Verge of Darkness

  *******  

   

  When Elphemina brought her hands together, the sound-waves sent the Terrene spinning with such velocity, Pagan and Liang, who should have remained unaffected in its cushioned interior, were knocked senseless. 

  Coming to, Pagan sat up with a groan, and head still spinning, crawled over to Liang. She moaned, and her eyes flickered open as Pagan reached her. He curled an arm around her shoulders and drew her closer. Both sat on the floor, legs outstretched, and looked around, marvelling they were still alive.

  The Terrene – a minuscule sphere of light, spun silently in a sea of nothingness. It was clear they were no longer in the burrow of the Gualich, but they had no idea where they were. Liang leaned into Pagan and kissed him lightly on the lips. Pulling back, she reached up, cupped his face between her hands and gazed deeply into his eyes, her turbulent storm-grey eyes now calm and loving. “It doesn't matter where we are my love,” she whispered. “We are alive and we are together as it should be.”

  Pagan had no words to answer, for she had said it all. He stroked her face, and leaning back against the Terrene's wall gently cradled her head on his chest.

   

  Aftermath

   

   

  Father Durmast sank back on his pallet with a sigh of relief. He was no longer a young man, nor was he of robust health. Taking care of the needs of the hundred or so people sheltering in the temple had left him exhausted.

  He had cowered alongside those behind the piled-up benches, as the black man together with the two strangers, had battled the yellow-eyed demons and their monstrous hell hounds. It was a scene he knew would haunt his dreams for years to come: the stench, pools of noxious blood, and the fat writhing maggots. The whole thing had been dreadful.

  He was still perplexed at the unexpected arrival of the mysterious golden-eyed woman. She had claimed to be a servant of Mithros like him, but surely that couldn’t be true for everyone knew the Sun god only accepted male priests. The idea of priestesses was heresy of the worst type.

  When this dreadful business was over, he would go through the temple’s archives to see if it provided any answers.

  He was beginning to drift off to sleep when a knock sounded on the door to his private chambers. “Come,” he called, swinging his legs onto the floor and sitting on the edge of his pallet.

  The door swung open to reveal his helper, Banous. “I didn’t want to waken you, Father,” the young man said, “but there is someone at the door.”

  Supressing his flash of irritation, Father Durmast peered at the gangly young man. “And you didn’t want to open the door, afraid it might be more demons come calling, eh, boy?”

  “Yes, Father.”

  Durmast stood up with a sigh. “Well, let’s go see who it is, and hope it’s Casca come tell us the demons have been vanquished.”