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A FIRE-WORLD OF molten lava met her gaze when she was spit out of the portal, and she hovered, looking for a place where she could stand.
There wasn’t any.
Spouts of clay—opening mouths no larger than three or four feet in width—covered the landscape and spit sprays of red, burning puke. These geysers were scattered as far as she could see and spewed their insides at regular intervals. Fire sparks exploded as they burped hot, black, crusted lava. She thought of the geysers at Yellowstone when she looked at them, except this landscape was red, as was the sky above.
Jazz adjusted her inner temperature just as Trevor had taught her, and she remained calm in the face of what could be a horrible death. She had to find a way out of this dimension. Would Trevor find her?
She took a breath, and it burned to the taste. She was in serious trouble.
She said out loud, “Hey, Trev, trouble here—come and get me.” She then tried the mind link and repeated, Hey, Trev … now would be a real good time. Nothing. No response. Was he okay? Oh, please let him be okay. She looked around and added another request: Please let me be okay.
How could Trevor find her when she didn’t know where she was? She needed a Fae GPS system. Good idea; she would talk to him about one.
She felt a moment of panic and calmed herself again. Yup, she was in trouble because she knew he would have no way of knowing into just which dimension the portal had taken her. The iron had neatly shut the portal down.
Right. Well, she couldn’t hang out over these hot mud tubs forever, now could she? She had to do something.
She scanned the horizon and discovered something interesting. Was it a mirage?
She took a series of ‘jump shifts’ in the air, careful not to touch ground, and after what she assumed was about fifteen or so minutes found herself at the edge of a cliff.
At the bottom of the cliff was a narrow, bubbling foam of water, and it was moving with a great deal of speed. Were there rocks beneath the foam? Was it too far to jump shift? Was foaming water better than hot lava? Ah, yeah … at least, she hoped so.
Across the divide was what looked like a forest that had seen better days. Could she jump shift the distance—would it be cooler there? The trees were black and dead and the earth charred, but at least the lava-spitting geysers would no longer be a threat.
She came lightly down from her hovering position and found the earth beneath her boots very hot. She did an ‘ooh-ahh dance’ a few times before she remembered her internal temperature. Still, her shoes weren’t made for this heat. She was going to have to make it to the other side sooner than later.
She heard Trevor’s voice as he’d whispered to her just this morning, Think about where you are going … think hard, and your mind, which has the science, will pull up the coordinates for you. Think, my sweet.
“Okay, Trev … I’m thinking,” she said and set her goal to shift to the other side of the ravine.
She didn’t quite make it!
* * *
Trevor realized too late what Pestale had done.
The portal they could see was not the one Pestale meant to use. It was a diversion. The other portal was hidden down the long corridor.
The iron had depleted his ability to sense the other opening, and no doubt Pestale had installed a magical wall around it earlier, bringing the attention to the portal his Jazmine Decker had just flung herself into.
Where would it take her? He was damn sure it wasn’t to the Human Realm. It had been a trick.
He had felt the real portal before he had seen it. The Gypsy spell had not fooled Pestale earlier. The Dark Prince had known all along that they were there watching, and he had put on quite a show.
Trevor shifted and tried to spell the portal closed, but its mouth just continued to widen, like a dark funhouse grin.
The numbers of Unseelie were too great for him to cut down. Pestale and his two brothers were surrounded by their grotesque brethren, and he would not be able to get to them.
He had to hope that the queen would locate this opening and get to it in time on the other side, for already Pestale, his brothers, and Queen Morrigu were stepping inside its swirling chamber with a flood of Unseelie at their backs.
And his sweet beloved—where was she? He called for the Orb, and as he stood in the now empty dungeon, for the portal had sucked in the last of the army that Pestale had called upon, he demanded, “Show me—where is my mate?”
“In trouble, my Prince,” the Orb said as its gray cloud cleared and showed Trevor Jazmine Decker falling into a rushing, foaming river.
He closed his eyes and whispered in his mind, Jazmine Decker … hear me, beloved, hear me … hover, before you hit the water, hover … you can do that.
And then the gray cloud returned inside the Orb.
