Nevermore: A Cal Leandros Novel (38 page)

It is time to go.

No one could fight and win against a god. Not even the three of them. Not by themselves.

Not alone.

I hadn’t been alone fighting for my life in the gray room.

I hadn’t heard them, but they’d been there for me the entire time. They’d fought for me harder than I was able to fight for myself. On that first and last day in one, the day that had counted above all the rest, they had never left me alone.

It is time to go.

And I was not going to leave them alone either.

No one could defeat Tyr?

It is time to go.

Damn straight, it was time to go. I slammed the cottage door on that boring and bland painting of a Thomas Kinkade clichéd misty meadow. Then I turned back into the cottage, moving from where I’d come. There was a door other than the one that led to the wet green silver grass. This was a door that was supposed to open once then lock behind you. Fortunately for me, I’d been picking locks since I was five years old and I didn’t care if they were solid or goddamn metaphysical. If I wanted that door open, then, by God, it would fucking open if only to let me prove Goodfellow wrong.

No one could defeat a god? What about the First who were born before them? Ruled before them? Invented murder, death, and war before them?

No one could defeat a god?

Good. I didn’t want to simply defeat him. I wanted him dead. Could someone kill a god when he was born of the First? Could he with all he’d learned from the First? Even if he wasn’t quite a First himself, not entirely.

I grabbed for the handle of the door I didn’t remember coming through.

No one could defeat a god.

We’d
fucking
see about that.

The second part of the story will continue in the next Cal Leandros novel, coming in winter 2016 from Roc.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Rob Thurman
is the
New York Times
bestselling author of the Cal Leandros novels, including
Slashback
and
Doubletake
, the Trickster novels, including
The Grimrose Path
and
Trick of the Light
, the Korsak Brothers novels, including
Basilisk
and
Chimera
, and several stories in various anthologies.

For updates, teasers, music videos, deleted scenes, social networking (the time-suck of an author’s life), and various other extras such as free music and computer wallpaper, visit the author online.

CONNECT ONLINE

robthurman.net

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