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“It will—” Art begins.
“— soon,” I finish sarcastically.
“Sorry,” Art says. “I know this is hard. But there is much we have to tell you and it is complicated.”
“Let’s try something simpler then.” I think about the sort of things I’d ask any stranger. “How old are you?”
Art makes a sound like someone clearing their throat.
“Oh, come on,” I shout. “Surely you can tell me that much.”
“There is no easy answer,” Art says. “We are as old as this universe but we existed before it. In the original universe, there was no such thing as time. We were not born. We did not age. We simply were.”
“You can’t be as old as the universe,” I challenge him. “It’s billions of years old. Nothing lives for that long.”
“We do,” Art insists. “We exist as spheres of light, and light is almost ageless.”
“Almost? You’re not immortal?”
“Not anymore,” Art says.
“This is crazy,” I mutter.
“Be patient,” Art urges. “By the end of this journey we’ll reveal the secrets of the universe, the origins of life, and the cause of the Big Bang.”
“What’s the Big Bang?”
Art is silent for a long time. Then, in a dejected tone, he says, “This is going to be harder than we thought.”
More worlds and chambers. I doze during some of the journey. In the demon universe I can go weeks or months without sleep, but here I grow tired, just as I do on Earth. I start to wonder how long we’ve been traveling.
“This is the fourth day,” Art answers.
“How much longer will it take?”
“I cannot say.”
“A week?” I snap. “A month? Years?” I lick my lips and ask quietly, “You will take me back, won’t you?”
There’s a pause. “If you choose to return, we—”
“What do you mean?” I roar. “Of course I’ll return! Why shouldn’t I? Are you going to try to—”
“Peace,” Art hushes me. “The choice will be yours. I don’t think you’ll want to go back, but we will not prevent
you from following your destiny.”
“I’ll definitely want to go back,” I growl.
“You should not make such sweeping statements,” Art says. “When you went in search of the demon masquerading as your brother, you were certain you’d return home when you found him, but you didn’t. There are no certainties except death. And even that—”
Whatever he was about to say is lost, because we pass through a window into a chamber made of moss-covered stones. And the place is crawling with demons.
They’re foul beasts, shaped like horses, but their flesh is rotting away and their bones poke through. Yellow blood drips down their legs from their rib cages. The heads are larger than on any horse I’ve seen, and each has two sets of mouths, one above the other. There are no teeth—instead, human-looking fingernails jut out of their gums, blood and drool dribbling between the cracks.
The demons had been fighting or playing with one another—hard to tell with these monsters—but they stop when we pop out in the middle of them. Then, with howls of hunger and delight, they hurl themselves at us.
I react automatically and fire a ball of energy at the nearest beast, then leap clear, onto one of the higher stones of the chamber. The roof caved in long ago and I can see out. A quick survey of the land beyond reveals a scorched, ruined world teeming with monsters. A massive demon is rising into the air a few miles away. Hundreds of beasts are clinging to it, or settled on its back in rows. Fleshy strands dangle from its stomach. Large rocks are attached to the lower ends.
