Chapter 22 · The City Under the Lock

"Don't move, Mara. The next step takes your legs off."

Calder's hand clamped around her wrist before her boot could touch the black line.

Pain flashed up her arm. Not from his grip. From the seal.

The line across the stone floor had opened like a slit, glowing red beneath a skin of glass. Runes crawled along it in tight little circles. Every one ended in a hooked point aimed at her chest.

Mara stared down at the killing grid. "You could've mentioned that before you shoved me through the door."

"You were running."

"You were chasing me."

"Same problem. Different shoes."

His fingers tightened. Warm skin. Hard knuckles. A pulse beating against hers like he had no right to be that calm.

Behind them, the vault door groaned. The city seal had locked them inside the old maintenance chamber beneath Veyra's eastern wall. Ahead, the grid filled the passage from floor to ceiling. No way around it. No room to turn back.

And three red marks had already burned into Calder's palm.

Mara looked at them. "You touched the border."

"I noticed."

"You have about thirty seconds before it finishes reading you."

"Then stop staring and fix it.