Page 135 of Bones

I met Deke’s gaze. I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen him so distraught. He wasn’t scared for himself. He was terrified for me.

But I’d spent enough of my life being scared. I wanted to be brave.

Or at least fake it.

I gave him the most reassuring smile I could muster.

Then Jones stole our attention as he dramatically leaned to the side to see Lilith. “Good, you made it in before the door closed. That would’ve been inconvenient. It’s impossible to get you all in one place outside of the warded houses.”

“Well, you have us here now.” Juno held her arms out but inched back to touch the wall. “What’re you going to do about it?”

“Isn’t it obvious? Steal your souls.” Jones stepped back, and the others attacked.

Not with guns or knives. They must’ve known those would be useless.

But balls of gray fire. They weren’t big, but I knew that didn’t mean they wouldn’t hurt.

“Be careful!” Lilith leaned toward me to confirm my suspicion. “You weren’t there to see, but those are similar to what almost killed me.”

Then we dove apart before one took us both out.

While only a few people were launching those, the others were trying to corner us. Pin us down so we’d be easy targets.

“Fuck,” Juno said, narrowly avoiding a grabbing arm—one that Lilith swiftly broke—as she ran her hand along the wall. “I can feel their warding. It’s suppressing our magicks. But with these bastards trying to play flaming pickleball, I can’t focus long enough to fix it.”

Still dodging and weaving, we formed a protective half-circle around her without making it obvious. Deke lifted a man to throw him into another group, but it was too late.

One of the men caught on to what was happening. “Sir!”

“A distraction,” Juno’s voice pleaded in everyone’s head.

I assumed someone would kick or scream or knock something down.

Or go bowling for Absolve again like Deke had just done.

Instead, Denny began singing “Push It.”

Loudly.

And not particularly well.

I didn’t know all the words. Or really any outside of the chorus, but I joined in. As did Lilith.

Juno’s motions picked up, and I wasn’t sure if it was because the song helped her concentrate or because the Absolve assholes had slowed to try to figure out why we’d started an impromptu karaoke.

“Get them, you dumb fucks,” Jones screamed.

It kick-started the attack again, but they were too late.

“Got it.” Red flashed from Juno’s hand and seeped into the cement wall until the whole section turned red. It did nothing to slow the barrage of fireballs and violence, but it lifted the weight holding down the magicks.

We might’ve been outnumbered, but with our powers…

We were still outnumbered.

But there was at least hope, and I clung to it.

“We need to cut these numbers without risking blasting a ward,” Nate said, touching a man’s arm with Denny.

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