Steal the Sun (Thieves #4)(124)

Chapter Thirty





I launched myself off the ground and into his arms, sighing with pleasure as they wrapped around me. “You came for me.”

“I will always come for you,” Dev promised as he hugged me fiercely. “Even when I prove myself to be a stupid ass, I will always wake up and come for you. I realized that everything I loved was over here, wife. My future was here and I couldn’t give it up for revenge. Please forgive me.”

“Zoey, please forgive my brother later as we have an army of red caps ready to slaughter us, and I don’t think they will wait for your tender reunion,” Declan said even as he notched an arrow. He pulled the bowstring back to an impossible spread. I’d seen Declan use his weapon before and I believed his boast that he was the greatest archer in all of Faery.

“Zachary, Lee,” a deep, soothing voice said. I looked up and saw Bris had taken over. He looked…angrier than I had ever seen him. Bris was gentle and kind. He was patient, but there was nothing of that Bris in his face now. “Please protect my goddess. Where is Daniel?” He directed his question at me.

Lee and Zachary began to lead me away from the fertility god as Declan started letting his arrows fly faster than any human would have been able to manage. “He’s safe as far as I know. He’s with Neil.”

The red caps stopped advancing as Con held his hands up. He looked over our small party and let out a hearty laugh. “Welcome, Prince Declan. I couldn’t ask for a better guest to join us in these proceedings. And the priest was stupid enough to come after his bride.”

“He isn’t alone,” Bris said solemnly. He stepped forward, his big body a target, but he stood in front of the group as though we were his to defend.

Con smiled, showing small, curved goblin fangs. “Yes, I heard you had ascended. Your time in the priest will be short lived, My Lord. So Prince Declan, you brought along a fertility god to fight a war. I’m afraid you’re outgunned, unless you intend that we all f*ck each other to death.”

“Con,” Declan acknowledged with a frown. It was obvious he knew the half sidhe and didn’t care for him, but there was nothing new on that front. “I suppose Angus does not know about your treason.” A terrible thought hit Declan and he blanched. “Please tell me you were not working with the Duke of Ain. Say it was anybody but him because you have to know that my sister-in-law will never stop saying she told me so. I will hear it as long as she has a voice to speak.”

“I told you so,” I yelled from behind my wolf guards. Declan was right about one thing. I would be saying those words a whole lot in his near future. If we made it out of this alive.

“Damn it. I hate it when she’s right.” Declan turned back to Con. “You will pay for your crimes. Tell me something before we kill you, Con. Where is the woman who owns this house? Was she in residence? Has she been taken prisoner as well?”

“She got away,” I told Declan, who nodded and turned back to his task.

“How exactly do you intend to make me pay for my crimes?” Con asked arrogantly. He held his arms wide, indicating his men. “I have an army of killers willing to do my bidding. You have a fertility god, two men, and a helpless girl.”

“I wasn’t so helpless when I carved up your balls, Con,” I pointed out.

Zack laughed out loud and seemed far too relaxed for a man who was facing down an army.

“Lee.” Anxiety made my stomach churn because that nasty old Con was making sense. We were horribly outnumbered. “Shouldn’t we get up there and help Dev? Tell me you brought guns and maybe a tank.”

“We have everything we need, Zoey.” Lee didn’t take his eyes off the scene in front of him. “You stayed alive and you castrated a son of a bitch. You did your job, darlin’. Now let your husband do his.”

“I’m going to kill you, bitch,” Con promised. “And I’ll make your husband watch when I take your head.”

“You arrogant fool,” Bris said darkly. “Those who deal in death always forget how powerful life can be.”

There was a mighty rumble as the earth beneath us began to shake. I could see plainly that it wasn’t an earthquake. Earthquakes don’t just happen in a small area leaving everything else untouched. The house behind us was still, completely unaffected by the cracks that began to form in the ground beneath the army. I started to fall, but Lee held me up. The sound of all that dirt moving seemed to fill the yard as I had a sense of something big coming.

“It’s all right, Zoey,” Lee said.

The ground spat up a thicket of rope-like vines that came from seemingly every inch of the yard where a red cap stood. I watched as their red eyes popped open in surprise as they lost their footing. They tried to move away. They tried to run, but there was nowhere to go as the ground drank them up, hungrily pulling them under.

The goblins fought and tried to claw their way out, but the vines just pulled harder until there was no one left on the field. I was struck by the sudden quiet and how the ground shifted easily back to its formerly perfect state. It was like nothing had happened. No one who had not seen the deed could believe an entire army was now held in hard dirt.

“Damn,” Zack said beside me, respect plain in his voice. “I’m totally not pissing Bris off.”