“Same door?”I ask.
He doesn’t stop, just pads right up to it and nudges the corner, using his paw and claws to try and open it.“Meow.”
“I’ve got it,” I say and open the door, then gasp.
It opens to the outdoors.I glance down at Mortem, but he doesn’t seem surprised.He trots through, nonchalant, like we don’t have half a dozen monsters and a feral fallen angel chasing us.I close the door behind us and sink to the ground.
We’re by a river, but it’s darker than any river I’ve seen before and I dread thinking what’s lurking inside it.
I turn to glance at the door and gasp.It’s the most exquisite building I’ve ever seen.The door we came out of is nestled in the peak of a turret.This tower is identical to Finis, only inverted.The tower spike is buried into the ground and with every floor up, the tower gets wider and wider.More windows, more doors, spiralling up, up, up, piercing the dark clouds until I can no longer see the top or, maybe more accurately, the bottom?How that enormous structure balances on a tiny spike is beyond me.It’s a feat of architectural genius.
Underworld magic, clearly.The same long windows I saw in the circular staircase stretch up the side of the tower.Stone arches and dozens of gargoyles litter the exterior.All of them chattering and muttering to each other.
I glance back at the river.It cuts through what I assume are the tower’s grounds.Everywhere I look, we’re enclosed by trees and shrubs.In one direction are secluded gardens of desiccating roses and dozens of fungi; to my right is an enormous maze made of bones, where the odd shade drifts in and out of the open sections.No wraiths, though.They seem to be contained inside for now.
In the distance is a city, and in the other direction lie the fungus fields.The river flows at a slow and leisurely pace, but the dark water builds a carnal desire within me to run.
Mortem bounces up to the river like he’s going to throw himself in.He swings his paw through the surface, and I fling myself at him right as he loses his footing.My calf pulses and throbs, blood oozes over the makeshift bandage and down my ankle.
But I manage to grab his tail.
He hisses as my other hand slides under his belly and pulls him back upright.And to my astonishment there is a little fish, flopping and flapping, clenched in his paw.
He has what I can only describe as a self-satisfied grin on his face.His eyes slow-blink at me before he brings the wriggling fish to his mouth and bites half of it off in one go.Fish guts and goo slide down my fingers, and I squeal, dropping the fucking cat and plunging my hand in the river with zero regard for whatever creatures lurk in the murky water.I’d rather risk my life with them than smell like fish innards.
“Vile,” I mumble.
“You are, in fact, correct.This fish…” he shakes his paw, flinging yet more droplets of fish guts over my robes and the ground.“Is disgusting.”
“How disappointing,” I drawl.
“It is, actually.”He sighs in a dramatic fashion and flops down on his paws.
I examine the haphazard bandage I applied.I’ve long since bled through it, so I loosen it, ball it up and leave it beside the river.Then I shred a fresh piece of fabric and retie it.My wounds seem to have dried, like they’re attempting to crust over.They’re healing.Weirder, the runes around the wound are glowing brighter than all the other ones on my leg.There’s a constant thrum inside me now, and I’m certain it’s the runes.
“The dead don’t heal, right?”I ask.
“We can be pulled apart and destroyed but not injured.”He trots over and draws his tongue up my leg, licking up the congealed blood.
I wince, and swat him and his coarse tongue away.“You really are the most disgusting cat I’ve ever encountered.”
“You really are the whiniest creatureI’veever encountered.”
How he can like the taste of stale blood I will never know.“Listen.You said the wraiths are pouring into Ora, right?”
“They were.I expect they’ll have sealed the tear by now,” Mortem meows.
He rubs a paw over his face as if I exhaust him.
“But wraiths get in all the time?”
He meows confirmation, followed by, “I really am starving.”
I glare at him.“You get tuna when I am somewhere safe not being hunted by fallen angel professors or wraiths.”
He flops, resting his head on his paws.If he were human, he’d look like a petulant five-year-old.
“Now what?”He opens his mouth for a giant yawn.“Is it nap time?”
