“You bitch,” Derek growled. “You tried to humiliate me on purpose in front of my people.”

I shook my head. “Actually, you ran at me. I protected myself, and you took a dive in the dirt. That’s really on you.”

He snarled and his face twisted, skin bubbling and pulsing. The crowd oohed, but Bridgette’s voice that cut through the rest. “He shifting into a dark goblin! Run!”

“RUN? Where?” I lifted my hands and indicated the very closed-off arena we were in.

Bridgette had pushed her way to the front tier of the crowd. “You have to kill him, kill him now!”

“HOW?” I yelled back.

“Cut off his balls!” she screeched.

I turned to see the goblin king had sprung up like a weed after a rainstorm. He’d gone from being four feet tall to having a massive twelve-foot frame bulging with muscle. He was naked as the day was long, and his . . . well, his bits were hanging low.

“ARE YOU SERIOUS?”

“Yes, it’s the only soft spot on his hide now,” she yelled, and the crowd around her yanked her off the front line. The only soft spot? Of course it was.

Jaysus lawd in heaven, this was going to be gross. The now monstrous goblin king took a step toward me and the reverberation rolled through the ground and into the soles of my feet. Fear kissed the back of my neck, reminding me that despite all the things I’d been through, all the shit I’d had to deal with, I wanted to live.

Which meant I had to be smart about this. I had to outsmart this big ducking goblin.

25

Outsmarting a goblin? All I had to do was piss him off enough that he would make a mistake and give me an opening. That being said, I was still standing with him in a fighting ring, and hoping I could take him down before I got killed or maimed.

No problem, irritating men was a gift of mine.

“I talked to your girlfriend,” I said, loud enough that the crowd could hear me. “She said you couldn’t get it up again last night.” I made a motion to his man bits, and he roared as the crowd howled with laughter.

So much for any sort of solidarity amongst thieves. Or goblins, as was the case. Big dumb Derek let out a roar that rattled my ears and literally sent me shuffling back a few steps.

Crash yelled something at me, but I couldn’t hear him through the ringing in my ears.

“Did you tell your wife yet that you have a girlfriend?” I asked.

A screech from the stands said not so much.

I grimaced, still moving, keeping my distance from the giant lug, waiting for my moment. Robert had said to use my heart, but I wasn’t exactly sure what he meant by that. Maybe my magic? But I still didn’t fully understand what I was capable of—or how it could be of use in this particular situation.

The goblin king held out his hand, and a pool of deep red shadows curled up from his palm, wove through his fingers, and began a slow crawl toward me.

“HURRY! He’s using his magic!” Bridgette screeched.

Her yell pushed me forward and I ran toward the goblin king. As I got within his reach, he swung the hand covered in red shadows toward my head. I bobbed downward, came up on the other side as his hand passed over my head.

I snapped up a knife, thinking—or maybe just hoping—I could cut off his hand.

The knife that had just decimated two deadbolts dug into his flesh and bone . . . and stuck. He wrenched away from me, taking one knife with him.

“Oh dear,” I whispered. Looked like Bridgette had been right.

He whipped around and grabbed me with both hands around the waist, circling me with his giant mitts. Lifting me, he snarled, “I’m going to squeeze the shit out of you.”

The constriction around my middle ramped up as he leaned into his hold on me, and yeah, I could tell he meant what he’d said. And it was obvious he could follow through too. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t so much as gasp around the pressure on my middle.

It would be a matter of a minute, maybe less, before I blacked out. I twisted in his hands, one knife still tucked against my forearm. One knife, one shot at his twig and berries. I pulled my arms above my head as if I were squirming to get out.

A boom rippled the air behind us, almost like thunder had been unleashed in the small space, and the crowd oohed at whatever they were seeing.

Even the goblin king’s stupid yellow eyes slid away from me. I snapped my hand forward, throwing the only weapon I had left, praying that it hit its mark. Or marks. I closed my eyes, knowing that I had no time left.

Crash wasn’t going to save me. My friends didn’t know I was in trouble, and I had nothing left to defend myself with or fight.

The sudden release of the hands on me sent me tumbling to the ground. I hit the dusty packed dirt with a puff of air and had to roll quickly to avoid the flailing feet of the giant goblin. His legs shook and his whole body seized as blood sprayed from between his legs.

I ran to his arm, where my other knife was still embedded, planted a foot on his skin, and yanked my blade free. The goblin king stared up at me. “Damn . . . un-terrr.” The last word slurred as the light went out of his eyes.

