Ageless

Chapter 7

There are few certainties in life, but one of them is this: No matter the culture, setting, time period, ethnicity, or even dimension, everybody shares a mutual hatred for waiting in lines.

As we neared the capital, the scene materialized before us. First the barrier surrounding the city: a tall, cream colored brick wall topped by a spiked fence. The once white bricks had yellowed over time, the discoloration starting at the bottom and creeping its way towards the spikes on top like untreated enamel. In front of it was a queue of travelers that seemingly stretched for miles, starting from the clay road and trailing down the right side of the wall off into the distance.

"Bugger that," Ko'sa said as she eyed the procession of irritated faces caught in the stationary line. "Come on, we're going to cut."

My gaze followed the line to the front, where a heavily armored patrol-man was barking at a young couple who appeared to be next to enter the city. The intensity of the interrogation had left the woman in tears, while the husband continued a heated discussion with the guard, both faces flushed with anger. "Um Ko'sa, I don't think they want us to-"

Ko'sa was already walking past the gate entrance and down the length of wall, to the left away from the line. "Don't worry, I know a guy. I bet he could get us in if we play our cards right. If you see a guard named Dalton, holler at him."

To the left of the road, I could see a row of stalls with brightly colored tarp roofs tucked up against the city wall. They clustered together to form a narrow makeshift alley, from which I could hear singing, laughing and the clinking of mugs. "How am I supposed to know what this Dalton looks like?"

"Look for any guards near the pop-up bazaars," she said. "It's illegal to sell goods and drink right outside the gate like this, but some of the guards turn a blind eye during festivals, long as you grease their pockets a bit." She smiled as people jostled past us, sloshing cold beer on our feet as they did so. "'Specially Dalton. Rules with an iron fist, that one. I'd bet my next haul he runs this section of the wall."

We began to weave through the bazaar. It smelled like stale beer and sweat mixed with a few other recognizable scents that I cared even less for. Everyone we passed looked red in the face and had a drink in their hand. In the gaps between the stalls, my eye caught a line of men squared up against the wall, relieving themselves as if it were a trough. I quickly turned away. "Festivals? But I thought this was a funeral?"

Ko'sa shrugged. "Just another reason to gather and drink. For most common folk, it's all the same. Our kind die all the time, and its not like any of them get a big fanfare."

She had a point, but I couldn't shake the feeling that there was something callous – even mildly sinister - about treating a funeral like a celebration. I remembered the look of disgust that the Broken Prince had given the travelers camp before robbing us all blind.

No wonder he hates us all, I thought.

Ko'sa began to skip through the market; she was in a good mood. After all, she was convinced that we would be embarking on the adventure of a lifetime once the funeral concluded.

Me? Not so much. Two nights ago, I had written a diary entry about my anxiety caused by leaving our tax returns to the last minute. Today, if I were to write a new entry, it might go as follows:

> Dear Diary,

> Today has been a real doozy. For starters, I was violently thrown into a new dimension before this morning's pot of coffee had even finished brewing. Since then, I've only gotten half a nights sleep, I haven't showered in two days and am still wearing the same filthy pair of pajamas, my feet are killing me, my throat is sore from being choked out by the She-Hulk, my phone has been stolen, and oh yeah, I found out that my now missing husband has allegedly lived a thousand years without me, married another woman, and garnered some kind of cult-following during his meteoric rise into a controversial dictator of some random medieval kingdom that apparently specializes in raising big demon horses, all of this occurring in-between brushing his teeth and putting in his contacts and without him providing any kind of explanation to his own wife, save for one note consisting of a hastily scrawled sentence ending with a winky face.