Page 52 of Us in Ruins
“Like I taught you?” Van asked. Something a lot like pride welled in his gaze.
“Not exactly.” Margot faltered. “Remember rule number two?”
“Yeah...” Van’s eyes darted over her shoulder. Presumably toward where a very angry Enzo was running toward them at full speed. “Margot. What did you do?”
They shot off in tandem, zigzagging through the displays. Margot was running out of juice, but Van’s hand wrapped around hers, tugging her forward. Enzo wasn’t far behind.
“Duck,” Van said. Like it was voice-controlled, Margot’s body responded.
Enzo’s blade zipped overhead, and the momentum of his swing crushed a display case. Glass shattered underfoot. Margot tried not to think about how close he’d gotten and pushed forward.
Van wove through the market until Margot was thoroughly lost. But then she saw it.
Probably the most beautiful thing Margot had ever seen: stairs. Stairs that hopefully led to an emergency exit or even a window. Any semblance of an escape route would do.
Margot took the stairs two at a time to keep up with Van, seriously wishing she hadn’t abandoned her borrowed shield. At some point, Enzo had traded his short-range sword for a spear with a sharpened tip. He prodded upward, and Margot lurched left and right to avoid its jabs.
“Give it back!” Enzo yelled and hurled his spear javelin-style.
The tip of his weapon wedged into the wall, separating them. Enzo wrapped two hands around the spear’s wooden shaft, but Margot had no intention of waiting around for him to wrestle it free.
“Run faster,” she urged.
Van grouched, “You run faster.”
At the top of the stairs, a hallway spread out in a T. A set of painted-white double doors flanked either end. Apartments, maybe? Offices? Frankly, Margot didn’t care as long as they led her somewhere she wouldn’t get unceremoniously skewered.
The hall before them was, like the rest of the gallery, crowded with globes and glass-paned displays stuffed with scrolls and parchment, and broken pieces of stone friezes. Off one of the nearby tables, Van grabbed a golden apple from a potpourri cornucopia and lugged one of the doors open.
With one arm, he nudged Margot into the room, placing her protectively behind him. Around the door, he launched the apple down the hallway.
Margot heard the crash but didn’t see it. Just like she heard Enzo’s pounding footfalls chase after the noise.
Van closed the door and wrapped his arms around her, reeling her in so that her face was pressed flat against his chest, his thundering heart underneath. They stood motionless and silent on the other side of the gallery door.
Margot wriggled out of his grip, blaming the way her own heart stammered on the chase scene and not his proximity. Her eyes adjusted to the light in the room.
This part of the gallery was spacious and airy; arched windows ran the length of the walls. Instead of cluttered stalls, here there was a polished granite floor webbed with silver and onyx, the foundation for statues of great ancient leaders and the women who made them that way. Dozens of sculptures, all still and stone.
For now. But knowing their track record, probably not for long.
“Van...” Margot said, refusing to peel her gaze off the emperors, imposing in white marble, towering over their heads. Their plaques named them: Trajan, Nero, Augustus. Was it her imagination, or did Hadrian just blink?
Next to her, Van pressed his ear to the seam in the door. Margot could barely hear anything over her jack-hammering pulse. Her chest burned, lungs weary from all the running and the subsequent panicking. Van had barely broken a sweat.
“He’s upstairs still,” Van whispered.
Nero’s head swiveled on his neck. Oh, god. Margot was going to be sick. There was no other outlet. Just the door against her back, a hallway with an aggravated treasure hunter, and a gallery of soon-to-be murderous emperors.
“Hurry,” she urged. “We’ve got company.”
Van made a noise at the back of his throat. Something between disbelief and annoyance.
Margot pinched Van’s chin between her thumb and forefinger, turning his head so he had no choice but to reckon with the fact that every statue in this corner of the gallery had gained consciousness. Because apparently that was a totally normal thing that just kept happening.
“Oh no,” was all he said.
Nero, holding a marble fiddle, shifted toward them. Every step was an earthquake. If Enzo didn’t know where they were before, he knew now. Nero swung his bowstring like a stone blade, entirely too closely for comfort.