Paper and Fire (The Great Library) by Rachel Caine

her jaw, the line of her shoulders. She was angry. “Get to the gates,” she said. “Get Santi here and
not
Feng. Watch your back. Go, Jess.”
    He didn’t like leaving her here, all but alone to protect Wolfe, but, then again, there was no one he’d trust more with that job. And, he thought with a bitter spike of awareness, no one
she
would trust more to risk this. He’d grown up running books for his father through the mazelike, dangerous streets of London. She knew that.
    “Here.” Jess pitched her his weapon. “I won’t need it, and it’ll just slow me down.”
    Glain caught it one-handed and promptly handed it to Wolfe. When he tried to protest, she fixed him with a straight glare and said, “Take it. We’re beyond all that now, I think.” In Wolfe’s hands, it looked entirely out of place, but Jess well knew the Scholar was no stranger to fighting or killing, if it came to it.
    He cast one look down at Helva, who managed a smile. She was holding her own weapon now—a smaller sidearm—and said, “Run fast.”
    “Always,” he said, and—mindful of the cobra lurking in the dark corner—moved to the closed back door. He opened it and checked. It seemed clear. The alleyway was bright after the dimness of the shop, and he took a breath to let his eyes adjust, then stepped out and turned to scan the roofs. No one in view, which meant he
might
have a chance.
    Running for his life was a feeling that settled on him like old, familiar clothes. He wasn’t frightened by it: he’d played keep-away with thelocal London Garda all his childhood, and running in that vast labyrinth of a city was much harder than in these straight lines and clean angles. It meant, though, that there was less cover, less chance to lose pursuers in blind corners and narrow passages. He’d have to make up for that with sheer speed.
    Jess took in three deep, stomach-straining breaths, oriented himself by the sun and memories of how far they’d come from the entrance, and
ran.
At the next alley, he cut around to the main road—it was, as the centurion at the gate had warned, the only way out. No point in wasting time.
    The first block was easy; he’d caught their attackers by surprise, and when he exited the back of the alley at a flat run, he was moving like a blur. He heard the shouts rise like smoke, and a scramble up on the roofs, but they were nowhere near the right position. Someone shot at him, but it went wild. Five steps farther down, there were more shots flung his way, but with the same lack of accuracy.
    Someone up there made good time or was in a lucky spot, and he saw a bottle of Greek fire arc toward the ground two body lengths away from him. No good choices: if he swerved, he’d lose momentum, and there was no telling which way the fire would splash. Going through it wasn’t an option. The thick goo would cling to skin and fabric and couldn’t be wiped or washed away. He’d burn.
    As the bottle hit the ground and the fire rushed to life, Jess ran straight at the nearest wall. He put more energy into his stride and ran two gravity-defying steps sideways on the wall, then pushed off hard and launched himself like an arrow past the roiling green blaze in the middle of the path. He landed hard on the cobbles on his shoulder, and close enough that the toxic smoke crawled hot into his lungs, but he coughed it out and rolled to his feet and
kept running
. Shots scattered behind him, but they all missed, and now the inferno behind him was also—usefully—cover.
    Only another block to the exit gates, and Jess made the turn andpoured on even more speed. His heart was pumping furiously now, his lungs rebelling from the effort and the smoke, but the goal was within sight.
    That was when a shot hit him squarely in the back with enough force against the flexible armor beneath his Library coat to knock him off stride and stun his lungs into paralysis. Deprived of breath, blazing with pain, Jess tumbled to the ground, rolled