Page 98 of Princess Avenged

I sense a second set of footfalls on the ladder. Grateful that Crusher is following, I call up. “Are you both okay?” But I can’t hear my own voice, nor any response.

I can’t sense my heartbeat anymore, can’t hear my blood flowing through my veins, and I realize that, although I’m still moving down, I can barely sense the pressure of my hands and feet on the rungs. The metal no longer feels cold, almost as if it’s perfectly matching my body temperature.

No. It’s more like I’ve lost my sense of touch along with my sight and hearing.

I descend for what feels like thousands of rungs, wishing I’d counted to know how far to climb on the way back up, and then realize I am no longer descending. I’m climbing.

I didn’t change direction. I’m on the same ladder. But I’m definitely climbing now, with Phil and Crusher still behind me.

I’ve counted two thousand and thirty-one rungs since I realized I was climbing, and I spot a hint of dull light above me. It must be nighttime in this other realm, just like in ours. The quality of the dim light seems strange. Flat.

Moving faster, I count another three hundred and forty-two rungs.

Reaching the top, I quickly climb out and stand. Then I stagger back from the hole, trying to make sense of what I’m seeing and hearing, what and feeling, but before I get oriented, Phil emerges, Crusher right behind him.

Crusher plants himself between us, facing Phil, and clearly bracing to protect me. His huge muscles are prepared to fight, to do anything to keep Phil—the demon—from hurting me.

“It’s okay,” Phil says calmly, and I shift to see him past Crusher’s bulk. “The demon doesn’t need Ana in this realm. This is his home. He’s happy to be here. He’s set me free.”

Phil smiles broadly and shifts his gaze from Crusher’s to mine. The light in his eyes is strange. His irises turn black for a moment, but it happens so quickly I wonder if it was an illusion, or some affect from our strange environment.

Crusher backs slowly toward me, and then gathers me into his arms, wrapping me up so tightly I can barely move. “Keep away from her, demon!”

Phil raises his hands as if in surrender. “Calm the fuck down, brother. No demon here.” He points toward his head. “Not anymore.”

Relief floods inside me. Phil seems back to his old self to me, but Crusher doesn’t drop his guard—not at all. If anything, his hold on me tightens.

Phil glances around, and I do the same. Crusher’s high alert mode is enough for us both.

The ground is grey and barren, like no rain has fallen in years, like there’s no sign of life at all, and casting my gaze wider, I can’t see any trees or vegetation, just a vast open plain, which looks like it’s been scraped and flattened, cleared of all living things. Or burned?

About twenty feet away, something slithers along the ground, then disappears. Are my eyes playing tricks on me?

“Snake,” Crusher says as he holds me, and I’m glad to know that he saw it too. “We’re on some kind of plateau.”

Studying our surroundings more carefully, I realize that he’s right. In the flat light, I didn’t notice at first, but it’s like we’re on a sliced off mountaintop. The edge of the platform is about a hundred yards ahead, and it’s about half that distance to each of our sides.

“I’m going to check out the edge.” Phil steps forward.

I tug on the steel trap of Crusher’s arms. “I want to look too.”

He grunts. “We should stay close to the portal.”

“It’s not far.” I turn my neck trying to see behind me. “We’ll come straight back.”

Crusher seems to have forgotten that I need to find a sword. Or maybe he’s starting to believe that the demon’s left Phil.

Crusher carries me to the closest edge of the plateau, and we look down. I gasp. It’s a sheer drop, a few thousand feet to the bottom, and straight, almost like whatever plateau we’re on was carved out of a mountain by sharp knives.

The landscape down below isn’t as flat as up here, but also seems barren with no signs of life. Not that it’s easy to tell from this height or with this lighting.

Above us, the sky is dark, but it’s nothing like the night sky in our world. There’s no moon or stars perceptible through the dense clouds—if they are clouds. The light is dim and gray, but I can’t tell what’s casting it. There’s no hint of a sun or any star, or any sense of what direction the light is coming from.

Not only does the light seem gray, everything is gray, almost like we’ve landed in a black and white photograph, or an old movie. I glance at my clothes, at Phil’s, and then at Crusher’s. The lighting has cast us all in shades of gray. None of our clothes were brightly colored before the portal, but now they’re decidedly dull. So is our skin.

My eyes felt so strange when I emerged from the darkness, and I didn’t process the full effect right away.

Above, the clouds are not only dense and low, but they’re oddly shaped and shifting, seeming to move in many directions at once. And yet there’s no hint of wind down here on the ground. I’m not having difficulty breathing, but the air is stagnant, like we’re not outside, but trapped in a small, airtight chamber with no ventilation.

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