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It wasn’t the first time we’d seen s day in October seven years ago, the Veil--the barrier that separated huic we hadn’t even known existed--was shattered by the Paranormals who’d lived incalled the Beyond

They wanted our world, and they didn’t have a probleh the fracture, bringing death and destruction--and changing everything: Magic was now real and measurable and a scientific fact

I was seventeen when the Veil, which ran roughly along the ninetieth line of longitude, straight north through the heart of NOLA, had splintered That round zero

My dad had owned Royal Mercantile when it was still an antiques store, selling French furniture, priceless art, and very expensive jewelry (And, of course, the walking sticks Sosticks) When the war started, I’d helped hi MREs, water, and other supplies to the inventory

War had spread through southern Louisiana, and then north, east, and west through Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, and the eastern half of Texas The conflict had destroyed soacres of scarred land and burned, lonely cities It had taken a year of fighting to stop the bloodshed and close the Veil again By that time, the ht alongside the troops

Unfortunately, he hadn’t lived to see the Veil close again The store became mine and I moved into the sether--he didn’t want to spend every hour of his life in the sa were now my only links to him, so I didn’t hesitate I missed him terribly

When the as done, Contained the war and the Paranoric but of voodoo, Marie Laveau, ghost tours, and even literary vaic Act, banning ic inside and outside the war zone, e called the Zone (Technically, it was the MIGECC Act: Measure for the Illegality of Glamour and Enchantment in Conflict Co to it)

The war had flattened half of Fabourg Marigny, a neighborhood next door to the French Quarter, and Contain Para they could find into the neighborhood and built a wall to keep them there

Officially, it was called the District

We called it Devil’s Isle, after a square in the Marigny where cried And if Containic, I’d be iood reason to be wary Most huic; if it was an infection, an illness, they were ie of the population didn’t have that iy from the Beyond That hadn’t been a probleh was ic tricks and illusions but not ic still seeped through the rip where it had been sewn back together Sensitives weren’t physically equipped to handle the ic wasn’t a probleic day in and day out, but that ic had an outlet--their bodies becas; soic that way Instead, we just kept absorbing ic, until we lost ourselves coerous shadows of the huic, filling that horrible need

I’d learned eight o that I was a Sensitive, part of that unlucky percentage I’d been in the store’s second-floor storage roo alking sticks, ns The sticks, at least, were easier to store) I’d tripped on a knot in the old oak floor and stu flat on my back And I’d watched in slow n--and one of its sharp metallic points--fell toward me

I hadn’t had time to move, to roll away, or even to throw up an arm and block the rusty spike of steel, which was aimed at the spot between my eyes But I did have a split second to object, to curse the fact that I’d lived through war only to be in that should have been rusting on a barn in the middle of nowhere

"No, damn it!" I’d screas, withhad happened

Lips pursed, I’d slitted one eye open to find thetwo inches abovewith adrenaline and sweating with fear, for a full athered up the nerve to ed and rolled away The star’s point hit the floor, tunneling in There was still a two-inch-deep notch in the wood

I hadn’t wanted the star to iic I hadn’t known I’d had--Sensitivity I hadn’t known I possessed--to stop the thing in its tracks

I’d gotten lucky then, too: The ered, and I’d kepth memory to my spot on the sidewalk I juuys!" I yelled Not that I was close enough for theht Excess was the entire point

Six years before, the Second Battle of New Orleans had raged across the city (The first NOLA battle, during the War of 1812, had been very human At least as far as ere aware) It had been one of the last battles of the war and one of the biggest

Tonight we’d celebrate our survival with colors, feathers, brass bands, and plenty of booze It would be loud, crazy, and aet arrested before the fun started

"You finally losing it, Claire?"

I glanced back and found abehind me Antoine Lafayette Gunnar Landreau, one of my best friends, looked unwilted by the heat