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Wild magic stirred around me; it filled me with energy and hastened my steps even as it sharpened my fear. Aiden. Oh God, Aiden. It shouldn’t have taken him this long to simply drop Belle off. He should have been back l
ong before Émigré had erupted into flame.
He must have escorted her inside.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
The word pounded through my brain, its rhythm as swift as my footsteps. Alarms bit through the night. Building alarms. Fire alarms. Emergency services.
I’d get there before the rangers, the ambulances, and the fire brigade, but would it do any good? Would the burned bodies I’d vaguely glimpsed in my dreams belong to the two people I cared most about in the entire world?
I hoped not.
Hoped that I had read Clayton—and his need for revenge—so very wrong.
I skidded around the corner, my arms flailing as I fought for balance. The wild magic spun around me, its force burning my skin, urging me on, urging me to hurry.
Up ahead, flames leapt high and black smoke billowed. The air was thick with the stench of burning wood, material, and flesh, and my stomach churned at an even faster rate. Shadows moved through the smoke—some staggering, some supporting others, all of them trying to get away from the heat and the flames. My gaze swept them, desperate to find someone I knew. No one. There was no one familiar.
The closer I got, the fiercer the heat became. I threw up a hand in an effort to see against the glare and the smoke. Dear God, the whole front of the building had been blown apart. All that was left was fragmented skeletons of what had once been walls and roof beams… and yet the rear half of the building looked relatively intact. If there was any chance of survival, then perhaps it was there…
Energy wound around my fingers, then Katie said urgently, This way.
She led me into a lane that ran along one side of a smaller building. All its windows were shattered and its security alarm was ringing, but the explosion that had torn apart the front of Émigré had done little more than blacken the paint here. But the pungent black smoke cut visibility and made breathing even more difficult. I pulled my sweater over my nose in an effort to filter out some of the muck and wished I could do the same when it came to the thick waves of emotion that rolled from the building—from all those who’d been injured or were close to death.
Dozens; there were dozens of them.
I swallowed heavily and tried to ignore the psychic wash. I couldn’t save everyone… and it was very possible I might not be able to save the two people I loved most in the world.
The lane came out into a small parking area behind Émigré. Though bits of wood, concrete, and metal lay scattered all over the area, the flames and destruction hadn’t yet reached the back of the building or the loading bay. A metal grate barred entry into the latter; beyond it, at the top of the stairs, was a double-width door. Entry into the back of Émigré.
Given the state of the building and that door, there was a very good chance that Belle, Aiden, and others might still be alive… but only if they’d been in this portion of the building rather than the front.
I gathered the wild magic, blasted the metal shutter apart, and then raced up the steps and strode toward the door. The wild magic stirred around me even as Katie silently urged me to hurry.
“Do you know what lies behind the door?” I asked.
A hallway leading into the rear storage areas.
“How close to the destruction zone and the fire is it?”
Close enough.
“And Aiden?”
I warily pressed a hand against the door. It was warm to the touch, and there were thin threads of smoke leaching out from underneath it, but neither were an indication that the hall beyond was ablaze. I once again used the wild magic to punch the door open. Smoke billowed out, its stench a mix of wood, burning plastics, and who knew what else. The hallway beyond was dark, filled with the crackle of distant flames and the groaning of a building on the verge of collapse.
He’s trapped in the basement, Katie said. The roof has fallen onto the main stairs, and a beam blocks the secondary exit door that leads into this hall. You must hurry.
I knew that, but I nevertheless stalled. My heart raced a million miles an hour, and my fear was so thick it squeezed my throat and made breathing even more difficult.
It was stupid to go in there. Absolutely stupid. But if I didn’t—if I did the sensible thing and waited for emergency services to get here and do their job—there was every chance that no one in the basement would survive. It wasn’t only precognitive ability telling me that; it was also evident in the growing pulse of Katie’s fear.
My heart skipped several beats and then kicked up a gear. “What about Belle? Is she with him?”
She’s not in the basement. Nor is she outside or amongst those who lie in the rubble.
Her words only made the sick churning in my gut intensify. Either she’d escaped through that weird doorway she’d mentioned with Roger and Maelle, or she was now Clayton’s prisoner. While I’d definitely prefer the former rather than the latter option, it didn’t explain why I couldn’t sense her presence. As far as I knew, the only thing that could break the connection between us was death, and I had to believe she wasn’t yet dead. Surely, surely, I would have known if she was.
