Page 69 of The Princess Tied

“Ahhh. Well he did tell the coffin maker to throw himself off a roof. I applaud you, little one.”

Po stood straight, inhaled, and decided she was ready to keep running. “His name is Ruff.”

“Come, we cannot stop here.” Ruth said. “If we continue to the opposite wall, there is a long tunnel then a place where I can wedge the entrance shut and perhaps make the ceiling collapse.”

They alternated between walking and jogging toward the line of doors. These stood by themselves without any wall to support them. By taking a sideways steps, she could see both front and back of most, though the first door, which stood in rippled sand, vanished if seen from the back.

The second door was actually the front of a tall wardrobe and was covered with carved ornamentation. A lion’s head was also carved into the timber.

The third door was dark blue and had signs all over that said things that did not make sense:

POLICE PUBLIC CALL BOX

A glass object like a lantern perched above. What was a police box? Or a public call? It was puzzling, but she memorized the sign. Perhaps one day she could return to do research.

The fourth door was a grungy, paneled, white door with chains crisscrossing it. Clearly it was not safe to open according to the scrawled handwritten sign:

DO NOT GO OUT.

She decided not to ever touch that one.

The fifth door was small, white, and knee height, and seemed to be a cupboard. In the lock was a gold key with red ribbon attached.

The next one was purple with a large square, but opaque, window in the top half, and an attached box with a slot. With more writing on another sign: TOLLBOOTH. She shook her head. Another mystery.

Po peered ahead of her, looking for perils, holes, and sundry monsters. These lost places always had monsters, or so she’d heard. Dust was underfoot, as well as small rocks that must have fallen from the ceiling a mile overhead.

To take her mind off the dangers, she asked Ruth, “These are the Doors of Derayagungun?”

The round one she was passing was set into the floor and had a lid with a rabbit engraved on it. It seemed obvious what they were—magical doors—yet they were quiescent and showed no sign of activity.

“Yes. When I was young and small, I played here. The dwarfs unearthed them while extending our city. I went through this one.” She pointed.

A few doors ahead, a door possessed a faint, unearthly light that limned the frame.

“So this was why you began to grow?”

“Yes.”

So, the doors were only mostly dead.

“I usually don’t say the truth of how it happened. There are those who would believe these doors are something to be dug up and sold. I don’t even know if you can move them…”

The tramp of boots following had grown louder yet. How was it the Storyteller gained on them?

Po turned to jog backward. Looking above at where they might be on the stairs, she glimpsed the hurried flash of legs or feet, or perhaps of tentacles. They too carried someone, gliding him downward. She had no doubt it was the Storyteller.

The Thulians were swift and had lent their master their speed.

“We must go faster!” she urged. “They are gaining on us!”

Shades groaned then paused, chest heaving. “Here.” He handed Xander to Ruth and swiped his arm across his forehead. As he turned again to run, a voice boomed out from behind them, reverberating, sinking into their flesh, their bones, their minds.

“Stop! You will wait for me.”

Though she heard Xander cry out No, she turned and waited with John and Ruth and Shades.

As the boots descended all the way to the ground floor and as the people who owned those feet tramped closer, she stayed in place. Feet wedged, glued, stuck.