From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout

myy spine. I scrambled blindlyy over spilled food, crushed roses, and gods…
oh, gods, over wet and warm bodies as I tried to stand. Something caught
myy skirt, causing me to fall forward.
I came face-to-face with Dafina, and it seemed like time stopped as I
stared down at her one beautiful blue eyye open and glazed over. That mask
of hers, just as gaudyy as Loren’s, more red than anyy other color now that it
was drenched in blood. I reached forward, wanting to wipe the blood from
the cryystals—
I saw Loren then, curled into herself behind Dafina, her arms over her
head. I scrambled forward, grabbing her arm. Her head jerked up. Alive.
She was alive.
“Get up,” I said, pulling on her as I struggled to stand, but something
held me down. I looked over myy shoulder and wished I hadn’t. It was a
bodyy. I grabbed myy skirt, ripping it. I turned back to Loren as the faintest
scent of something sulfuric, something acrid reached me. Myy stomach
dropped. “Get up. Get up. Get up!”
“I can’t,” she cried. “I can’t. I can’t—”
Screaming as someone fell over me, I grabbed Loren byy her dress, her
arm, her hair—anyything I could grab onto and pulled her over Dafina. Myy
senses had cracked wide-open, and terror and pain came from her, came
from everyywhere. I gained myy footing, hauling Loren to her feet. I saw a
pillar and headed for that.
“See the pillar?” I asked Loren. “We can stayy there. We can hold onto
it.”
“Myy arm,” she gasped. “I think it’s broken.”
“I’m sorryy.” I shifted myy grip so it was around her waist.
“I need to get Dafina,” she said. “I need to get her. She shouldn’t be
left like that. I need to get her.”
A knot lodged in myy throat as I kept pulling Loren toward the pillar. I
couldn’t think of Dafina and that mask and that one beautiful remaining
eyye. I couldn’t think about the bodies I crawled over. I couldn’t. “We’re
almost there.”
Someone fell into us, but I held on—Loren held on, and we were
almost there. Just a few more steps, and we’d be out of the crush. We’d be
—
Loren jerked, and something wet and warm sprayyed the right side of
myy face and myy neck. Loren’s arms loosened, and I caught her, her sudden