Free Ghost Dance by Rebecca Levene

each breath and he could feel sweat sluicing off his body.
    There were more people on the next floor, milling and confused. He wanted to know what they'd seen, but he couldn't waste time asking. He pushed them aside, sending one girl tumbling against a bookcase and the books themselves falling to the floor. Another boy flung himself out of Morgan's path and then he was through that room and into the next - and suddenly there were only two more people, and one of them was already dead.
    The Mossad assassin was kneeling beside Julie, head turned towards Morgan as if he'd been expecting him. His face smooth and olive-brown. Only a frown of irritation crinkled his brow. Beneath it, a droplet of blood hung suspended from one eyelash. Julie lay on the floor beside him, her face turned away from Morgan. He was glad he couldn't see it. He had a good view of the slash in her throat, the one that should have been bleeding and was smoking instead. The room was full of the smell of scorched flesh.
    Morgan only froze for a moment. The instant he flung himself towards the killer the man moved, lithe and confident as a cat. Morgan felt something crunch beneath his foot as he hurled himself in pursuit and he realised, with a nauseous lurch, that it was Julie's hand.
    The assassin fled deeper inside the library, away from the crowd of students and their frightened eyes. Even in the dim lighting his white T-shirt shone bright against his dark skin. Morgan followed it through room after room, always only a few paces behind, but never quite close enough.
    The Israeli still held the knife in his hand. It looked like an ordinary army-issue weapon, but Morgan could see its edges glowing yellow. Their outline led him through a long, stone-floored corridor, down one flight of stairs and then another as the glow slowly faded through orange to a sullen red.
    He was faster on the stairs than the assassin, vaulting them recklessly until his ankle buckled on the second flight. He felt the creak of cartilage pushed to the breaking point and gritted his teeth as he leapt again, his leg burning but still working. And now he was only two paces behind his quarry.
    Morgan could hear the man's laboured breathing. He smelt his sour sweat and beneath it the copper hint of blood. His belly clenched with fury and though they were still ten feet above the next landing he bellowed and flung himself from the stairs, diving through air to catch the killer round his waist.
    The man let out his own roar of rage, bucking in Morgan's grip. There was a sickening moment of free-fall, then the jarring impact of landing. Morgan tasted blood as his teeth snapped shut on his own tongue. His knee slammed agonisingly into the wooden floor and he couldn't suppress a gasp of pain. But the killer's body took the brunt of the fall and Morgan heard the whoosh of air as it was all forced from the man's lungs.
    The assassin was silent, sprawled like a ragdoll. Morgan pried the knife from his limp fingers. As he lifted it free, the last heat seemed to dissipate from the metal, leaving it lethal but mundane. He tightened his hand on the pommel and used his other to flip the killer over, tearing the white T-shirt he used for leverage.
    As he rolled, the man's eyes flicked open and for a second Morgan thought he saw a red fire burning in their depths, the same sullen glow which had earlier lit his knife. Was this another demon, one of Belle's kind? Morgan shuddered as he remembered the little girl who'd housed something monstrous inside her. His hand tightened on the knife and he pressed the flat of the blade to the killer's throat. The thick tube of the man's windpipe compressed and Morgan knew that the slightest tip of the knife, the first pressure of its razor-sharp edge, and the Israeli's life would end as he had ended Julie's. Morgan's hand shook with the effort of not doing it.
    The killer's eyes were locked on his. He didn't look frightened. "Morgan Hewitt," he said, his accent strong