What Song the Sirens Sang by Simon R Green

Author:Simon R Green
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781448305773
Publisher: Severn House
Published: 2022-06-06T00:00:00+00:00

SIX

From the Afterlife to the Undercity

The mirror delivered us into the midst of a great open wasteland. It was bitterly cold, with no sign of shelter anywhere. Our breath steamed on the still air, and we all hugged ourselves tightly to keep out the cold. No matter which direction I looked in, we were utterly alone. Nothing moved, and there wasn’t a sound anywhere. There might have been buildings once, but they had collapsed long ago. Now it was all churned-up earth and dried mud, with bricks and stones protruding here and there.

As though civilization had come and gone, and left nothing behind but the rubble of our dreams.

‘Is this the Low Road?’ Polly said finally.

‘No,’ I said, ‘it isn’t.’

Annie looked at me. ‘How do you know what the Low Road looks like?’

‘Because I’ve been there,’ I said.

They all looked at me.

‘When was that?’ said Annie.

‘After Fredric Hammer destroyed our lives,’ I said, ‘and the protection I bought from Honest John turned out to be worthless, I needed somewhere to hide where Hammer and his people couldn’t find me. So I reached out to Sandra Ransom …’

‘Hold the boat and drop the anchor!’ said Polly. ‘You know the Divine Busybody? Damn … Maybe you are cool, after all.’

‘I didn’t realize you and Sandra were so close,’ said Annie. ‘Why is a living goddess so interested in someone like you?’

‘One of these days, I’ll have to ask her,’ I said. ‘But now you know why I was so reluctant to ask her for help. I already owe her far too much. The point is, Sandra opened a door for me on to the Low Road, and I stayed there until it was safe for me to come out again.’

‘You can stay on the Low Road?’ said Annie. ‘But that’s just for the dead, isn’t it?’

‘Not always,’ I said.

‘What was it like?’ said Lex. ‘In the land of the dead?’

‘The Low Road is the path the dead walk, to get to what comes next,’ I said. ‘It’s not meant for living eyes.’

‘I thought you didn’t seem too pleased at the idea of going back,’ said Annie.

‘I’m not,’ I said. ‘I had to work really hard to forget most of what I saw in that place.’

‘Why?’ said Annie. ‘What’s so bad about it?’

‘You’ll have to see for yourself,’ I said. ‘It’s not something you can talk about. It has to be experienced.’

‘It is worse than this?’ said Polly, glowering at the deserted wasteland. ‘Because this is pretty bad.’

‘Have you looked at the sky?’ said Lex.

We all looked up. The sky was unrelentingly grey, as though made up of endless clouds of dust, and the sun was just a pale-yellow ball, dull and distant.

‘A dead sky, for a dead world,’ I said.

Polly growled, deep in her throat. ‘I’m not hearing any birds or insects … And I’m not picking up the scent of a single living thing, apart from us.’ She scowled at me accusingly. ‘You promised me action and adventure, but this is

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