Page 102 of The Girl Who Inherits the Dead

It takes her breath away with a punch, before he recoils back, his eyes flashing red.

Delina freezes.

And all the hair on the back of Delina’s neck raises. Something’s off, something’s wrong, and the very magic in the air constricts around her.

Chloe grabs Gurlien’s arm, turns him back to the two of them.

“What’s going on?” Chloe whispers, and her eyes are wide. “Something’s going on, what is it?”

Gurlien looks between the three of them, fast. “Frederick, what is it?”

“I don’t know,” Maison says, deliberate, every syllable distinct. “Something is…off.”

Delina forces herself to take a breath, the sudden tension like dousing herself in water.

The one other patron at the bar tosses a twenty to the bartender, then leaves, as if something’s chasing him.

Leaving just the four of them and the bartender in the room.

The bartender watches them, and Delina can see the whites of his eyes. “Everything okay over there?”

He’s sweating, too, and Delina can sense the single drop of sweat dripping between his shoulder blades.

She can sense that, she can sense the ache still on Chloe’s neck, the sharp pain in Gurlien’s wrist—worse than usual—and the sudden tension along Maison’s jaw.

All without thinking.

Maison swings his glance down to her, and his eyes reflect back. “Delina?”

“I…” she trails off, her mouth suddenly dry, her skin cold where it was perfectly warm only a few seconds ago. “Everything is…”

There are two people outside the bar, between her and the skeleton of a mouse, and even though she couldn’t see it, even though she couldn’t touch it, it’s like she could grab it with her mind.

The two people are…

One, the smaller of the two, seethes with an angry, chaotic sort of energy, half sour and half bitter. Their skin hurts, their lungs hurt, their bones hurt, their thoughts hurt. Everything about them is pain, brutal and violent against Delina’s awareness, and they’re furious about it.

The other…her scan slips off of, slithering away from him, as if the very essence of herself cringes away.

She grabs Maison’s arm, unsteady, the tipsiness from before now horridly sitting in her gut.

“Someone’s coming, they’re outside, someone—”

The door to the bar slams open, skittering off its hinges, and the power slams off.

“Shit,” Maison’s arms tighten around Delina, swinging her back, the drinks on the table wobbling.

The bartender yelps in surprise, and there’s nothing, no movement, the very air choking down Delina’s throat. Not a stir of wind through the bar, nothing.

Until the bartender flicks on the flashlight on his phone, shining it towards the door.

The woman—she’s the smaller one, she’s in so much pain—squints against the light, throwing up an arm to shelter her eyes, recoiling back, until she thumps into the person behind her.She’s petite, smaller than even Chloe, and one side of her auburn hair has been shaved to the skin, the other shorn harshly at her chin.

There’s something around her throat, and it takes Delina half a breath to realize it’s not something physical.

Behind her is Korhonen, and even before the flashlight beam hits him, the oil-slick drenched in cold sensation washes over Delina.

Immediately, Maison kicks over the table, sending the glasses shattering to the floor, and Chloe yanks Gurlien over, out of the way. Delina ducks behind the table, her heart pounding.

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