Page 95 of Obsidian Dream

“How long will it take for the iron to affect her once she has been hit?”Khalida asked.Their entire plan hinged on the assumption that the metal still affected Ninhursag.

“One minute and full paralysis will set in,” Kade answered.

Seconds could last a lifetime in their line of work, and a minute could be an eternity.

“What happens if she knows that we are at her location, waiting for her?She is a god.”

“We assume she knows we are there.It isn’t about the element of surprise, like a typical ambush.What she will not be expecting is our weaponry.She has been trapped beneath Rome for thousands of years and is nowhere near her full strength.The last time she was on the surface, all we had were swords and spears.”Kade flicked Dante a look.“We have placed snipers within the vicinity of Palatine Hill.If we cannot make the shot, they will.”

Khalida snorted.Playing a potential decoy for an angry, malicious god was not on her bucket list, but here they were.

Dante sighed.“We need her to retrieve the relic first.”

It was the crux of their plan—they needed the relic, and none of them knew exactly what it was, and only Ninhursag knew where it was located.

“We have once chance for this to work.”

Neither of them disagreed.

Khalida flexed her hand.“And I should trust this information?”

Dante stared at her, his green eyes unflinching as the surrounding temperature swiftly dropped to an artic chill.“I would not risk Rieka’s safety otherwise.”

Khalida spun on her heels and headed toward her door, her room all of a sudden too small, too crowded, and she needed fresh air.Something to stop the sense of foreboding that was threatening to suffocate her.

She reached the door, hand on the metal handle when the words reached her.Barely louder than a whisper, they slammed into her.“Or Talik’s.”

Chapter Forty-One

TALIK

They conspire againstyou.

Talik held onto the porcelain basin, willing the voice away as he stared at his reflection in his bathroom mirror.After an hour and a half of studying the box and the dark cube, Kade had switched out with him.The hunter had been his usual stoic self.But that hadn’t stopped Talik from feeling he was in Kade’s crosshairs—being carefully observed.It was what he wanted, after all—for Kade to realize something was wrong.Every time he attempted to say Ninhursag’s name, his throat constricted until it hurt to breathe and a hand squeezed his heart until it felt like it was about to burst.

It was nowhere near as painful as when he thought about Khalida.She had been the perfect soldier in the armory, no hint of emotion, but he knew that if he had scratched at the surface, her pain would have destroyed him.Talik didn’t enjoy knowing that he had the power to bring Khalida to her knees, not if it led straight to her destruction.But like everything else in his life, he was much more suited to destruction.