In the end, Khenemhotep didn’t bother finishing his tale.

  The session wrapped up right after the undead priest had launched into the opening act of the squabble between his god and the rebellious Nakhran. Time ran out before the story could reach its conclusion, so it was left hanging in the air, suspended and unresolved.

  I guess the heart of storytelling lies in the art of making cliffhangers, huh? Viktor thought.

  Oh well, whatever.

  He was going to hear the rest in the next session anyway. And while the story was mildly entertaining, at the end of the day, it had nothing to do with him. He was far more interested in Iseth-Ra and the magic she governed, practical matters with immediate consequences, than in a divine mess that happened millennia ago in a distant world. The fact that Nakhran had returned from oblivion was also very intriguing, especially if he could bring the others back as well, but since Khenemhotep himself didn’t know where the man got that power or how it worked, the point was moot. So as far as he could tell, he had already wrung most of the useful information out of that little history lesson.

  Viktor cast a glance at the reception desk. There was a long line of people waiting for their turn, and Rhea was receiving them. Claire was nowhere to be seen, of course, since she was no longer a receptionist. Instead of wrestling with the adventurers in the main hall, now her brawl was with the endless tide of paperwork the Guild kept spawning every day.

  He had come a bit early, which was why both women were still on the clock. There was no point in lingering here, however. The mess hall wasn’t swarming yet, so he should go claim a table, before the storm of boots arrived.

  Pushing through the door, he found the place half occupied, just as he had expected. Near the far wall, where the Guild served food and drink behind a low counter, a small crowd was beginning to gather. He made his way over and tossed out a few words of obligatory greeting to the girl working there, someone he had exchanged such meaningless pleasantries with many times but never bothered to remember the name of. Dropping a quarter-copper onto the wooden counter, he grabbed a mug and filled it with apple juice from a barrel nearby.

  He walked over to a table near the window, where the midday light slunk through dirt-smeared panes and spilled across the battered wood, and set down the mug of juice alongside the lunch he had brought: a loaf of bread, a wedge of cheese, and a portion of cured meat, all wrapped up in a cloth. He wasn’t in the mood for any fancy cooking today, so he had kept it simple. If Claire wanted to grumble about it, she was more than welcome to make her own lunch.

  “I’m telling you,” Viktor heard a voice from a nearby table, “the wall just gave out. No one even touched it. We were checking the maze on the second floor, and then—boom—half the wall crumbled.”

  “And behind it was a desert? Inside the dungeon?” said a younger voice.

  “Not just a desert,” the older man replied. “A whole damn world. Sand dunes stretch endlessly. And some gigantic stone buildings poke out of the sands. And get this... There’s a sun there.”

  That earned a few scoffs.

  “A fucking sun? Underground?”

  “I saw it with my own eyes, bright as noon. They said that it was not real, just some illusion created by the dungeon’s magic. But you can feel it. Real or not, it burns your skin.”

  So, it had begun.

  Khenemhotep’s kingdom of sand had finally been revealed to the public. Before long, the rumor would spread like wildfire, and every adventurer in Daelin would be buzzing about it. Even the Guild might put out some sort of official statement. People would swarm toward the undead priest’s domain, chasing fame and fortune, or just the thrill of the unknown. Khenemhotep was going to have his hands full. Or not. The guy had a legion of minions of his own to handle the crowds, and their ranks grew proportionally with the number of corpses in the disposal pit, so he could simply let them deal with the small fries while he enjoyed his eternal slumber or whatever. Viktor highly doubted anyone would be able to reach the Chamber of the Dead to challenge the ancient priest anytime soon.

  What concerned him more was how Brynhildr and Dagnar would take the news. They were the main prize, after all. With any luck, they would follow the other would-be heroes into the depths of the dungeon. He would observe them as they descended, learning what tricks the man had up his sleeve in the process, and then, when the timing was right, he would spring the trap and bring the entire weight of the dungeon crashing down upon them. The ideal battlefield should be outside, within the walls of the complex, where he had room to maneuver and could deploy his minions in full force, as the interior of the tomb was simply too cramped to capitalize on his advantage in numbers.

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Of course, there was always the unpleasant possibility that they would stick to the first floor and refuse to move forward. It would complicate things. In that case, he might need to get close and give them a little push. A bit of manipulation to give them a reason to press deeper.

  Viktor spotted Rhea entering the mess hall, her lunch in one hand and a thick, heavy-looking book in the other. Some Guild document, probably. Was she planning to work through lunch? Typical, that girl. He couldn’t help but chuckle to himself.

  She looked around, saw him waving, and headed over to his table. “Been waiting long?” she asked with a smile.