Just like that, gone, his body shrinking as the life left him.

There was no time to find my other blade. I turned as Davin strode toward me.

Crash was on the ground behind him, stunned by the looks of it, holding his head in his hands. “Give me the spell book,” Davin said, “and you can go free.”

“I’m not giving you anything,” I wheezed around what I was pretty sure was a cracked rib or two. Maybe even some breaks.

“Well, then, how about give it to me, or I will kill him?” Davin held up his hand and a spell shot out of him, wrapping around Crash and holding him tightly. “My master will not like that he is dead, but we can live with it. We can survive without his help.”

I held onto my one knife, keeping it tucked against my forearm. The Silver Lady was still behind him, and I felt the same connection to her that I’d felt before—a link to the power that welled inside of her, just under the surface.

I made myself nod, and the crowd gasped. “Here.” I kept my knife hidden and put my other hand to my shirt as if I would pull something out from under it, lunged forward, and slashed my knife through the magic that Davin had wrapped around Crash.

The magic blasted apart, sending us flying in every direction. I hit the far wall, slid down it, and landed with my limbs all askew. Struggling for air again.

Crash was nowhere to be seen.

Davin was running toward me before I could so much as blink, the Silver Lady dragging him back and slowing him down.

The connection bloomed between us, and I lifted my hand. A burst of teal sparkles shot through with black—dust?—curled up around my fingers, and intuition had me flicking it at the ground.

Ghosts shot upward, not that anyone else could see them, and a hundred or more of them spilled toward Davin, clinging to him, pulling him down until he could no longer move. Goblins and humans, tiny fae, and others I couldn’t identify. They’d all died here, in this arena. And they were all pissed.

I forced myself to my feet and limped toward him. The pain in my ribs was now matched by a pain in my lower back and left hip. If there was ever a night for double Advil . . .

He glared up at me even as his face paled, not from fear, but from the energy they were sucking off him. I could see them taking him down in great gulps, their faces and forms solidifying further and further.

“They’re killing you,” I said. “You have any last words?”

“My master will finish what I started.” He smiled, though his lips were cracked and bloody.

I crouched beside him, and the second I did it—I knew I’d made an error. I was too close.

He lunged at me, tackling me and rolling us across the arena away from the ghosts.

Everything happened quickly and slowly. He sat up straddling me, my own knife in his hand. Even though I could see it hurt him to hold onto the handle, he swung it down toward me.

A body shot between us, long black hair and grimy clothes.

“Robert!” I yelled as he took the blow meant for me. I rolled over and pulled out the only thing I had left. The coin from my back pocket.

The Silver Lady touched the center of it, and it thinned and stretched into the weapon she’d held in the vision she gave me at the Marshall House. Robert lay unmoving off to the side of me. Crash was nowhere to be seen.

Before Davin could do anything more, I jammed the thin silver rod up and into his heart.

He bucked on top of me, his body stiffening as I held the tool meant for killing a vampire, but no doubt a silver rod through the heart would kill most people. The ghosts around us scattered, their eyes wide and their bodies shaking as the silver tool pulsed in time with Davin’s heartbeat.

“You . . .” Davin shook his head. “Not possible.”

And like all assholes should, he died rather unceremoniously after that attempt at a final pithy phrase. He slumped to the side, eyes glazed and chest still. I crawled to Robert and pulled my knife out of his ribs. “Tell me you’re okay,” I whispered.

I shifted so I could hold him a little better, harder than it sounds with a skeleton. “Robert?”

I didn’t know if magic could help him.

“Whiskey,” he mumbled, and I laughed.

“So soon after the last binge? Hell, why not.” I struggled to my feet and then reached down to pull him up. He was as wobbly as me.

Every part of my body shook, every muscle was on the verge of seizing, dancing as though I had electricity running through me. But I was alive. Robert was alive, well sort of. Bridgette was alive. I hoped Crash was alive.

Karissa was gone without so much as a see-you-later. No shock there.

The crowd though, they shot to their feet and began to chant a name I didn’t know.

“Gov-Nu. Gov-Nu. Gov-Nu.”

I turned to see Crash standing across from me at the far side of the arena. His head lowered until his chin touched his chest.

We’d done it.

The crowd of goblins burst over the edge of the arena seating and flowed around us. Some reached out and touched my hands first and then touched their foreheads. Some dared to touch the flat of the blade that I held in one hand.