The smoke fills the room quickly, obscuring my view.
People start to scream, the crowd pushing wildly around me. Pushing me back, forcing me to turn from where I want to be. The noxious, sulphuric scent fills my nose, chokes up my lungs as I try to bellow at the men ahead. “Get those fucking doors open!”
Nobody is paying attention, everyone fighting.
In front of me, a girl – a V’Arezzo – goes down with a scream, someone climbing straight over her without pausing. Cursing, I reach down and wrap my hand around her arm, dragging her upright as she sobs. But she’s not the only one. The crowd clamors at the doors, people pressing in behind them and making it impossible for them to get out.
People are going to die unless we get those doors open. The smoke won’t kill anyone, although it might injure, but the crush is the real danger here.
Desperate, I glance behind me, but the thrones are completely hidden from view by the black smog. “Dante!”
No response. As if he could hear me over the shouts and screams as people claw to survive.
I fight, trying to get forward whilst pulling people back, but it’s a losing battle. Bodies press into me from all sides, and I tilt my head up, trying to take a breath. Getting a lungful of smoke for my trouble.
And all the while, people push behind me. Pushing forward.
Desperate, I start to push sideways instead. Across, instead of forward. It’s a fucking slog as people claw to get ahead, but my hands touch the wall, the bodies opening up to a small pocket of empty space as I drop down and take a deep breath where the air is clearer.
I edge my way down the room, my hands feeling along the walls as I go. Searching. Smoke still obscures my view of Caterina’s seat, but pockets are opening up, the smoke drifting away and leaving hazy wisps in their wake.
I close my eyes in brief relief as my hand meets something metallic. The fucking fire escape.
It resists, but I shove it hard, and it opens with a screech. Cold, fresh air floods in, and I take a breath, pushing open the other door and ducking back inside.
“That way!” I grab anyone I can, almost throwing them in the direction of the exit until the crowd starts to turn. To move towards fresh air.
A few crumpled bodies remain where they are, and I dart between them, checking each pulse. Everyone is still breathing.
“Luc!” A bellow, and I glance up, sagging at Nico’s relieved expression. He grips me tightly in a brief embrace, his hand clapping against my shoulder. “Fucking hell. What the fuck was that?”
“Here.” Hauling the unconscious Asante at my feet into my arms, I pass her to Nic. “Get everyone out. I need to find Cat, Nic.”
Because this wasn’t a fucking accident.
No, it was a distraction.
When I reach the thrones, Dante is already there.
Staring at Cat’s empty seat, his body frozen.
Grabbing his shoulders, I shake him. “Could she have gotten out?”
He looks grim. “No.”
I look behind the thrones. “There.”
We burst through the door into an old hallway. Dante is ahead of me as he sprints ahead, to the very end. Where a set of doors are ajar, banging slightly in the breeze.
His face is ashen as he picks something up from the floor. “Luc.”
The feather glints in his hand.
“We split up.” I push him through, out into the mud, trees and trails leading to fuck knows where branching off in every direction. “They could be anywhere.”
“She might already be—,”
“She’s not,” I snap. My hand drops, making sure my guns are still in place. “They’ll make a spectacle of it, whatever it is. We just need to get to her first. They won’t be far.”
