Page 261 of Psycho Gods

We slipped through time and space and kept falling.

Sadie turned midair and cushioned me.

We slammed into concrete.

Time lost all meaning as we lay in a pile of bruises and broken bones. Everything was silent. It was almost peaceful—until it wasn’t. The saber-toothed tiger cushioning me shifted back into a scrawny woman.

The world snapped, and sounds rushed back into my ears.

Fear mixed with adrenaline, and I stumbled to my feet. I stood in front of Sadie’s naked body.

The room spun, my vision blurred, and my hips ached with throbbing pain as I pointed my sword forward protectively.

Blue glowed all around.

I blinked furiously to clear my vision.

A rock pinched the side of my mouth, so I pulled out my pipe and spit it into my palm. It was my tooth.

I shoved my pipe back between my lips and inhaled smoke desperately as my eyes slowly focused.

We were in a sprawling brick room.

The temperature was unbearably warm, and my clothes were suffocatingly heavy. I broke out in a sweat.

The walls were covered in pictures. Flame sconces provided the only source of light. The ceiling towered high above and was at least thirty feet tall. There were no windows or doors.

On the far wall, an expansive tartan hung off the ceiling and showed the locations of the mountains, valleys, and infested settlements within the realm.

It was a map.

In the far north, next to the third battle location, large red Xs were once again laid out across the mountain range near the valley. I squinted. At the bottom corner of the map, there was a key that said “X - villages.”

My stomach pitted with unease, because even if we were successful in clearing the last compound, there was likely still more infected.

The war wasn’t done.

I exhaled with shock, a puff of smoke curling from my lips as I took in the rest of the room.

I stared forward numbly.

A hundred or so people stood before me, most of whom had enchanted swords hanging off their hips.

My brain processed anomalies: there didn’t seem to be any bathrooms, and there weren’t signs of food, but the room didn’t stink of waste, and the people weren’t starving.

The portal swirled in the center of the towering ceiling.

A rushing sound filled my ears.

I backed up slowly. We were lucky we’d fallen near the corner of the room so we had protection at our backs.

That was where our luck ended.

In the dim lighting, the crowd of people’s eyes glowed with a familiar, vibrant green sheen.

The nearest infected were about ten feet away.

They stared at us.