She kept hitting me, her blows even, steady, and achingly hard as she got into the rhythm of the fight. And all I could do was lie there and take it. I couldn’t reach the knives strapped to my thighs with her on top of me, and she’d already shown me how useless an Ice knife was. Even the pepper spray hadn’t bothered her all that much. I was out of weapons. Right now, it was all I could do to concentrate on my Stone magic to keep her from pummeling me into a bloody smear. Soon that would be gone too.

Finally, though, Clementine grew tired of using me as her own personal punching bag.

“Fine,” she growled. “Your skin might be as hard as a rock, but let’s see how you do without any air, bitch.”

Still kneeling on me, she wrapped one hand around my neck and used the other to cover my nose and mouth. She might not be able to punch her way through my skin, but Clementine had a death grip on my throat and was slowly pushing her fingers into my windpipe with all her might. I clawed and clawed at her, drawing her blood with my short nails, but she was in the position of power here, not to mention how much stronger she was than me. I didn’t have a chance, and we both knew it.

It was inevitable. All the fights I’d been through tonight, all the nicks and cuts and lumps and bumps I’d gotten. None of them debilitating or life-threatening, but they’d all chipped away at my strength, at my magic, until I had nothing left in the tank. And now the giant was cutting off my air supply. I’d be dead in another minute, two tops, unless I could figure out some way to get her off me long enough for me to regroup and grab one of my knives. Even then, I didn’t know if I’d have strength enough to kill her with one of the blades—

Strength.

The word rattled around in my mind, bouncing from one side of my skull to the other, and I remembered what Clementine had said to Owen earlier tonight in the vault.

This isn’t about strength, Mr. Grayson, it’s about finesse.

And I realized that’s what this fight really came down to—my strength versus Clementine’s. Physically, I wasn’t a match for the giant, especially not now, since she was using the weight of her body to pin me down. But maybe I didn’t need brute strength, raw force, sheer power, to beat her. Maybe all I needed was a little of that finesse she’d talked about earlier.

Or maybe the lack of air was already making me hallucinate, because I just couldn’t think of a way to stop her.