Their footsteps pounding against the metal floors. The low rumble of burgeoning thunder, the storm reaching through stories of bedrock to make its voice heard. Her heart jumping out of her chest, her blood thrumming through her skull, like so many pounding drums.

  Leira, Cort, and the three clueless warriors tore through the Kaia-lit halls in a mad dash to get away from the teleporter and the soon-to-be pursuing Leviathan stormtroopers.

  Cort led the way, carrying the eagle-man on his shoulder. Leira assumed Cort knew where he was going, based on the confidence with which he took some turns and ignored others. That, or he was making a damn good show of pretending.

  They reached the top of a ramp (that they were going upward had to be a good sign) and Cort slid to a halt in front of a storage closet. He dropped the eagle-man on the floor and threw the door open.

  “Not the time,” Leira hissed as she wheeled around. “We can’t hide from them like that, idiot. Scanners.”

  Cort backed out of the closet, towing two tall carts, their shelves packed with an assortment of glass bottles. “Can you make them help us?” he asked, nodding at the warrior women.

  He shoved the two carts down the ramp. They swiveled as they gained speed, then one flipped over, bringing the second down with it. A hundred bottles shattered like a fallen chandelier; golden liquid sprayed like champagne, coating the floor. The surviving bottles rolled down the ramp as if taking part in a race.

  “Shards of glass and a slippery floor won’t do sh- Ohhh!” Leira cackled. “You knew this was here?”

  Cort nodded. “We checked it earlier. Thought it might be useful.”

  Oil. All those bottles were filled with different types of cooking oil—olive, sunflower, sesame, hemp, peanut.

  Leira shoved the two warrior women into the closet. “Quick, quick, quick, c’mon ladies.”

  Using her thoughts alone, Leira could force them to carry out simple commands, but yelling and gesturing worked best.

  The two women moved in the swaying, jerky manner of her enthralled. She’d given them both a hefty dose—this was no time for half-measures, and the green-haired one was a stubborn gal.

  Leira had seen expressions like theirs before, that mix of incomprehension and terror as something unimaginable descended. It was the face of the conquered when they learned that they were insects in the eyes of their conquerors.

  The sight of that teleporter had struck the three warriors dumb, nailing their feet to the floor. Leira would’ve bet at least one of them pissed themselves.

  Standing side by side with Anesidyra, Leira had witnessed how those stupefied expressions remained unchanging even as death came swirling down upon them.

  She’d seen it in so many eyes, deadened by shattered innocence. In those final moments, they could not muster thoughts for their lives or their loved ones. Instead, they were force-fed the truth of their insignificance. They died choking on the knowledge that they were worthless fodder.

  No one deserved to die like that.

  The three of them wheeled out the four remaining carts and sent them careening down the ramp. They crashed in spectacular fashion. The pool of green and yellow oils slicked the floor, streaming down the ramp.

  Cort handed Leira their backpack that was full of ztuff. She started grabbing handfuls of tubes and chucking them down the ramp.

  At the same time, Cort planted the Kaia stove on the floor and flicked it on. Then he took an empty glass bottle out of his pocket, tore off a strip of his shirt, and twisted the cloth into the neck of the bottle.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  Leira nodded as she slung the backpack over her shoulder and ushered the three warriors ahead.

  Cort lit the molotov on the stove and then hurled it.

  Flames flashed to life across the floor, an instant inferno that filled the hall. The ztuff tubes exploded like little bombs. The three warriors clapped and whooped in awe at the light show.

  Cort tucked the Kaia stove under his arm, and they set off running again.

  “That’ll buy us some time, but I don’t think it’ll be enough to bring the ceiling down,” Cort said.

  “Maybe the closet at the bottom is full of lumber,” Leira said.

  They took the next right turn and then climbed another ramp. At the top, they passed an ajar closet. Leira recognized it as the one where they’d found the sushi.

  “We’re near the exit,” Leira said.

  Cort nodded. “Yo, birdman.”

  “Thank you for carrying me,” the warrior said.

  Cort made a face at Leira. “Can you make them less stupid?”

  Leira deadened some of the spores that were afflicting the eagle-man.

  “Demons!” the warrior screamed, shaking his head and stumbling. He recovered, bashed Cort in the hip with his shield, and then aimed his bladed club at Cort’s face.

  Without breaking his step, Cort caught the man by the throat, carried him for a few strides, and then slammed him down on the floor.

  The two warrior women stopped and watched, their heads both tilted in curiosity.

  “No time for this, Cort,” Leira said, straining to listen. A faint clamor echoed through the halls.

