The Lost Sun Series Box Set 1: Books 1 and 2 (Lost Sun Box Set) by Riley Morrison

Author:Riley Morrison [Morrison, Riley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction, steampunk, fantasy
Publisher: Riley Morrison
Published: 2018-02-06T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 26

AEMON

Aemon strained his ears to listen to Erinie’s voice over the thumping of their feet. “We’ll turn right up here, then we’ll be at the door where we heard the Metal Man.”

Trailing at the edge of the torchlight, Aemon tripped on a chunk of broken concrete, almost invisible in the dimming light. Cursing at the pace Minard was setting, he got back to his feet and ran on.

The Dead City was a ruin, its concrete passages rubble strewn and dark. As they passed decrepit metal doors and through shattered antechambers pockmarked with craters, Aemon was struck by the utter desolation of the place. A forlorn cornucopia of devastation and primeval mystery.

What had been the instrument that had wrought such destruction? Not time, for its labors were the gentle weathering of a river on stone, the slow degeneration of bone or the eclipse of one age and the ascendance of the next.

Perhaps a battle had raged there, long ago. But if one had, who had fought it and why?

The craters in the floor and ceiling reminded him of the ones left by the enemy projectiles at Deep Cave and Celestial Rest. About the only other thing Aemon knew that might have caused the damage was explosives. He used to believe the Priest King’s alchemists were the only ones who knew the secret of making them, but Erinie also possessed the knowledge. That suggested anyone with the right skills and ingredients could make them too.

Perhaps their use had once been commonplace. If that were true, what would people have done with such powerful weapons? Aemon chuckled knowingly. What they always do. They turn them on one another.

Kara stared back at him from Minard’s shoulder but seemed not so much to look at him—but through him. Whoever was behind them had really spooked her.

Aemon could still feel Kara’s lips on his. The taste of her mouth, the feel of her body pressed against his, the softness of her hair. How he longed to feel them again.

She had seemed more her old self then, but it had not lasted long. Now she was more distant and lost than ever before. As he ran, he called upon Lydan, the Shield of Heaven, to make her ordeal near an end.

Up ahead, Erinie cheered, “We’re here.”

They stopped at a metal door built into the fractured, concrete wall. Nothing set it apart from any of the other ones they had passed. Puffing, he shook his head. This is it? The fabled door from the story of the Metal Man?

It looked so ordinary, nothing but a rusted, battered old thing like a hundred others around here. A corrosion-pitted plaque with strange symbols on it was stuck to the wall beside it. No, not symbols. Writing.

But what did it say?

Minard kicked the door, knocking off a layer of rust. “Are you sure this is it?”

Before Erinie could answer, a voice sounded from within. It spoke in a deep monotone, in a language Aemon could not understand. Considering how the words were spoken, he guessed the voice was listing off names or reciting numbers.

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