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Tired but unfazed, I reached the top of the stairs and crawled in through one of the open doors. I hopped down, grateful to find a solid floor, and made my way through the narrow open lobby space deeper into the building.
The stink was so strong, I had to breathe through my mouth. The air tasted like rotting fish and felt as muggy as if I was wading through a sewer. A thick layer of goo on the windows blocked out all but a few shreds of sunlight. Only a little farther.
I pushed my way into the main hall.
There, at the center of the tentacles, stood a gigantic, man-shaped blob. Lights flickered in the center of its head like fireflies on a warm summer night—beautiful, if not for the fact that those little blips were the life the monster was draining from the townsfolk.
The sooner this was over, the more likely the victims would recover. All I had to do was slap my magical handcuffs on the monster, and the cuffs would nullify the monster’s magic, shrinking it down to a manageable size.
I lifted my shotgun and took a step forward.
The soup snapped its head in my direction.
I pulled the trigger.
Salt shot into what would have been the monster’s face, had soups actually had faces.
This was it. I’d won, all on my own, exactly like I knew I would. Take that, Madison in HR.
I shot the monster again. Take that Silas Huxley, for stealing my life.
Watching the chunks fly off and the holes melt the acrid tissue away, I finally felt like my old self. This was what my life was supposed to be like—me crushing monster faces, me showing the magical world exactly what I was capable of, me tasting sweet victory over my foes.
The holes began to fill back in. Wait a second. It wasn’t possible. Soups couldn’t regenerate. How was it doing this?
A wet mass landed on the top of my head.No, no, no.This wasn’t supposed to happen. I’m Lily Fernsby, tough, capablelibrarian. Ihadto win this mission.Losswas not in my vocabulary.
As acid and panic clutched my throat, everything went black.
CHAPTER 2
My breaths came quick and ragged.I was going to die.
I blinked and strained my eyes, but saw nothing. A tremble began in my fingers and carried up my arms until my whole body was shuddering. My muscle memory should have been strong enough to push me into motion. I couldn’t move. It felt like my chest was being crushed from within. Lights flickered and swirled in the darkness.
Move, body, please.
Breathe.
I was paralyzed, unable to stop the shaking, unable to stop the tears that poured down my cheeks. This was not an effect of the soup’s attack. Draining by a soup was slow, painless, and nearly unnoticeable.
Something else was wrong with me.
This was not how Lily Fernsby, tough-as-nails librarian, responded under pressure. This was the response of a new recruit…or someone in shock. I was having a panic attack.
If I didn’t pull myself together, the soup would drain my brain first, then my body, using every last bit of energy inside of me to fuel itself.
No one was here to help me.
I tried to ignore the fear flooding my system. I tried to focus on firing the gun in my hands. These were the tangible, real steps I could take to survive.
But I couldn’t feel my hands. The stink faded from my nostrils as my consciousness dimmed.
Where was I? What was happening?
Panic transformed slowly into dread as I lost myself in darkness.
Fuzzy at first, recognition slowly returned, but not to the present, to a memory I wished I could forget—a nightmare I had lived through, then repeated time and again while I slept.
