It was a little more complicated than that. I wouldn’t trust Lydian to lead his own horse to water if it came down to it. The stag, however, had a different opinion regarding being able to trust the goblin enough to be led through a realm only he could inhabit fully.

I pressed my fingers to my temples and rubbed away the ache before continuing, forehead still in my hands. “And what I saw, what the stag tells me—it trumps everything, anyway. It doesn’t matter that the entire thing personally makes me feel like a million spiders are crawling all over my body. I don’t necessarily get a choice in this.”

“How do you know the stag is right, anyhow?” Landon spoke from his position at the door, lip curled in a sneer. “You can barely access its power after a year of training, but you still think you know enough to make the decision to work with an absolute madman? How do we know this isn’t your incompetence?”

My eyes blurred, but before I was able to do anything, Soren rose from his chair. There was already a dagger impaled in the wooden door right next to Landon’s head. The goblin took a hand to his ear and marveled at the blood coming from this small cut.

“Landon, right?” Soren growled. The other goblin nodded as Soren continued. “You were put on this group of advisors due to the many years you survived the previous Erlking’s court. It would be a mighty shame if your tenure ended so quickly under mine. I won’t tolerate that language to the stag.”

Eyes flickered to everyone else in the room as we tried to identify the thrower. All of them quickly latched onto Tanya, who had another thin blade in her hand and was using it to clean her nails.

She gave a half shrug. “I would suggest you not talk to your superiors like that, Landon, as my nephew calmly pointed out. The situation with the stag isn’t one we’ve ever seen before. Of course she doesn’t know immediately how to use it or train with it. Were you able to defeat strong enemies with a sword when you first picked it up? Are you some kind of god among goblinkind? No? With what we know—which is nothing, I might add—about the stag’s mantle of power transferring to Janneke, she’s done remarkably well trying to figure it out. I doubt you could do better. So, do us all a favor and keep your mouth shut.”

She said all of this without looking up from her handiwork. Her voice was calm and even—she would’ve been less scary somehow if she yelled.