She'd forgotten that the Duskoff Building would probably have some serious protective wards around it. She remembered what Jack had told her once. The barriers were meant to allow non-magickals through, but not just any old witch. No magick other than what the wardweaver had decided was safe could pass.

That meant she was definitely locked out. She was not safe to them.

Mira slid along the barrier, finding what felt like a seam in the magick. She followed. Maybe she could find an imperfection of some kind, a mistake or a back door. That's what the wardbreakers had found at Jack's apartment, according to Thomas. Completely perfect wardings were a fluke. Some wardings were better than others, but no witch could get a barrier up that was completely solid.

This warding seemed perfect.

She explored for what felt like hours and found nothing. Mira searched until she felt despair rise up from the center of her. There seemed to be no imperfections anywhere in the sleek magickal barricade or along its perfect seam.

Just as she was about to admit defeat, she found a tiny crack at the base of the southern wall. She went right over it at first because it was so small. Mira came back to it and worried at it with her own magick, trying to make it rip, but it held fast. She was incorporeal after all; she couldn't hope to have that much effect.

Taking a different tact, she pushed and squeezed until she forced her awareness through the miniscule tear and into the building. She felt her consciousness ooze through like a viscous liquid.

Now to find her godmother.

The moment she put her focus on Annie, Mira experienced a zoom stop straight to her, as though merely thinking of her had some kind of magnetic attraction. Her godmother was being kept in a storage room somewhere in Duskoff International.

Annie lay on her stomach on a cot. Black and red, blistering burns marked her back where her very clothing had ignited and burned away. Shivers wracked her body, either from the cold or from her injuries.

The amount of damage that had been done to Annie stunned Mira into nonreaction ... a moment before perfect rage filled her. Mira could feel her physical body shaking from it back in Thomas's bedroom.

Mira attempted something she'd never tried before. She pulled a thread of magick and created a warm breeze in this remote location. It caressed Annie until she no longer shivered.

Annie pushed up, wincing at the pain the movement caused her. "Mira?" she whispered.

Mira could feel tears running down her physical cheeks, but she had no way to answer her. Instead she created another steady breeze in the room, warming the air for her. It was all she could do.