I halted as well, making the line behind me bunch up. “Will?” the Indian boy said, trying to peer past me. “I wiped the—”

“Dhruv!” the Chinese kid whispered. “That’s him!”

The Indian boy froze. “So,” I said to the Chinese kid. “I guess this answers the question of who you’re working for, huh?”

The life-drinker had been about to push me forward, but now he stopped and gave the Chinese kid a suspicious look. “You talked to him?”

The Chinese kid looked back and forth between me and the life-drinker. “No, uh—”

“Hey,” gold-hair girl called from the back. “What’s going—”

For just a second the group of them were distracted, and as the girl started to say on I whipped my heel up and back, kicking the life-drinker hard and accurately in the crotch. In the same instant I lunged forward off the other leg, sprinting for the two boys ahead of me. Dhruv and the Chinese kid flinched away and I ran between them, slamming through the doors and onto the casino floor.

Shouts came from the corridor behind, but I had a couple of seconds’ lead and in combat that’s a long time. I had absolutely no intention of fighting if I could avoid it—Will and his friends wanted this fight, and as far as I was concerned that was a good reason to get out of here. I curved around the bar and was just starting to turn towards the stairs when I heard a flurry of footsteps behind me and someone hit me at waist level. We both went tumbling to the carpet, and as I tried to pull myself up I heard a snarl and felt Will hurling himself on top of me with inhuman speed.

I twisted onto my side and got my leg back just in time. I had one glimpse of Will falling towards me, his eyes filled with insane fury, then I kicked up off the floor, my foot catching him in the stomach hard enough to send him flying. He did a funny sort of flip in midair and came down on hands and toes. Gold-hair girl was coming in after him and she was about to throw a fire spell, but before either could line up on me I pulled a crystal from my pocket and crushed it.

Mist surged from between my fingers, a dull grey cloud blanketing the area in an instant. I couldn’t see but I heard running steps and I rolled left just in time for Will to miss me, charging blindly through the space in which I’d been. I came to my feet and listened.