  “Are you in charge?” Cort barked, leaning over the eagle-man, their noses nearly touching. “What’d you know about this shit?” He jerked the man’s head up and then smashed it down. “Levi scumsucker.”

  “They know even less than us,” Leira muttered. That was part of the reason her spores were having such an effect on the warriors. Their minds were vulnerable because they had no goddamn clue what was going on. Cort was just being a brute.

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  “Demon! Demon!” the eagle-man cried. “Lall, Atla—run!”

  The two women hugged each other, staring slack-jawed at the altercation. Leira shook her head and deadened their spores, too. Might as well make it a party.

  “The Gracestorm will devour every single one of you demons!”

  “Demon?” Cort growled. “No, you’re a demon.” He looked up at Leira, flabbergasted.

  Leira blew out through puffed-up cheeks. The fuck am I supposed to do? She knelt and flapped her hands, signaling the others to join her. “Listen up, we need to hurry. Truce? If you don’t agree, Cort will crush his throat.”

  The three warriors looked between each other and nodded.

  Leira spoke very quickly. “I’m guessing here, so bear with me. You all think the World has ended. I dunno why you think that, but it’s not true. We are not demons. We’re just travelers who stumbled into your home.

  “Those red-eyed soldiers, those are fucking demons as far as you’re concerned. They will raze your little temple. As to why the fuck you have a Leviathan teleporter in your basement? Take it up with your ruler.”

  “You summoned the demons!” one of the women said. “We saw you!”

  “By accident!” Leira said. “I mean- That’s not true!”

  “Leira,” Cort said. “Their army will attack us when we get outside here. That’s the problem.”

  “Right. None of us wanna get killed by those soldiers. Let’s work together. There’s not so many bowlheads. We can beat them if we’re not fighting with each other.”

  Cort, the eagle-man, and the green-haired lady got into a small scuffle as the eagle-man tried to sit up. Leira and the other woman managed to separate them.

  The eagle-man clutched his throat, and, rasping, said, “You massacred our brothers and sisters with furniture.”

  Leira grimaced.

  “You attacked us first!” Cort said. “Look at my teeth.” He peeled his lips back, revealing the gaping gap.

  “You monsters invaded our home, kidnapped our goddess, and slaughtered us!”

  “Shut up about your teeth, Cort,” Leira shouted, jumping to her feet. The noises were getting louder. Maybe the soldiers had already gotten past the fire. “We have no fucking time. There’s a company of stormtroopers a minute behind us. You have two options. One. You three escort us out of here and stop your warriors from attacking us. We all team up and fight the Leviathan together. Afterwards, we’ll leave, and you all live happily ever after. Option two. We fucking kill you right now. Then we go outside and kill all your friends. What’ll it be?”

  “Kill us, you demon-witch!” spat the green-haired warrior woman, who was the more decorated of the two.

  “Oo, I kinda like that,” Leira muttered.

  “We would rather die than bargain with filth!”

  “WHAT?” Cort roared. “Let’s just leave them, Leira.”

  “No. We’re the ones who brought the Leviathan here. I’ll put them to sleep, and we’ll use them as hostages or something.”

  The petals of the Megrim flower swayed, and pink spores whispered out.

  “We agree to option one,” the eagle-man said.

  “Quez!” shouted the two women.

  “I don’t care. I will commit any sin for the slimmest chance at saving my comrades.”

  “Great,” Cort said. “Get up, get up. Let’s go.”

  They scrambled through the last stretch of halls. Leira realized they were near the exit when they passed a broken chair she’d dropped earlier.

  “We need to find Gwil,” Cort said.

  Leira nodded. “At least we can bet he hasn’t fucked things up as badly as us. Hey, you three! What are your names? I’m Leira.”

  ***

  Gwil, Challe, and the snaketopus zipped down a waterway. They’d thrown all the boat’s cargo out so that they could both stand up inside. They rode the winding chute all the way down to the atrium’s second level, and then stepped onto the dock that ran alongside the balcony.

  “You think the Jaguars went to fight my friends?” Gwil asked as the snaketopus loosened its grip on his arms. The creature had been clinging on for dear life as they rode the waterway. “They must be down below still.”

  Challe pressed her fingertips together and breathed through pursed lips while tugging at her braid with one of her extra hands. “I believe so. The Warden and the Jaguars are warriors. They would have to join the fight against the demons.

  “You care for your friends, don’t you? Aren’t you worried? Just the two of them against a thousand?”

