Webb's a dead guy with no memory of his life, and that's how he likes it. He'd sworn he'd protect After, the city of the dead, from monsters, but the monsters have all been killed off. Now he has only one thing left to do: go through the Gate and fi...
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"I can't believe it..." I exclaimed after the sky had cleared and Jake and I beheld the city before us. The closer we had trudged to the immaculate spires of black glass, the brighter the world had become. Three crystalline suns hovered over the necropolis, the red light that reflected from the gleaming skyscrapers almost blinding. These people never had to deal with centuries of eternal darkness and a plague of shadows like After had thanks to the asshole that used to run the place. These guys in their ebony towers had it easy.
And it all would've been beautiful...
If not for the screams and the clouds of ashes rising into the sky.
Jacob gawked up at the black spires, squinting up into the starry heavens that swallowed their pointed caps. I caught him chewing his lip as he murmured half to himself, "I wonder if there's anyone I know here..."
I thought of the name engraved on the switchblade he carried, but I said nothing in return. The unmistakable glow of an intact Gate pulsing amongst the bases of the enormous glass stalagmites held my attention. Despite the wailing and the distant clashing of metal on metal, Void hadn't yet destroyed this city's Gate.
"Do you think he's right, though?" the boy at my side asked me. "The void guy? That through the Gate is...You know, the bad place?"
I was about to answer, I hope not, but the words never passed my tongue. Instead, I scratched at my head and dug my heel into the sand, saying instead, "No idea. Now hush. We need to do this tactfully." I pulled him behind a boulder and rested my chin in my hand, the rusty gears in my head grinding away. Reynard's hunting party hadn't yet arrived. I didn't think we had the luxury of waiting around for them. "I'm pretty sure I'm immune to those voidlings' bad touches for whatever reason, so you should stay here—"
"No."
"Of course you won't." I groaned into my hands before continuing. "Okay. Void-guy's most likely at the Gate or making his way there." I met Jacob's determined glare with a scowl. "Let's meet him and get this over with."
A muscle in the kid's face twitched. "Are you gonna kill him?"
I pressed my knuckles to my brows; eyes clamped shut. The thought of snuffing out another life after taking them so callously for years made my nonexistent stomach churn, as if it was full of eels. But then I remembered what that creepy bastard had done to Aluki and Orville and the bloodbath he'd left behind in After, and a heat boiled inside me. I gripped my sword tight, casting one last look at the glass city under siege. "Yes."
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