City of Spells (Into the Crooked Place #2) - Alexandra Christo Page 0,105

me, Tavia thought again. It’s Zekia who kills me. It’s Zekia. It’s Zekia.

The mirror doll hitched in the back of her trousers called to her, begging for blood.

Tavia cursed at her knife, sinking slowly to the bottom of the waters where Ashwood had thrown it.

Still, she had one last dagger left.

She pulled it from her sleeve and flung it at Ashwood, but the knife caught midair and with a flick of the Kingpin’s wrist it sailed back toward her.

Tavia ducked in barely enough time.

She couldn’t kill Ashwood. She could only delay him.

And if that was all she could do, then she’d do it well.

She reached for her belt loop and pulled out the first marble she felt.

Cutting charm.

She threw it toward Ashwood and it split into a thousand pieces in the air, glistening daggers of glass heading straight for his cloaked face.

Ashwood waved a hand. Bored, almost lazy.

The shards fell to dust before her eyes.

“So much potential,” he said. “All of it wasted.”

Ashwood crossed the gap between them in a blink and grabbed Tavia by the shoulders.

His nails dug into her like knives of his own.

“At the very least, your mother died without a fuss,” he said. Tavia spat on the ground by his feet.

“After I kill you, nothing will stop my boy from coming back to me.”

Tavia looked at Wesley’s bone gun on the bridge floor and steeled herself.

Ashwood was close enough to whisper in her ear, cold breath making the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end.

“Wesley and I will create a new world together.”

Tavia flung her head forward.

The tip of her skull cracked against a part of Ashwood’s face that wasn’t made from shadow and magic.

He growled and stumbled backward and Tavia propelled herself forward, moving past him and skidding across the rough concrete of the bridge.

It burned against her skin, so much so that she felt like she’d grazed herself to the bone.

She grabbed Wesley’s gun, felt the familiar weight of it in her hands. The comfort it had brought for those weeks when she didn’t know if he was dead or alive.

She aimed. Dante Ashwood’s blood-red lips tilted upward.

“I like the old world just fine,” Tavia said.

And then she pulled the trigger.

36

Wesley

THE BULLET WENT THROUGH Ashwood’s neck and hit the bridge column behind him with a loud clang.

Wesley winced and stood, rubbing his head as Ashwood gurgled and clutched at his neck, letting out a strangled kind of cry.

Wesley ran for Tavia.

It wasn’t enough. That couldn’t kill him.

Wesley needed to get to her before Ashwood did.

Ashwood swiped his hand through the air again.

Wesley flew backward. Tavia flew backward.

They tumbled through the air together with frightening speed and Wesley caught a glimpse of Tavia crashing against the barrier before his head hit the beam and he catapulted over the side railing.

Wesley had just enough time to gather his magic and stop himself from falling into the watery depths.

He floated below the bridge, his magic jutting in and out as the pain in his head started to throb. He felt dizzy with it, the realms blurring and then struggling to refocus again.

He’d hit the beam hard enough that he could feel blood on him, but he couldn’t tell which part of his face it was coming from. Everywhere hurt, like thousands of tiny needles puncturing his cheeks and the cracks in his lips.

Wesley reached up a shaking hand and grabbed the railing.

The moment his fingers curled around it, his magic let out a sigh of relief as though it thought that meant it could rest for a moment.

Wesley sucked in a breath as he dangled from the bridge, one hand gripping the railing and the other floundering in the air.

He wasn’t sure he had the strength to pull himself up.

“Give me your hand,” Tavia said, appearing in front of him.

She flung her arm over the railing.

The sight of her was like a miracle in itself.

Wesley called on every ounce of strength he had to reach up for her. He called on his magic to quell the spinning in his head and halt the blood he could feel trickling down his neck.

Come on, he said. We can do this.

He stretched up.

“Just a little closer,” Tavia urged.

There was a tingling in Wesley’s hands, like a newfound power surging straight to his fingertips as hers dangled so close to his, and with a mighty yell Wesley lurched up and grabbed on to Tavia.

She clasped both hands around his arm and pulled him desperately until he was back