Page 60 of Spelunking Through Hell

When no one answered, I knocked again before stepping back to wait. The Murrays clustered up behind me, murmuring anxiously among themselves. I cast them as close to a reassuring look as I could manage, and they kept murmuring, clearly discomforted. The guards formed a loose ring around us, keeping us all shielded, at least a little, from the rest of the outside. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

And the door still wasn’t opening. I turned and knocked again, more forcefully.

“Are they going to let us in?” asked Lyn.

“If they don’t, they’re going to be sorry,” I said, voice going a little singsong at the end. These people barely knew me, and still they knew enough to take that as a bad sign and step back, eyes going just a little wider.

The guards tensed at the sound of footsteps coming from our left. I glanced to Sally. “One of yours?”

She shook her head, expression drawn. “No.”

“Any chance the Haspers have more forces out here?”

“They don’t do lying in wait. Too subtle for them. But they’re not our only neighbors.”

“Great.” I was almost out of bullets, I couldn’t keep chucking grenades this close to the compound, and we were running out of time. I started hammering on the door.

I was still pounding when it swung open and I all but fell into the hallway, stumbling past the woman I’d been introduced to as Aadya. She shot me a startled look, transferring it to Sally as the other woman followed me through the open door. “Did the two of you go out looking for strays?”

“We took out the jerks who were trying to huff and puff and blow your house down, and we picked up these folks along the way. They were answering the summons fromyourbeloved leader.” I waved for the Murrays to follow me inside. “Come on, all you, get in here. We can’t keep the door open forever.”

I was asking them to enter the stronghold of their oldest enemy, someone many of them had grown up fearing and hiding themselves from. But I had also taken the time to talk to them, and they were exiles now; whether they liked it or not, we were the best chance they had left. One by one, they came inside, and when the last of them was inside, Sally leaned over and pulled the door closed.

There was a finality to the sound of it latching that made me wonder about magical locks, and how secure we actually were in here. The walls seemed thick enough, but Thomas said that some of the people from the neighboring dimension were also in this one. How were our aerial defenses? How secure were the windows?

“The Autarch will not like this,” said Aadya.

How much was she going to like it if I redirected all of my current frustrations onto her? I swallowed my rising temper, forced a smile, and said, “I think you’re wrong, since this was his idea. Don’t scarethe nice people. They’re already anxious, and I for one don’t want to deal with a stampede of panicked Lilu.”

“Lilu?” said Aadya. “These are the Murrays, if I’m not mistaken.”

“Yeah, and with a name like that, at least some of their founders probably came from Earth, but we can worry about that after we’ve given them something to eat and a place to rest,” I said.

One of the smaller children started crying softly, out of hunger if nothing else. Aadya thawed somewhat, inclining her head.

“Of course,” she said. “Children never go hungry here. If you would all come with me?” She gestured broadly with all four arms before she turned to make her way down the hall. The Murrays followed, more quickly than they had followed me. I guess food is a better incentive than violence. Cer and Lyn were the last to go, stealing anxious little glances in my direction until I smiled and waved them on. I didn’t need to pick up any strays this trip. Not when it looked like we were already taking Sally home.

Sally, who was looking at me with amusement in her eyes. I bristled a little. “What?”

“You know, I expected the boss to be into getting his savior complex on, the same way he always does. I didn’t expect you to be into it. I also didn’t expect you to be that prepared for the boundary line.”

“What were you going to do if we reached it and I stopped breathing?”

“Shove you back onto the good side and send a couple guards to walk you home,” she said unrepentantly. “Boss may have thought it was a good idea to send you with me, but I didn’t know how well you could handle yourself, or whether you were going to freak out the second you saw things get messy. That’s on me. I underestimated you, and while I’m not going to apologize for wanting to protect my people, I won’t do it again.”

That was understandable, even admirable, no matter how little I liked it. “Good thing I had a breathing charm on me,” I said.

“Yeah. Boss warned me about that one,” she said. “He’s got a whole list of magical effects he thinks you can manage with what’s written on your skin, and a list of what he thinks the side effects will be. Did you know that if you triggered too many of those in quick succession, you could put yourself all the way into a coma?”

“Yup,” I said.

“Can I take the speed and chipperness of that answer as an indication that you’ve done it?”

“I don’t know. Can I take the fact that you keep acting like I’msomehow infiltrating your base to make problems and not because Ibelonghere as an indication that I’m allowed to push you out this door and lock it behind you? If we’re asking crappy questions, I mean.”

Sally laughed. “Okay, okay, fair enough. The boss will be thrilled to see us all safely back home, with no major injuries, a threat eliminated—or at least reduced—and a whole bunch of new mouths to feed.”

“Assuming they don’t start any trouble,” said one of the guards.

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