"Granted. But that still doesn't mean it's Meryat."

"Why are you so resistant to the obvious?"

"Maybe I just like the thought of people being in love without any sucking going on!"

Oh, yeah. Definitely too much use of the verb to suck. He kind of wished he'd remembered that.

But all Austin said was, "I wish Claire was here."

Chapter ELEVEN.

Claire closed her fingers just a little too tightly around Lance's arm. They were standing at one end of a ma.s.sive hall, although ma.s.sive didn't really do the place justice, on a pair of circles made of the only red tiles visible in a blue-and-gold mosaic floor. Just to be on the safe side, she looked up and breathed a sigh of relief. So far, no falling anvils. Behind them was a set of what looked like fifty-foot-high, solid gold doors. In front of them, a double line of huge pillars disappeared into the darkness above. If they were supporting a roof, Claire couldn't see it. The walls behind the pillars appeared to be covered in tiny black dots although, given how far away they were, it was entirely possible they were covered in huge black dots. Light levels were comfortably bright in spite of no visible light source, which was hardly surprising as ambient light was the one thing pretty much every reality took a crack at. If she'd been in one cave with phosph.o.r.escent fungus, she'd been in fifty.

"So. Where are we?" she asked, a little surprised by how calm she sounded. They were no longer on the Otherside, either Otherside, that much and that much alone she was sure of. Well, that and how much she'd like to kick Lance.

"I don't know!"

Not exactly a surprise.

"What were you thinking when we went through the door?" Maybe calm wasn't exactly the right word. Tight was closer.

"That if I didn't get it right this time, you were going to give me h.e.l.l."

"This isn't h.e.l.l."

"How can you be so sure?" Lance demanded, turning to stare down at her with wide eyes.

"It's my job to be sure."

"Of h.e.l.l?"

"Of what isn't h.e.l.l." While he was thinking about that, she turned to face the doors. Doors were doors. Fifty feet high and solid gold, two feet high at the end of a rabbit hole, it didn't matter. If she could get them open and fit through over the threshold, she could use them. In this particular instance, getting them open might be tricky since the doork.n.o.bs were a good twenty feet above her head.

A quick glance around determined the area was unfortunately empty of a small table holding a bottle and a note that said, Drink me.

"Incoming!"

Does he have to sound so cheerful about it? Claire turned again and watched as two figures approached from the far end of the hall. Of course, since she couldn't see the far end of the hall that was an a.s.sumption only. Wherever they'd come from, they were moving fast.

Very fast.

Impossibly fast.

One moment they were barely visible in the distance. The next, they were standing barely two meters away.

On the left stood a cat-headed woman, barely covered from neck to ankles in a sheer linen shift. Her fur was pale brown with darker fur outlining golden eyes, lighter fur around the mouth, and two large pointed ears; both pierced, with a small gold ring in each.

On the right, a jackal-headed man, naked to the waist, wearing a pleated linen skirt held in place by a wide leather belt. Two small metal disks, stamped with hieroglyphs, hung from the front of the belt.

Do not go there, Claire warned herself. It doesn't matter what it looks like, just do not go there.

"I know where we are," Lance offered helpfully.

"So do I." When PhD candidates in Egyptology thought about h.e.l.l, they didn't think about Dante. Granted, neither did Keepers, but that was mostly because they preferred not thinking about h.e.l.l at all and they sure as ... heck . . . had no intention of handing it helpful definitions.

"They aren't dead," Anubis growled.

Bast shot him a disdainful golden glare. "And once again I marvel at your grasp of the obvious."

"If they aren't dead, why are they here?"

"Since they aren't dead, why don't we ask them? Or maybe you could fill in the details with a little b.u.t.t sniffing."

His eyes narrowed. "It doesn't work that way."

Claire bit her lip to keep from laughing. Apparently jackals were just as clueless about sarcasm as dogs. She'd seen Austin reduce Rottweilers to twitching bundles of confusion with only a few barbed comments about their bathroom habits. Of course, the chances were good Anubis didn't drink out of the toilet.

As though thoughts of Austin had pulled her attention, Bast turned the full force of her golden gaze on Claire. "You're a Keeper, but this isn't one of the realities you Keep. Why are you here?"

Lesson number one in dealing with G.o.ds: don't lie to them. "I'm trying to return to a situation on the Otherside, but circ.u.mstances have landed me with a Bystander and his thoughts keep turning the paths."

And the corollary to lesson one: keep it simple.

The cat G.o.ddess glanced over at Lance. "He holds his thoughts strongly?"

"Oh, yeah. Once he gets something into his head you can't shift it."

And right on cue: "I know why we're here. This is Meryat's work!

She's trying to stop me from stopping her by sending me to the Hall of Osiris!"

"Lance . . ."

"No! It all makes perfect sense!" He gripped her shoulder with one hand and waved the other around the Hall. "She's trying to cheat the afterlife by sending me ... us ... in her place."

"When the ka is strong enough . . ." Bast began.

"This ka has been bound between life and death for three thousand years," Lance interrupted. He ignored Claire's elbow in his ribs, interrupting G.o.ds was never a smart action in her experience, and continued. "As soon as it was freed, it sucked the life out of Dr. Rebik."

Anubis shrugged. "It happens."

"It does?"

"Sure. Not as much as it used to, though."

"But that's not what happened this time," Claire insisted. "I don't know about Dr. Rebik and the life-sucking part . . ." Although, given that Meryat was staying at the guest house, she really hoped Dean was right and Lance's lunatic theories were just that. Lunatic. She had to get back to the mall and Diana, so she'd have to trust Austin to keep Dean safe. "... but I do know exactly why we're here." She pointed at Lance. "Bystander. Path. Idiot."