Hope and I sprint together, colliding in the cold shadow of the building, wrapping our arms around one another as tight as we can. Rasputin knows I’m dangerous now, that I have the power to kill, and yet he’s still headed this way. Either he has a strategy to subdue me until the Ascension can take place … or he has no strategy at all—and I’m not sure which is scarier. That hairline fracture between me and the Corrupter is spreading wider by the moment, and I’m not sure how much longer I have.

Taking a breath, I reach for the magic I felt on Tuesday night—when Jude, Gunnar, and I floated together. I’ve practiced this trick since then, but our conditions are worsening fast. Hope and I rise slowly, bubbles pushing up through heavy fathoms of water, lifting past the barricaded entry points of the crime scene’s first floor. One story up, most of the glass is still missing from the windows Rasputin’s crew used to crash the party, and my head aches with the effort to propel us closer.

We reach one of the openings, sweat matting the hair at my temples again, and we’ve just passed through when something inside of me lurches. The hairline fracture widens abruptly, and we plunge through five feet of thin air before I can catch us again, our bodies twirling madly in the fragmented moonlight. Hope’s arms dig into my ribs, her breathing frantic in my ear, and panic overwhelms me, gravity forcing our erratic descent.

Eight feet up from the concrete floor, I lose hold of this power entirely, and we crash down hard, sprawling. My ankle twists, a firestorm of pain shooting through me before it goes numb. Gasping, eyes bulging, I can already tell it’s broken, a dull throb setting in.

“A-Auggie?” Hope is white as a sheet in the shifting darkness that surrounds us, struggling up onto all fours. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fi-ine,” I wheeze through my teeth. It’s a lie, but it’ll be the truth soon enough. Even before the numbness has a chance to wear off, the heat and pressure begin to recede, vampire blood pulling me back together. “Don’t worry about me … just hide!”

My undead radar is starting to shrink, the picnic grounds out of reach, the signals from Jude and Gunnar too hazy for me to interpret. But Rasputin and his backup will be arriving any second.

Hope hesitates, but she must still hear my thoughts, because we both look up at once. Jumping to her feet, she races for the devouring shadows at the edge of the room, and not a second after she’s vanished from sight, two figures soar in through the shattered windows on opposite sides of the building.