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Carlos followed, blinking at the unexpected light, with Mal bringing up the rear. When they were all through, the door slammed with a bang and vanished. Carlos unrolled a new map. “This must be the Haunted Desert,” he said. “It says the Cobra’s Cave is somewhere in the Dunes of Sorrow.”
Jay looked around. There wasn’t much to see, just a whole lot of desert, and wave after wave of sand dunes. “This must be my territory. It looks a little like what my dad always told me about Agrabah. Although something tells me we won’t find any magic lamps, friendly genies, or flying carpets here.”
“Too bad. I’d take any of those over that weird pink thing we just avoided,” said Mal.
“Any chance the talisman is made of sand?” asked Evie as she scooped up a handful, letting the grains shift and fall between her fingers. “Since that’s all there is here.”
“Of course it’s not made of sand,” said Jay.
The wind blew across the dunes, howling like a coyote. But underneath its screech was another sound: a deep, slithering hum.
“There!” said Jay, pointing to a wrinkle in the sand. “It’s moving.” The wrinkle headed toward them, and the four of them jumped away as it passed directly underneath their feet.
“Maybe your talisman is made of sand,” said Mal.
“It’s not made of sand,” repeated Jay, exasperated now.
“That’s all I see here,” said Mal, refusing to let go of the joke.
“Weren’t you listening? Oh, wait, I forgot, you weren’t because you were too busy running after Mad Maddy and getting yourself thrown off a bridge,” said Jay. “Yen Sid said it was a Golden Cobra.”
He watched the movement in the sand as it slithered away—hold on…slithered? Before he could explain to his friends, Jay ran after the wriggling line. There was only one thing it could be, and when the line popped out of the dunes, he saw the Golden Cobra rear its ugly head.
The snake hissed, showing its forked tongue. It was the same golden color as the apple Evie had picked earlier.
“I think he’s found his talisman,” said Carlos as they ran to keep up with Jay, who was chasing the snake.
Jay was fast, but the snake was faster. It slithered across the sand, its golden scales shimmering in the light, while Jay kept stumbling and sinking in the dunes. Jay might be the best runner on the tourney field, but the desert definitely wasn’t the ideal location for chasing an evil creature.
The cobra crested a ridge and Jay tried to follow, but when he reached the top, the snake was nowhere to be found.
“Great, it’s gone,” said Mal, who, along with Evie and Carlos, had been stumbling along after Jay. “What does the map say?”
“It says the Golden Cobra has a cave,” said Carlos. “We could check that out, but it doesn’t really say where it is.”
“Some map,” said Mal, crossing her arms across her chest.
They scanned the desert landscape, looking for any sign of the cobra, but it seemed to have disappeared completely. The heat wasn’t helping either, and when the wind picked up, it blew sand at them, clouding their vision and biting their skin like little flies.
“We shouldn’t have left for the Catacombs before the maps were done,” said Mal, crumpling the piece of paper in frustration.
“We didn’t have a choice,” said Carlos. “And remember, we’ve got to find the talismans before our parents do.”
“My parent is a lizard trapped in a glass-covered pedestal,” said Mal.
“Maybe,” said Carlos. “Or your parent is a purple dragon that’s been plaguing Camelot.”
“Guys, stop fighting, it’s not helping with my poison headache,” said Evie as she massaged her temples.
Mal and Carlos apologized, and the four of them continued to look for any sign of the elusive cobra.
“One good thing about that toxic tree,” said Evie. “At least it stayed still.”
“There!” Jay yelped. “I see it! I think that’s a cave!” He pointed to what looked like a pile of stones in between two dunes in the distance. He ran down the ridge, his friends following behind.
They stood in front of the rocks, which were stacked together tightly. But a small gap between two of the larger ones looked like it could be an opening into a cavern.
“Wonderful, a cave within a cave,” said Evie.
