Tunnel of Bones (City of Ghosts #2)(47)

At last, Thomas stops fighting.

The tunnel stops shaking.

The Empire of the Dead goes quiet and still.

Thomas stares up at me, his eyes wide and brown and scared as I reach him. Jacob bows his head against the boy, his eyes squeezed shut as I bring the mirror up.

“Watch and listen,” I say gently.

His edges ripple in Jacob’s arms.

“See and know.”

He gazes into the mirror, tears staining his cheeks.

“This is what you are.”

Thomas thins from flesh and blood to gossamer and smoke, and I reach into the boy’s chest, fingers closing around the thread. I draw it out, the thin coil of a life that shouldn’t have been so short. It comes free, dissolving in my palm, and as it disappears, so does Thomas Alain Laurent.

There, and then gone.

Poltergeist, and then ghost, and then nothing.

Jacob’s arms fall to his sides, empty. He slumps back against the wall behind him, for once not even seeming to mind that it’s made of skulls.

“Jacob?” I whisper, worried by his silence.

He scrubs at his eyes and swallows. Then he pulls the borrowed cap from his head and tosses it aside. “Ick,” he says, peeling off the coat. “So gross.”

I lean against the wall beside him, and for a long second we just sit there, amid the bones, in the dark. My head is spinning, and my throat is coated with ash, and we both know it’s time to go, but something keeps us there.

“We did it,” says Jacob.

“We did,” I echo, leaning my head against his shoulder.

And then the Catacombs begin to whisper.

Jacob and I exchange a look.

Thomas may be gone, but this place is far from empty.

“Let’s get out of here,” I say, reaching for the Veil.

For an instant, it resists, but then Jacob’s hand joins mine, and together we pass through. A surge of cold hits my lungs, and the world is back, and suddenly bright. A second later, Jacob appears beside me, his usual see-through self, and I look around, worried we’ve wandered too far. But then I hear my parents’ voices, loud and blessedly close, and I round the corner the instant before they turn back and look.

“There you are,” calls Dad. “I thought we warned you not to wander.”

“Sorry,” I say, jogging to catch up. “I was trying to stay out of the shots.”

Mom slings an arm around my shoulder.

She looks back into the Catacombs.

“Here’s hoping that’s the end of that,” she says.

And I couldn’t agree more.

We climb in silence, and it’s only when we reach the street that Mom notices my clothes.

“Cassidy Blake,” she scolds. “How on earth did you get so dirty?”





Back at the Hotel Valeur, I take a really, really hot shower, trying to rinse the Catacombs from my skin. I towel off and slide on a pair of red-and-yellow pajamas, feeling like I’ve earned my Gryffindor colors tonight.

Mom and Dad are on the sofa, sharing a bottle of red wine as they watch the new footage. Annette gave them a copy of the digital file only, and said it would be best if she and Anton looked after the rest.

On the screen, my parents stand before a wall of bones, the lights casting long shadows across each of the patterned skulls.

“Looks good,” I say, padding past them.

“Well,” says Dad, “it wasn’t how we planned on spending our last night—”

“But the upside is,” adds Mom, “this take turned out even better.”

“I’m glad it all worked out,” I say, genuinely relieved.

“Want to watch?” asks Mom, patting the sofa beside her, where Grim twitches an ear.

I shake my head. “No thanks,” I say.

I’ve officially had enough of the Empire of the Dead.

In my room, I find Jacob sitting on the sill of the open window.

He glances over his shoulder.

“I wish I could take a shower,” he says, rubbing at a smudge of dirt on his arm. “I smell like grave dirt and old bones.”

I cross to the window beside him and sniff the air. “You don’t smell like anything to me.”

“Well, clearly my spectral senses are sharper than yours.” He runs a hand through his hair. “Speaking of smells, now that Thomas is gone, can we please get rid of all the sage and salt? It’s giving me a wicked headache.”

“Sure thing.” I search the hotel room and find the pouches I’ve hidden in Mom and Dad’s bags, on their windowsills, under the sofa, and in the planter by the door.

“What are you doing, Cass?” asks Mom as I put the box of protective charms out in the hall.

“Just packing,” I say, returning to my room.

“Better?” I ask.

Jacob sighs in relief. “Much,” he says, but he doesn’t climb down from the open window. Something’s clearly still bothering him, and I want to ask, but I don’t. I have to trust him, to believe that if he’s ready to tell me what he’s thinking, he will.

So instead I slump back on the bed, wincing as something digs into my side.

My cell phone.

I forgot to turn it back on, and when I do, my screen fills with messages, every one of them from Lara Chowdhury.