What Lies Beyond by Edward W Robertson

Author:Edward W Robertson [Robertson, Edward W]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Published: 2019-09-29T22:00:00+00:00

22

Blays took the cap and bounced it in his hand. "Not bad work for a crazy old man."

"Now it seems as though each one of us has won a portion of the spear."

"There's no way you could have dealt with the moon-demons without me. Though I suppose you helped a little."

"By the way, those demons are still here somewhere," Dante said. "So I'm thinking we shouldn't be."

"Let's not be too hasty," Blays said. "Gladdic, was there anything else worth stealing on the other side?"

Gladdic shook his head with an involuntary jerk. "It is not a place that you or I should go."

"But that only makes me want to go more." Blays gave a dour look up at the moons. "You know that's where she hides all her precious god-gold. But if you guys aren't interested in priceless riches, I suppose we can go."

Dante hastened toward the doorway out of the grotto. A legion of fireflies buzzed after him, as if spying on him. He stepped through the door and the insects dispersed.

Leaving the inner sanctum, a wave of disorientation washed over him, as if he'd awakened from a long dream. He stumbled through the cave-like room beyond that might have been a chapel and then out into the throne room. Through the windows, he could still hear some fighting going on throughout the palace, but it sounded much more casual than before. More like a mop-up.

Downstairs, a few more bodies had joined that of the servant who'd committed suicide. They didn't see anyone living until they were outside and running toward their horses, which thankfully hadn't been harmed or stolen.

They mounted up and exited the palace grounds to the north, the closest exit, before breaking around to the south toward the smashed-down city gates. The air smelled like smoke and churned-up ground. The horses often had to jump over or swerve around a body or four, most of them Proteans, and most of them not in any uniform.

They exited a zig-zagging alley into one of the plazas that housed mobile, makeshift neighborhoods whenever there wasn't a war going on. This one was filled with ramna in various states of plundering. One group of warriors sat atop mounds of bodies swigging wine. Blood trickled along the mortar between the cobbles.

Blays slowed. "Have we done a bad thing?"

"We haven't killed anybody," Dante said. "That palace servant doesn't count, either."

"Without us, the ramna never would have come here. Should we do something to help?"

"Which side are we to aid?" Gladdic said. "The invaders who show no mercy to their foes but have never taken arms in anger against us? Or the people of the gods who want both our world and the one beyond it scrubbed out like a palimpsest?"

"You're right. On second thought, screw both of them."

They rode south at a speed intended to avoid attention from either the ramna or the Proteans. A group of horsemen stopped them at what remained at the gates, but after a bit of vouching about being friends of Dasya and the Jessel, the guards let them through, if grudgingly.

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