Zekia was supposed to be taking care of Saxony and Karam, and the Kingpin was staring straight at Wesley, so why would he need to watch his back?

Rookie mistake, Tavia thought.

She slid her knife slowly out of her pocket and inched forward.

She could do this.

Dante Ashwood was not going to kill her. Karam had seen the future and Tavia knew how she died. It wasn’t by his hand.

Before she could talk herself out of it, Tavia ran forward, faster than she had ever run. She saw the moment Ashwood caught her out of the corner of his eye, but by then it was too late. She was close enough. She twisted behind him, lifted her arm high in the air, and brought the knife down into his back.

Ashwood grunted and turned slowly to face her.

He reached up, lips thin, and pulled the knife from his back.

And then threw it over the bridge.

No, Tavia thought, watching it tumble. No, no, no.

Ashwood’s smile stretched across his face and he moved his finger from side to side, admonishingly.

It wasn’t a mistake.

Ashwood hadn’t left a gap in his shield because he’d slipped up; he’d done it because he didn’t care who tried to hurt him. He wasn’t afraid of them.

Wesley’s magic still pressed against his shield.

“Tavia!” Wesley yelled. “Run!”

She stumbled backward.

Her mother’s face flashed in her mind.

Don’t be scared. It’ll all be okay.

Tavia couldn’t remember if those were the last words she had spoken before she died—before Ashwood’s dirty magic had driven her to death—but they were one of the few she could remember and they still haunted her.

Ashwood tapped his cane on the bridge and the sound reverberated into the wind.

Wesley made to move for Tavia, but Ashwood was quicker than him and he flung his hand out, knocking Wesley backward, far enough that Tavia lost sight of him.

His bone gun landed on the bridge where he had been just moments before.

The smoke poured from Dante Ashwood like it was water, pooling around his feet and winding in and out of his mouth, through his eyes, between his long fingertips.

“Coralina’s little girl, ready to take me on once more,” he said.

He raised his hand and Tavia lurched backward.

Through the air, through the wind.

It felt like she was being pulled from the inside out, her every organ tugged backward, her skin threatening to tear from her bones if she didn’t follow.

Tavia hit the side of the bridge, hard.

She fell against the metal column with a clang and then slumped onto the ground. She knew she needed to get up, but when she tried to lean on her palm to push herself off the ground, her arm collapsed beneath her.

It hurt like the fire-gates.