The War of Elevens| Book 1 of the Space Thief Chronicles

Chapter 9| A Palace Rises From the Pond

Lilly fell sideways.

Falling sideways is a little like walking on your hands: there is an awkward flip of perception and an intense rush of blood to the head. Weight is thrust upon a part of the body that has never bluntly acknowledged gravity's extra attention—in Lilly's case, from her torso up. Her thoughts scrambled for four agonizing seconds before her shoulder crashed into soft ground.

Was it logical she had fallen sideways after dropping feet-first into the gate?

She was dizzy, and a muddy mess of colors swam in her vision. Rubbing her shoulder, she stumbled to her feet and waited for her vision to melt back into focus. When it did, she saw that she was in some sort of tunnel, the sides and the ground composed of blue vines. Thick, cloudy slime oozed between the cracks of the plants.

She stomped. Her sneakers squelched in vine-slime.

Behind her was a long, endless stretch of wet blue plant life with no visible end.

Ahead of her, a bright light. An oval of silver in the distance.

Bring it on.

Lilly ran for it.

The silver was blinding, piercing through the dimness of the tunnel. She squeezed her eyes shut and kept running like a horse raging headfirst into battle—suddenly, the ground turned hard and sent her staggering forward. She had barely opened her eyes and thrust her arms out for balance before hands clamped around both her arms. Shapes materialized, went out of focus, sharpened again. The sounds were murky and chaotic and gave her a headache. As the hands spun her around, Lilly finally registered something.

Orange circular eyes.

Lilly gasped as her mind began to take in the rest of her surroundings. A very odd face filled her field of vision; it was young, with eyes that took up half her face, a tiny upturned nose shaped like a J, and a small mouth the color of pearls (white lips!)—the face looked like a caricature.

The owner of this interesting face gasped and said something in a language Lilly didn't understand.

"I don't...I can't..." Lilly stammered.

The girl's small hand flew up to Lilly's mouth. Lilly jerked back, but the girl's other hand pressed into the knob of Lilly's skull. She shoved something hard and seed-like through Lilly's lipa. Lilly swallowed, yanked away from the girl's hands, and spluttered.

"I've never seen so much blue blood on a person before," the girl said.

Lilly looked up. The rest of the environment still hadn't quite come into focus yet. Everything was dark and the shapes in her vision swam.

"Language pill," the girl explained. "So you can understand everyone. They're a prototype made by Bloom scientists. They have an expiration date of six months, so you should be okay for the rest of the summer."

Lilly pressed a hand to the base of her throat. Language pills?

"Corpsa!" a shrill voice shrieked from behind the girl. "I need her now! The water's cold!"

"Oh!" The girl, Corpsa, grabbed Lilly's wrist and pulled her forward. The room spun again, and this time, Lilly could tell what things were. Sheer rippling fabric took the place of walls, so Lilly figured she was in some sort of large tent. There were orange curtains that divided this tent into several cubicles, and Lilly realized with a start that half the people scrambling around had wings sprawling out of their backs. Their wings were so thin, Lilly wondered that if she touched them her fingernails would rip through the delicate fiber. They were fragile, gorgeous fascinations, butterfly-shaped and dragonfly-fast in the way they fluttered and flapped about.