The Prof Croft Series: Books 0-4 (Prof Croft Box Sets Book 1) Brad Magnarella (ink book reader txt) 📖

would stand out, but I would also be protected from both friendly and enemy fire—assuming the goblins weren’t bearing magical weapons.

The steep staircase deposited me onto a busted-up asphalt path. Trees pressed in from all sides. More gunfire sounded ahead of me. Away to my left, I picked up a burst of goblin speech.

“Vega!” I called.

Arrows clattered off my shield.

Shit. I reinforced my protection and plowed into the woods ahead. Leafy limbs batted at my shield. I stumbled over something and went down. I knew without looking that it was a body.

Please don’t let it be hers, I thought desperately.

I turned and held up my staff. White light illuminated a row of small sharp teeth and the staring squash-colored eyes of a goblin. Its muscled torso had been ripped open by gunfire. Beyond the black talons of an outstretched hand rested the creature’s short bow. I hesitated for a moment, never having seen a goblin up close. Even in death it looked menacing.

Another hail of arrows got me moving. By the growing volume of goblin chatter, I guessed more were emerging from underground—just as I’d feared. Gunfire answered in staccato bursts.

“Fall back!” I shouted. “Fall back!”

But a fresh series of horn blasts obscured my cries.

I saw the next body before I could trip over it. One of ours this time. With a force invocation, I rolled the body onto its back, arrow shafts cracking beneath the weight. I let out a relieved breath even as my stomach clenched at the sight of the young man’s lifeless face.

I pulled the helmet from his head, donned it, and activated the communication system. “This is Everson Croft,” I said. “We’re outnumbered. I’m ordering everyone to fall back. I repeat, I’m ordering everyone—”

Feedback blew into my ears, and the power box exploded. I swore and tossed the smoking helmet aside. Cupping my hands to the sides of my mouth, I shouted for Vega again.

Behind me, something broke through the brush.

I turned and nearly screamed. The hairy giant that loomed over me grunted, pointed ears flattening back from a short brow and huge red eyes. Bugbear, a voice stammered in my head. It’s a frigging bugbear. Eyewitnesses frequently mistook the creature for a bigfoot—an easy mistake to make. Only a bigfoot didn’t brain its victims and tear them limb from limb.

From a fanged mouth, the creature let out a horrid cry.

I raised my sword, but the shock of the encounter had cost me the precious second I’d needed to cast. Muscles hardened across the bugbears hairy torso and a club came crashing toward me.

I criss-crossed my sword and staff in front of me at the same moment the club collided into my shield. Sparks blew against my face, and the impact hurled me backwards. I ricocheted from tree to tree like a giant pinball. At last, I crashed to a stop. The woods reeled around me as I sat up, but the glimmering shield had held, sparing my life.

“Not gonna survive a second round, though,” I mumbled.

I chanted quickly to reinforce the shield. The bugbear screamed again, limbs breaking with his next charge. Too soon, his fierce red eyes shone above me, club raised overhead.

“Respingere!” I called.

The pulse from my shield knocked the bugbear onto his heels. Without my feet planted, the counterforce sent me backwards. The shield and I broke through a sweep of reeds, and then we were … bobbing?

Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.

The shield fizzled and burst apart. Warm water soaked through my clothes. I splashed until I was standing shin deep in the muddy shallows of a pond, my sleeves dripping wet.

Beyond the tall reeds, the bugbear unleashed another scream.

I waded across the finger of water at the pond’s tapering end and splashed onto the opposite shore.

“Protezione,” I tried.

Brown light popped around the staff’s opal before blinking out.

I peeked back through the reeds. In the faint moonlight, I could see the rustling trees that marked the bugbear’s progress. I took several crouching steps backwards before the sounds of gunfire and goblin chatter stopped me. Escaping the bugbear meant fleeing into the heart of combat. Without my protection, I wouldn’t make it ten yards before an arrow or bullet found me.

But I had to locate Vega. Had to get everyone out of the park.

Red eyes appeared above the reeds. They shifted from side to side before narrowing in on me. A low growl rumbled across the water. I readied my sword, but I wasn’t dealing with a fire-soaked ghoul. This creature was at full strength and had all of his senses. I would get one thrust or swing. Anything short of a lethal result, and I was looking at an express train to the afterlife.

Yeah, screw that.

I turned and ran. I’d take my chances in the combat zone—and take Harry here with me. The bugbear crashed into the water at my back. With any luck, he would eat bullets before I ate arrows. Right now, I was eating a whipping series of tree branches, and they were slowing me down. I panted out a Word of protection, but no shield would take shape.

Something whistled near my head. An arrow.

“Vega!” I called, more from desperation now than anything.

“Croft,” she shouted back.

My heart jerked, and I veered toward her voice. She was alive! My new route took me around and down the hillock I’d been ascending. I scrambled and slid past massive boulders.

“Vega,” I repeated.

“Over here,” she said.

I found her in a protected pocket where three boulders came together. She was sitting against the far boulder, aiming an automatic rifle toward the opening. Her helmet was off, and I caught a shine of blood along her hairline. I glanced over my shoulder before crouching beside her.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

She winced. “Got clubbed in the head.”

“By big, bad, and hairy?”

“I emptied my pistol at it. Not sure whether I hit it or just scared it off. What in the hell was it?”

“A bugbear,” I said, looking back again. “And you’re lucky.