  The girl seemed to have recovered well from the incident. That day, right after getting out of the forest, she had looked like a stray mutt dragged out of a river: frightened, shivering, and clinging to him as if he were the only thing keeping her tethered to this world. And even a couple of days later, she hadn’t quite bounced back yet. But now, one would never guess the encounter with the bandits had ever happened.

  “Just got here. Finished your work?”

  “Sort of.”

  After that conversation with Claire the other night, he had kept an eye on Rhea, but he found nothing out of the ordinary. So maybe she wasn’t the one who had spilled the beans. After all, she had promised to keep the incident a secret, and she was the kind of person honest enough to feel guilty if she ever broke her word, even by accident. Oh well, whatever. Not that it mattered anyway.

  “Now we just wait for Claire,” Viktor said.

  “Actually, she told me earlier that we should just go ahead without her. She’s a bit busy right now, so she’s planning to eat later.”

  “All right.”

  These days, it was usually just the three of them having lunch together. Jeanne was probably still poking around the ruins, and Alycia was holed up in her shop, preparing for her grand opening. Viktor imagined she was sitting down to eat at this very moment, having the exact same meal Rhea was about to have. Because, let’s be honest, despite that woman’s repeated assurances that she could handle her own cooking, she never actually followed through on that promise and always let Rhea take care of everything for her.

  As for Lucian and Noi’ri, they hadn’t been around lately. In fact, he hadn’t seen anyone from their party at the Guild for quite some time. He wondered what was up with them. He doubted the dungeon had chewed them up, since Celeste should have told him if it had been the case. Besides, did anyone even die in the dungeon these days? The place was practically a walk in the park at the moment. And if they had left town, they would have said their goodbyes, wouldn’t they? Not that he really cared all that much, but there was something he needed to discuss with the boy mage. About how his Brotherhood and those so-called Druidesses had gone and split off from the Emerald Order.

  “Everything seems to be in place,” Rhea announced.

  Viktor arched an eyebrow. “What’s in place?”

  “It’s about what you’ve told Alycia to do,” the girl said with a grin. “You asked her to make a list of everything in the shop, especially the dangerous stuff, store them, keep tabs on them, figure out how to keep them safe, and make a plan for when it all goes wrong anyway. Right?”

  “Yes, and?”

  “She’s done all of it.”

  Viktor stared at her. Hard.

  “You sure?”

  “I figured you’d say that,” Rhea said, hefting the heavy tome she had brought in and sliding it across the table. “That’s why I brought this.”

  “What the hell is that?”

  “The documentation,” she said proudly. “Every item. Current condition. Storage details. Security measures. Contingency plans. Everything. All in her own handwriting.”

  Viktor eyed the monster of a book as if it might grow teeth and bite. Honestly, it was hard to believe, but he doubted Rhea was lying to him. Also, even though Alycia had the self-discipline of a drunkard during a free ale night, if she had seriously given it her all... well, it was not impossible.

  Rhea nudged the bulky book toward him again. “Come on. Take a look.”

  I’m not going to read that. So he looked at her and smiled. “I trust you fully.”

  She looked amused, as if she could read the exact thought straight from his head. “So,” she asked, still smiling, “you’re going to become her apprentice for real this time?”

  “Well, yes...”

  He had given Alycia his word, and unlike the blonde, he actually intended to keep it. Besides, there was something to gain. After all, that woman wasn’t just a pain in the ass. She knew stuff, useful stuff. So the idea of learning from her was not without merit.

  Still, there was something about the whole situation that rubbed him the wrong way, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Why was Rhea acting like this? There was a new tone in her voice, a playfulness that hadn’t been there before. Was she... teasing him? Since when had she started doing that? Maybe she had been spending too much time with Alycia and thus had been infected by some contagious madness.

  “I’ll go to her shop,” he said. “But can you be there with me?”

  “What... why?” Rhea blinked in surprise, her eyelashes fluttering.

  “I think she will take things more seriously if you’re around.”

  “I think she’s always serious when it comes to her inventions, but...” Her voice faltered as her pale cheeks turned pink. “If you want, I can come. Just not during weekdays. I have work at the Guild, so weekends only.”

  “Fine by me,” Viktor said with a shrug. One day a week was more than generous for someone like Alycia.

  For some reason, Rhea stopped talking. She dropped her gaze and dug into her food in silence. Odd. But whatever.

  It seemed his attempt to strike back at her had had some unexpected, but not unwelcoming, effect. Well, he just wanted to make sure that if Alycia’s next bright idea did end in an explosion, and he got blown to pieces because he had made the mistake of trusting Rhea, then she might as well be standing close to share the blast when it happened.