasant surprise. I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from smiling. Crossbows pointed at us or not, this could be good.
“Which would be more convincing?” Tam drawled. “To regale your friends here with how when you were fourteen, you fell face-first out of Countess Na’Ghal’s boudoir window into a pile of horse manure with her enraged husband in pursuit, or your eighteenth birthday when you treated yourself to a pair of ripe Caesolian—”
“I believe you,” his brother said quickly, lowering the crossbow.