Page 159 of The Girl Who Inherits the Dead

“Not without the keys,” Gurlien responds, and Ambra immediately stops with the outward aggression. “All of them or none.”

There are two more cells between them and the rune box. One of them will die instantly, the other is another catatonic person with bones jutting from his face and the nameplate that just reads ‘coward.’

And Ambra watches them from behind the glass, until the angle of her cell no longer lets her.

Maison is stiff, his jaw tight, his shoulders aching, and Delina’s known him long enough to know he’s doing some mental calculations, some sort of decision making.

“We have to,” Delina says.

“I know,” Maison mutters, and he leans against the wall next to the box. “I’m trying to gauge how much I’ll be able to fight her.”

“Hopefully none,” Gurlien says, popping open the paneling to the rune box. “Still have a dead bug you can take? Get it ready, so you don’t have to panic in the moment to reach one.”

Delina does, and pulls out the thin golden string, even though the pull in her gut tells her that the people will be infinitely more powerful, infinitely more useful.

She lets the string slink between her hands, weighing it.

“I think I speak for us all that when we do this, everything’s going to be very, very chaotic,” Chloe says, slinging her backpack down and handing Maison another chocolate bar. “I’ll prep the wall for the staircase.”

“Half these people will take hours to fully wake,” Gurlien argues, which is a little better. “We make sure the wight is gone, we keep going.”

“And there are two failed Terese Projects and one actual, we have no idea how this will go,” Maison says grimly.

“Can you make a splint?” Delina asks, at the continued weakness in Maison’s knee.

“She should save her power,” Gurlien responds, and Maison nods. “We’re going to need it for at least two more traps and there’s no good material.”

“Delina, here,” Chloe instructs, gesturing her over to the box. “You disrupt this,” Chloe gestures, precise, “and break this, then it’ll fall.”

Maison straightens, and his knee pangs him, but his face settles into something detached, before twin strips of magic appear in his hands.

Gurlien tugs Chloe’s backpack off of her, his face grim, and pulls out the gun.

The gun from back in the cabin, the one stored in the living room table drawer, the one he pointed at her the very first night.

“That won’t do anything against the demon,” Maison warns, as Gurlien checks the chamber and magazine.

“Obviously,” Gurlien snips back. “I’m worried about what else is coming down the hallway.”

Chloe’s face is tight, but there’s something approaching determination across her features.

“Want me to tie this around you?” Delina asks Maison, and he hesitates.

“Save it for two floors down,” Gurlien replies, grim. “We’ll need more power there.”

“Power down there won’t mean anything if we’re dead up here,” Delina shoots back.

“This is going to ruin them, I think,” Chloe says, thoughtful, and they all glance back at her. “All these people, once they wake up, the ones that survive…they’re not going to be able to recover from this.”

“Good,” Delina says, and the two of them share a brief, insane smile. “We ready?”

“Not terribly,” Maison grumbles, still leaning against the wall, but he nods anyway.

“If the wight doesn’t have a way out, we’re gonna be screwed,” Chloe warns, but she’s already tracing the motions across the runes, fingertips swiping in the dust, where Delina can follow. “Just so everyone knows, this’ll be loud.”

And so Delina steps up to the box, and with the horror still in her heart, breaks the runes.

The moment her fingertips lift from the last one, death punches into her.

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