“Upstairs,” Myrnin said. “Lead him upstairs. Claire, go. He needs to destroy you, not us. Go now.”

After a breathless look at Shane, Claire turned and ran. She scrambled up the steps, only half balanced now, and made it to the top with a surge of relief. The hallway was so familiar, this was home, she loved it here, and there was Eve’s room with the door open on its crazy, dark chaos; Shane’s door was closed. Her own was open, her bed unmade. It hadn’t been long; the place still smelled of cinnamon and Eve’s perfumes, of chili, of the normal life that had been taken away from them.

We’ll get it back. We have to get it back.

Shane and Michael and Eve were down there, fighting for their lives. For their home. Please, God, please let them be okay. She could hear the sound of the shotguns going off, but then … then suddenly they went silent.

She felt for the hidden controls in the paneling. For a heart-stopping moment she couldn’t find them, and then it seemed that they wouldn’t work; she glanced back down the hall and there he was, Magnus, standing motionless next to Michael’s closed door.

Watching with those terrible, monstrous eyes.

“What did you do?” she asked, and panic smothered her—not for herself but for them. For Shane. For her friends.

“They’re unimportant,” he said. “You have a power the others do not. You must not survive to lead them to me again.”

His whole body rippled in a sickening, wrong way, and she knew that she had seconds to live. No. Not again.

She slapped frantically at the controls to the hidden door, and it popped open in the paneling. She charged in and slammed it shut. It was inky in the shadows down here, but at the top of the steps she saw the warm, colorful glow of the Tiffany lamps. Safe up there. It had always felt like another world. If there was anyplace Magnus couldn’t reach her, it would be here.

Deep down, Claire knew it wouldn’t be enough. But there was a portal up here, and maybe, just maybe, she could get through, get out that way …

She reached the top of the stairs and saw … Amelie. But not the Amelie she knew. This was only the shell of her, glossy and hard, and underneath was the same rot and writhing awful foulness that was inside Magnus.

Amelie was a draug, a master draug.

The creature—like Amelie, but not her—was holding Oliver by both wrists. He was on his knees in front of her, face upturned and marble white, and Claire could see the horror in his eyes.

The loss.

There was a silver knife on the carpet next to Amelie, and Claire, not even thinking now, threw herself at it, grabbed it, and plunged it to the hilt into Amelie’s back.

The shrieking knocked her backward into the wall, then into a shuddering, fetal ball with her hands over her ears.