  Gwil shook his head. “They’re fine. Not to be rude, but your warriors aren’t any good at fighting.”

  Challe gasped. “I’ve just thought of something. You did come through the Oubliette, yes? Just not through a portal.”

  “Yeah,” Gwil said, pointing upward. “We fell through the ground. It was an accident. We were only trying to cross through these lands on the surface.”

  “The Oubliette was sealed off,” Challe said. “No one alive, save Tezca and the Jaguars, has ever stepped foot inside. What did you find?”

  “A dead lady with a tree growing out of her corpse,” Gwil said. “And a poisonous stake driven through her heart.”

  Challe sighed and picked at one of the jadestones in her arm. “If I’m to follow this blasphemous avenue… Our scripture cites the Oubliette as the place from which the first demons poured forth. It is described as a broken bridge to hell, sealed by a sacrificial corpse.”

  Gwil furrowed his brow. “Hmmm. That’s not what I saw. I don’t think that’s right. It felt more like… something in chains.”

  “Well, exactly. The Progenitor is alive. If all your claims are truthful, too… Everything that I—we—believe, everything we’ve been told… All lies. Our scriptures, complete fabrications. It would only make sense that the Oubliette is something completely different.”

  “Oh! I get it. So you’re wondering why it was forbidden.”

  “Yes. It is something that Tezca took great measures to protect and keep hidden. If something so precious has been disturbed, I wonder if that is where we might find him. But the way is blocked off.”

  “I could shrink and go take a look,” Gwil said. “But I don’t think there’s any point. There’s nothing there anymore. We ripped the Erithist spike out and then set the corpse on fire.”

  Challe clamped four hands over her mouth in succession. “Goddess! What lunacy!”

  Gwil laughed. “Yeah, so if Warren does care about that place, I bet he’s pretty pissed. Let’s just go find my friends. Their names are Cort and Leira. You’ll love them.”

  ***

  Claws and Body opened the door and exited the secret tunnel. Legs and Tail hung back to help Tezca up from his cart-chair.

  These secret tunnels were a godsend, allowing Tezca and the Jaguars to move all throughout Malikau at their leisure. Even better, thanks to the chair and the system of rail tracks, Tezca did not have to walk.

  Tezca liked to keep himself and the Jaguars shrouded in an air of mystique. That they could pop up anytime, anywhere, really added to the effect. Also, since the Malikauan servants all believed that Claws was their Elder Warden, an extra bit of discretion aided in maintaining that ruse.

  Stepping out into the lobby of his temple, Tezca sniffed at the air. “Ooo,” he said, rubbing his hands together. “Did I leave something on the stove?”

  “Self,” Claws said. “When will you generate a new Head?”

  Tezca tapped his lip with his fingertip. “Mmm. We will undoubtedly require his intellect while we prepare for our escape. We’ll need to contrive a great disaster that will convince all the Malikauans to flee their beloved sanctuary. A demon invasion, perhaps.

  “Even a childish and stupid version of Head will offer valuable insight. And we must craft our plans ASAP—that’s as soon as possible, if any of you didn’t know. Mmmm. But I suppose a week of peace and quiet wouldn’t hurt. Ask me again in a few days.”

  “Very well,” Claws said. “I will begin hunting the intruders. I hope to have them dealt with before dinner.” He made for the exit.

  “Body,” Tezca said. “Lower the lift. I am dying to know what I left cooking upstairs.”

  Body waddled over to the lift, and Tezca waddled after him. Body untied the rope from its post and pulled.

  The wooden lift came crashing down, smashing into bits and kicking up dust when it hit the floor.

  Tezca jumped back. “What the deuce?”

  Body picked up a blackened piece of debris—a few planks of wood dangling from a charred bit of rope. “It’s been burnt.”

  Tezca’s eyes widened. He gasped, dislodging a piece of food from his teeth, which he subsequently inhaled and choked on. He pounded his fist on his sternum while Tail and Legs thumped him on the back.

  “W-what in the hells did I leave on the stove?” he sputtered.

  Tezca hurriedly waddled toward the door, full of dreadful urgency, urgency he’d not felt in a century, not since…

  Claws blindly rushed back into the lobby, shouting, “Self! Self!” He crashed into Tezca and bounced off his belly.

  “Self!” Claws said, gasping. “There’s been a tragedy. A fire in the kitchen. Self, it’s all burnt! Everything!”

  “WHAT?” Tezca roared. “All my ingredients! Not again!” He hurried outside, so devastated that he did not even consider how irritating it was that he had to climb the stairs. Gods damn my boundless culinary ambitions.