It still hung there as Lord Leighton, the computer, the whole gloomy chamber snapped out of existence in a single moment. There was no light or sound, no sense of heat or cold. Blade was alone in a lightless, soundless, senseless void, motionless, speechless. Nothing registered on his senses except Zulekia's face in front of him.
Then the face flared brightly, the gold hues of her skin turning luminous. It rose to incandescence, flickered, and was gone. The void was all around Blade, and a chill of utter loneliness entered his bones. In a single moment all awareness left him.
Chapter 3
Blade came back to consciousness several feet up in the air. He landed with a thud and rolled down a grassy slope, arms and legs flailing wildly. At the bottom he crashed against a small tree, picking up a few more bruises, then lay quietly.
Gradually the splitting pain in his head and the ringing in his ears faded away. Now he heard the thin moan of wind sweeping past from vast distances, the creak of strained trees, the whispering ripple of wind-blown grass, the chirrrrr of a bird or an insect.
Off to his right a mighty range of hills sprawled across the horizon, towering against a pale blue sky where white wisps of clouds raced before the wind. Blade sat up, and perspective returned to his vision in a moment.