Chapter 11 · Buying Back the Past

"Nia, sweetheart. Come home."

The thing under the floor grabbed Nia by the ankle.

She went down hard, palms scraping tile. Tavi dropped Kellan and lunged. His fingers caught the back of Nia's jacket just as the black hand dragged her toward the crack in the archive floor.

It looked like a hand if you ignored the extra joints. The strips of paper skin peeling from its wrist. The way it spoke with Kellan's father's voice.

"That's not my father!" Kellan shouted.

His voice broke.

Nia kicked at the thing. Her boot hit bone. The hand tightened.

Red light flashed over the floor. Elias jerked against the sigil-lock, still pinned beside the widening crack. Blood ran from his nose and dripped onto the old archive tiles.

"Tavi!" Nia snapped. "Get it off me!"

"Working on it! I've got, like, three hands and none of them are magic!"

"You stole a magic key five minutes ago!"

"I stole a key that hates me! Different problem!"

The archive doors boomed behind them.

Once.

Twice.

On the third hit, a seam of white light split across the black metal.

Enforcement squad.

Tavi's stomach dropped.