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My feet thud against the wood floor, scorching footprints into the lacquer. But my books rustle and flinch, and the sounds echoing through the arching stacks confuse my hunt.

Then, a creak of floorboards sounds in the distance and stills my hand. I smile, my face stretching unnaturally with it.

Found you.

I burst from the stack near my iron stairs. Flames roar around me like a twisting tornado as I scream. Fire explodes to collide into a shield that is thrown up to envelop my target.

I breathe through bared teeth, my chest heaving, as I turn my arm in an arc. Flames lick the high ceiling before slamming down. The shield shatters, and a shiver of satisfaction shakes me.

I move fast, my flames blinding me with the flashes of light and darkness. Spots fill my vision, but I do not stop my assault. The intruder’s back slams against the iron stairs’ railing, and he dives out of the way. The iron extinguishes the magical flames instantly upon impact, and I roar my frustration, gathering more fire until it builds behind me in a lethal wave.

The intruder is speaking, but I cannot hear him over the thunder of my pumping blood, over the echoing whispers and shrieks of the grimoires. A stack tumbles over, the crash rattling my teeth. Books erupt from it, some slithering and stalking away, others attacking the weakened, damaged ones.

A surge of power nearly steals my attention as one grimoire convulses, leather binding splitting as it shifts into a monstrous, papery beast. It distracts the intruder, and he bolts towards the grimoire to strike it back into submission.

And in that instant, he gives me an opening.

Fire crackles, snapping at his heels but missing him by a hair’s width when he dodges at the last moment. I pull back my flames sharply to leave claw marks gouged along the peeling wax coating of the floor.

He’s tiring, and I am only getting started. My smile is wide, my eyes icy cold. I laugh, the sound bouncing off the walls. My right hand bubbles red while my left turns gray as balls of flames swirl around me, growing larger and larger.

Something yanks my right foot. The world tips and my back slams into the unforgiving ground. I wheeze painfully, my firestorm dousing as I fight the tight discomfort in my chest. I clutch my sternum, and suddenly, bindings tighten around me. I suck in an agonizing breath and roar, flames crackling from my lips.

Then something slaps against my mouth, and the sound muffles. My arm tingles like it’s going to sleep where the bindings hold me. My teeth grit, my eyes shutting as I strain to break the bindings. I must not let the intruder get away.

Sound. Muted from a great distance away. A single word, yelled over and over, until it slices through my mind like a sharpened blade through paper.

“TOR!”

My eyes snap open.

Glittering gold threads ripple around the bindings that pin my arms and legs together. They illuminate a familiar face inches above mine.

My breath shivers as my eyes burn with a wave of tears that flood them. I squeak out, “Lucas,” and it is dampened by the large hand pressed against my lips.

Lucas exhales hard and removes his hand. “Have you calmed down? Can I let you go or are you going to try to set me on fire again?”

A sob steals my words and his tight expression softens. His threads loosen around me. I shake off the last few and ignore the pain that lances through me.

My heart explodes and I launch off the ground. I collide with his warm body, the force of my tears shaking me as I claw at him. He’s real. He’s actually real. Thank all the nonexistent arachnid gods.

Lucas is alive.

His arms wrap around me and he rolls us so I’m straddling his lap. I’m blubbering nonsense into his hot neck, his sodden flat cap flopping to the ground as my nails rake through his wet hair. The magical storm from the weavers’ in-fighting outside rages so loudly, it penetrates my shields to rattle my shop’s foundation with the force. But I don’t care about Vincentius and my father’s civil war or the resulting clashing, volatile magic. Lucas is here. His arms are around me and he’s crushing my body to his.

Three words I haven’t said to him nearly rip through my throat, but my lips are trembling too hard to form the proper syllables. I never want to feel this fear again. It’s different from anything else I’ve ever encountered. It’s a panic, pure and absolute, like my heart has been ripped free.

I shake off the sensation and breathe his scent deep into my lungs. Clean, with a masculine spice, mixed with smoky undertones of the city’s many chimneys on this unseasonably cold, wet summer night. It lifts the weight from my chest like a drug, and my nerves begin to steady.

Lucas. My Lucas.

I claw my hold under his damp jacket and groan at the scorching heat of him. My nose presses into the base of his neck on his right side where his black flame tattoo licks up his arm and shoulder.

Lucas presses his lips along my bare skin where my ruined white silk robe has slipped down, and I shiver. He slides his hand up my spine to cradle my skull.

“I’m here. It’s okay.” I melt into his comfort, his warmth finally seeping through our layers to penetrate my icy bones. “I won’t let the corruption take you.”

I blink. His words are slow to penetrate my foggy mind.