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With another thought, I banished the i aith a lazy flap of her wings

“Holy shit,” I murmured under my breath “That was… easy”

Chapter Twenty-Four

I played with my newly expanded powers for the next several days as we trekked across the barren landscape of the underworld, but was careful not to strain uage had been a barrier before, it certainly wasn’t now I didn’t even have to think in full sentences—I could persuade with is as easily as ords now

According to the directions Vee had given us, ere very near our destination She’d known of a location where Gavriel had hidden a large stash of Temple Stones, and the upside of that was that ouldn’t have to gofor them ourselves The downside, of course, was the Gavriel knew of the location of these stones and would likely have put ood chance we’d run into some kind of trouble, I wanted to save as much of my fresh juice as possible for the moments when it mattered most

I still convinced a young basilisk that his next h I couldn’t resist

The shadows on the ground were lengthening when Xero ca “It’s supposed to be here”

We were at the bottom of a slope in the center of a canyon Three creeks—one of which we had been following—twisted together a few yards ahead of us to create a river which almost i waterfall The water—or whatever it as oily and stank vaguely of rotting flesh, but the jewel tones of the oil slick were pretty fro for the entrance to a cave

One of the little rodents like I’d seen earlier crouched on its hind legs off toit feel like it had to go to the big dark place right now, then tracked its movements

“This way,” I said softly, lifting a hand to get the guys’ attention The rodent led me to a led through a hole s tofor

“What is it?” Jayce asked

“Airflow It’s strong too”

I checked the ground around the boulder “You see how there’s an indent in the ground on this side? I think the boulder’s covering the entrance on purpose It’s been rolled back and forth”

They guys exchanged looks and shrugged, then arranged themselves beside me on one side of the massive rock

“On three,” Xero said “One, two—”