Morgan’s smile melted into a thin horizontal line. “I thought you would come up with a more original quip, but your denial was expected.”
“Where is your other pet gorilla?” Patrick asked, nodding toward Palin. “Has Devin finally given up hunting for your hostiam?”
Morgan reached for Palin’s blade and pricked her finger on its tip, drawing a bead of black fluid. “Because of your little shooting incident the last time you two met, I thought Devin would not control himself as well this time. If you decided to reject my demands, as I expect you will, Devin would kill you, and all would be lost.” She held out her hand, allowing a drop of thick blood to fall to the leaf-strewn grass. A wiggling brown sliver crawled out of the ground, like an earthworm squeezing up from a narrow hole. As it emerged, it lengthened to the size of a man’s foot, then doubled, constantly growing in girth, and, as it continued to stretch, one end morphed into the head of a snake.
Gabriel tried to grab the snake, but his fingers slipped right through it. He clenched his fists and screamed, “Help me! I don’t know what to do!” But his cry fizzled, unheard. Even the giant hill refused to reply with an echo.
Morgan grasped the snake and wrapped it around her shoulders and torso. Cradling its neck in her hand, she brought the hissing head closer to Patrick as he edged backwards. “So when we finally tracked you down,” she continued, “I sent Devin to make sure the place I prepared is ready for your daughter’s arrival.” She took a quick step toward Patrick, and the snake lunged and latched its fangs onto Shiloh’s forearm.
Shiloh screamed and shook her arm until the snake finally released her and dropped to the ground. Patrick stomped on its head with the heel of his boot, pounding it flat. Paili yanked Shiloh away and hustled her to the nearby oak tree.
Morgan shook her head in mock lament. “What a shame! Now I’ll have to take Shiloh with me.” She picked up the dead snake by the tail. “You see, I have the only cure for the serpent’s venom.”
As Paili tended to Shiloh’s wound, Patrick spat at Morgan’s feet, his face red and taut. “What good is she to you?” he shouted. “She can’t be your hostiam without my approval!”
Morgan wound the snake’s body into a ball and slung it into the thicket. “Don’t worry. I will keep her safe in the sixth circle until you change your mind. I’ll let you decide which is better for her. Will you let me take her body, or will you condemn her to live an eternity of tortured loneliness? For now, though, you have to answer a more urgent question. Will you allow the serpent’s venom to rot her flesh over the next three days until she suffers an excruciatingly painful death, or will you give her to me?”
Patrick shot her a threatening glare. “For healing only. Not as your hostiam.”
Morgan smirked. “I will accept that for now. It will amuse me to see how long it takes you to change your mind.”
Patrick ran to the tree and scooped Shiloh into his arms, whispering as he carried her back to Morgan. “Will you trust me, dearest angel?”
Amid dripping tears, Shiloh nodded. “Yes, Daddy.”
As Patrick gazed into her eyes, his own tears fell onto her dress. “Will you remember what I’ve taught you? Never lose faith, no matter how long it takes. Above all, never eat Morgan’s food. God will provide for all your needs.”
Shiloh shook her head. “I won’t forget, Daddy! I’ll never forget!”
Sapphira pointed at the screen. “Palin’s carrying Shiloh up the tor. Do you think Gabriel will be able to follow her?”
“To the sixth circle?” Acacia pinched her chin. “I doubt it. He’d have to cross dimensions again.”
“But Shiloh’s got the pendant with her. Maybe Gabriel can use it somehow to get through a portal.”
“Good point, but we’d better hush and listen. It’s hard to hear them.”
In the viewport, Patrick and Paili charged up the hill behind Palin. Morgan halted, waiting for the pursuers to close the gap. She knocked Patrick flat with a wall of blackness, then shoved Paili with her foot, sending her tumbling to the bottom. Patrick scrambled down and helped Paili to her feet. Now separated by the entire slope of the towering hill, Patrick yelled up at Shiloh. “I’ll send someone to find you. I promise!”
“I know you will, Daddy!” she called back. “I’ll be waiting!”
With Shiloh still draped across his arms, Palin crouched low in front of Morgan as the dark sorceress waved her hand over her head. A blinding light flashed across the viewport and covered the hill with a sparkling blanket of white.
A lump grew in Sapphira’s throat. Was Gabriel close enough to Morgan to follow her through the portal? Would the scene change to the other dimension? After a few seconds, the flash’s glow faded away, revealing the familiar sloping grass of the Glastonbury Tor.
Sapphira stamped her foot. “He didn’t follow!”
“Shiloh’s in big trouble.” Acacia turned to Sapphira. “Why did her father tell her not to eat Morgan’s food? Does he know about her poisonous fruit?”
Sapphira folded her hands in front of her lips. “Probably, but I don’t think Morgan would give it to her. She wants Shiloh to live.”
“So now, if she doesn’t disobey her father, she’ll starve.”
“Not if I can help it.” Sapphira withdrew the cross from her waistband. “I know how to get to the sixth circle.”
“How? When we go through the portal Morgan just used, we come out at our mining level, and the rest of the portals here are closed.”
Sapphira waved her hand across the screen, and it rolled up into a spinning orange column. “Not this one,” she said, nodding at the portal.
“That leads to Morgan’s swamp. I know you love wrestling with serpents, but it’s still not the sixth circle.”
Sapphira tightened her grip on the cross. “I got to the sixth circle from Morgan’s island. I can do it again.”
“Will you be able to get home?”
Sapphira stared at Acacia. The deep lines in her sister’s brow mirrored her own concern. Could she return? To get to the sixth circle, she had plunged through that strange hole in one of the three doors, so there was no way to climb back up. And she left the sixth circle through a portal that led to the floor of the deep chasm, but, even if it still worked, climbing the sheer cliff would be impossible. The only other option was to dive into the boiling magma river, but going through that portal would destroy Dragons’ Rest, if it didn’t destroy her first.
Acacia laid her hand on Sapphira’s cheek. “You don’t know how to get back, do you?”
“No,” Sapphira said, lowering her chin. “I don’t.”
Acacia leaned over and picked up a stack of folded denim next to her sleeping mat. “I guess we should wear blue jeans, shouldn’t we?”
“For what?”
Acacia handed Sapphira a pair of jeans and kept another pair for herself. “For our journey to the sixth circle. Our skirts aren’t exactly suitable for tromping through snake-infested swamp water.”
“Right, but we don’t know how ”
“To get back. I know. A minor detail.” Acacia slipped her jeans on. “We’ll just create a new portal somewhere and see where it goes.”
Sapphira pulled up her own jeans. “But what if it’s dangerous? We can’t risk Shiloh’s life.”
“Easy.” Acacia pinched the snap closed. The faded jeans hung loosely on her narrow hips. “We’ll return by ourselves, and then, if it’s safe, we’ll go back to get her.”
“Okay.” Sapphira fastened her own baggy jeans, castaway pants from a beggars’ bin. “But in case we can’t get back,” she continued, tucking away the cross, “I want to bring her some food that’ll last a long time.” Sapphira ran to the museum and plucked one of the smallest white clusters from the branches, now plentiful in the midst of the lush greenery, some as large as a small melon. As she hustled to the portal, she carefully slipped the fruit into her jeans pocket.
“Do you think you can keep it dry in the swamp?”