20 Heroes: Emilian IV

Eighth in our Heroes series, by our own Robert Rhodes. Art is courtesy of Leonid Kozienko. Commenters are entered to win Changes by Jim Butcher.

The high grasses of the prairie thinned after he passed the final milestone. They grew shorter, sparser, before fading into cracked soil and dust. The desert began where the eroded stones of the road ended, and with them, the Empire that had been his.

Forty-five days ago, before dawn, he slipped through a false panel in his private library.


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