Page 164 of The Girl Who Inherits the Dead

“We’re almost done,” Delina whispers to him, and he squeezes her briefly, like he’s still not believing it. “We’re almost there.”

His face is blank, carefully so, his jaw working.

“We’ll get her out, we’ll get to safety, then we can plan.”

Ambra stalks up closer to Chloe, brushing by them, and Maison jerks Delina out of the way, swift, before he tugs her into a hug, burying his face into her hair.

She clings back to him, against his heart beating strongly, before he pulls himself back.

“I’m terrified,” he says, his voice low, simultaneously obviously tracking both the death magic in her hands and where Ambra whispers furiously at Gurlien and Chloe. “This could go so wrong, this could—”

Delina stands on her tip toes, and kisses him.

In terms of kisses go, it’s far from ideal. There’s dust coating her face, his leg is trembling from pain, but he opens his mouth to hers, brutal and brief, before pulling back.

Delina nods at him. “We got this.”

He nods, leaning against her, and she ducks her shoulder under his arm, supporting him. He’s warm against her, strong despite all the pain, and for a brief, crystalline moment, she wishes that this could stay like this, exactly like this, for forever.

47

Ambra remains true to her word, pulling open another illusioned door, and the pain Delina sensed back at the bar is slowly starting to creep in.

And the door opens to a disaster.

Immediately, Ambra scrambles back, hand flailing behind her, before the leash around her neck abruptly jerks.

She screams, high pitched, and stumbles forward.

“Shit,” Chloe breathes, and Gurlien tries to grab for the door, before the wall blasts open.

Delina rocks back, half protecting Maison, half ducking away from the shards of brick.

And in front of them, revealing a hall of prison doors, traditional prison bars, the wall folds open like nothing more than origami.

Delina grips the strip of death tight, pulling it taut, and she can’t see a thing in all the dust, can’t see a thing in all the smoke, and—

Behind the wall, blocking them from the prison door, is a group of people.

A group of people, all grim, all with weapons, all waiting for them.

With only a beat, Gurlien lifts the pistol and cracks out a shot, but the one in front bats it away like it’s nothing.

Maison inhales, deep.

“So, Frederick, this was impressive,” the one in front speaks, a man with close cut gray hair and a face that’s lined deeper than any that Delina’s ever seen. “Got your girlfriend to blast her way down her, free a bunch of criminals, impressive.”

Despite the pain, Maison swings Delina behind him, practiced.

The man’s hand is clenched around the leash, his knuckles white with the grip, and Ambra struggles against it, clawing at her throat.

There are way more of them than they can go against. Way more, and behind them…

…Sitting in the cell, staring straight ahead, her eyes blank, is the older woman from the pictures. Her hair is whiter, her face thinner, but her jawline echoes Maison’s and her brows are the same set as his when he’s trying not to think.

The man’s eyes fall on Delina, as if evaluating. “So the insane doctor bred a Necromancer, that’s typical,” he says, and his eyes fall to the ball of death in her hand. “You really don’t have any finesse, do you?”

“No,” Delina replies, honestly, and the group obviously didn’t expect that, their brows furrowing all at once.

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