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I’ll try to keep the captured boys from running, but I don’t know if I can.
Lily stayed next to the torch while the rest of them started running down the tunnel, clanging on pipes as they went and shrieking at the top of their lungs. She heard a huge commotion of screams and scrambling footfalls. Tristan’s mind brushed up against hers.
It’s working! They’re running away! Wait …
Lily heard gunshots.
“No!” she shouted.
She ran down the tunnel, abandoning the torch. When she rounded the bend, she saw the captured tunnel boys fleeing in every direction. Most of the guards had taken off in the opposite direction down the tracks, but a few had remained and they were firing wildly at what they believed to be Woven.
Lily dropped the glamour and the gunfire ceased. Shocked faces peered back at her in the dark.
“Get behind me,” she told the children. The guards raised their weapons again and Lily raised her hand. Rowan slid into her head eagerly.
Gift me, Lily.
An earsplitting crack and a blinding flash of light erupted toward her. Lily inhaled the hot rush of power and an unnatural silence bubbled up around the vacuum of absorbed heat, motion, and light. Bullets halted in their progress, their momentum stolen, and then dropped from the air with the sound of scattering stones. A witch wind howled down the tunnel, knocking everyone toward Lily in a wave.
“Witch!” a guard screamed.
Lily unlocked Rowan’s willstone and gifted it with a huge burst of energy. They both embraced the sensation with joy and awe. Lily was inside Rowan and their shared body became a blur of motion and strength as they flowed toward their enemies. Guards fell around them, but Lily felt held back. She wanted them dead at her feet, but Rowan was stopping her.
We must not kill, Lily.
Lily ached to take him over completely, to possess him and wear his body around hers. She would kill all the guards for daring to open fire on her mechanics. She would punish them for taking Rowan away from her, for striking him, for not getting down on their knees and begging her for their lives.
Let me keep myself, Lily. Please don’t do this.
Lily pulled back and released Rowan. Fatigue fell on her instantly and she stumbled under its weight. The iron taste of bloodlust was in her mouth.
“Catch her!” Una ordered, and Lily felt something break her fall.
“Got her,” Pip replied in a squeaky voice. She’d fallen on top of him and nearly squished him. “You alright, Lady Witch?” he asked.
“My head,” Lily moaned.
She rolled off Pip and propped herself up on her hands and knees, still shaken by the depth of the rage she’d felt along with the Gift. Lily looked around blearily. She saw Tristan and Rowan bending down and pressing their fingertips to each of the fallen guards’ necks.
“They’re all alive,” Breakfast told Riley.
Mary let out a sigh. “Any of your people hurt?” she asked.
“No,” Breakfast replied. “Yours?”
“Two got hit with bullets, but not fatally,” she said, waving it off. “A few more got banged up in the fight.” Mary looked down at Lily. “Are you okay?” she asked.
Lily shook her head and used Pip as a prop to haul herself up to her feet. “Will there be more guards?” she asked, staggering where she stood.
“Yes,” Rowan answered, stepping forward to hold Lily up against his side. He turned to Riley. “We need to get on a train and get out of here. Fast.”
Riley looked at Lily uncertainly. “Are you sure—” he began, but Rowan cut him off.
“In about half an hour every guard in Providence is going to be looking for a witch and her mechanics,” he said with certainty. “We have to get out of the city now.”
“Show them the way to the southbound train,” Mary told Riley. She gave Lily a begrudging smile. “And good luck,” she said as she left them to go gather up her wounded people.
“She needs salt,” Rowan told Riley.
