His phone. It was on the ground, half hidden by the grass. Why did he have this jungle of grass ten feet from immaculate roses?
As I bent over to pick it up, wind whistled on the back of my neck, making the hairs there raise. I dropped and rolled, turning in time to see a massive goblin, blue-haired with dark gray skin, glaring down at me, holding a battle ax over his shoulder.
"Stop!" Bran's voice pierced through the night. "She's a friend."
I clutched Rey's phone close to my chest and tried not to hyperventilate. Bran stepped out from behind the goblin, holding a broadsword in one hand. It looked heavy, but he carried it like it weighed nothing. I’d always known he was muscular, but now it was evident in every move, and it was a strong reminder that I hadn’t needed.
"What's going on?" I asked, my voice shaky. "Did you nearly kill me just now?"
My stomach lurched as the reality of what had almost happened set in. They'd almost killed me. Just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Bran sighed and glanced back to the goblin before shaking his head. "No, Christian is too good. He would've injured you terribly but kept you alive so we could question you."
How comforting. Only maimed and not murdered. That helped settle my jitters.
He sheathed his sword and offered me his hand. "It looks like the alchemists got him." He sighed and looked around as two other goblins studied the scene like it was a complex math problem. They even sniffed the ground.
I stood back and watched as they worked, handing over Rey's phone when one of the goblins held his hand out and grunted. I had no idea what they were doing, or what they hoped to gain from this, but their goblin senses probably had the ability to pick up more than my human ones. Almost definitely, actually.
"It's too bad he didn't keep his phone on him," Bran muttered. "We could've used it to track him." He looked at his men, and I resisted the urge to point out that Rey would probably have liked to keep his phone with him, actually. "Come on, let's go back to the office and look at our options. Do you have everything you need here?"
They nodded. We walked around the house. "I'm parked over there," I said, pointing across the street.
Bran nodded and climbed into his own car. The goblins followed in a van behind him after two more came out of the house. I hadn't even realized they were in there, which made me shudder. I hadn’t even been aware of them. They could have killed me without a second thought, and I would never have known until it was too late.
After jogging to my car, I managed to get turned around in time to stay on the van's tail. They went straight to the office building.
Bran held the door open for me, then we had to wait for the elevator. The lobby was empty this time of night. "Who is here using the elevator?" I mused.
"Probably the people I called in. We're all meeting here."
It took a couple of minutes, but finally, we hurried into Roma's office to find her waiting, along with Cassie, Carissa, and several other people I hadn't yet met.
Bran did quick introductions, pointing each of them out in turn so there was no doubt as to who they were.
“This is Hugh Moreno; he’s very good at finding hidden things and people.”
The new man nodded to me, not taking his eyes off the small shallow bowl of water in front of him. It looked like it came from someone’s silver set.
His skin was very pale, and his hair was pulled back in a short ponytail. He didn’t look like any of the goblins, but I had absolutely no idea what manner of creature he might be, and it felt rude to ask.
“Gareth Valo.” The most intense green eyes I’d ever seen met mine. They were offset by honey-colored hair in a man-bun, which made him look very silly to me. “He’s our lawyer.”
Ok, that wasn’t what I expected. He looked nothing like any lawyer I had ever seen. As if he heard what I thought, he grinned at me.
“Sometimes you need someone to get you out of jail,” he said in a humorous tone.
Rey was probably on a first-name basis with him with all the trouble he got into. A pang shot through me, even though I told myself it was just concern for a teammate who might eventually become a friend. Nothing more. Where was he?
"What do we know?" I asked. "How can we find him? Can't you guys do some sort of spell?"
"He is." Roma pointed to Hugh.
He finally looked up. “He’s here, or very nearby. But hidden behind wards.”
"I wish magic worked better than this." Roma paced. "Hugh is their best finder. But clearly, Rey isn’t here, maybe he’s on a different floor?"
Bran hummed low in his throat, almost a growl. "If I'd been at home with Rey, they never would've gotten ahold of him."
