5. Still walking #2
I hide my smile. I don’t want to make Sir feel bad as I suggest, “You could just go around it.”
He ignores me. Okay. So maybe he can’t understand me, but he sure has some determination as he tries a third time.
Sir gets a better grip this go-round. With a fierce, little growl, he hauls himself onto the rock, stands proudly at the top, then hops off the other side, bounding toward something in the distance.
I watch him go, a small, sad smile playing on my lips.
That was a lot of effort for something kind of unnecessary, and while I’m proud that Sir didn’t give up, I’m not so sure that I can follow his example.
It’s barely been one day—now that’s almost night—and I don’t know how much longer I can do this.
At first, I was amazed that I somehow found myself in the middle of a portal fantasy. Like, magic is real. How awesome is that? Well, it would be a lot more awesome if I could find another portal and hop right back home.
Look at me. I’m not in a position to judge whatever makes Sir happy.
I followed a puppy through a mirror because I thought he was in danger.
Now I’m lost in a magical world, worrying about what sort of monsters might be watching me where I can’t see them, and there’s no way for me to go home yet if I can believe Cassandra.
And I do. Don’t know why—maybe because I always felt bad for Cassndra, princess of Troy, whenever I read The Odyssey—but when she told me that I won’t be able to leave until I do whatever it takes to summon a portal out of this place, I believed her.
I’m also freaking out that no one back home has any idea what happened to me.
Did Mr. Z and his wife miss their trip when I didn’t show up to use their cabin and camp on their grounds? What about Daph? Has she completely lost it, worrying about me since I never got the chance to send her that proof of life pic?
My phone is on the floor beside the mirror.
I dropped it before I fell through, so Daphne’s text is still unanswered.
She’s probably asleep by now. At least, I hope she is.
Otherwise she might start calling, and when I don’t answer, she’ll assume I’m dead, kidnapped, or trapped beneath a piece of furniture because I attempted to move it by myself.
She won’t guess that I fell into a magical mirror, and maybe that’s a blessing.
Daphne is open-minded in some ways. She believes people can change if they prove they deserve another chance.
She believes love is real, even though she says romance is mostly manipulation with flowers attached.
She believes in hard work, and that there’s a glass ceiling that she’ll bust through, even if she has to kick it in with one of her stilettos.
Magic portals?
That might be a hard sell. Though, after what I’ve seen since I landed here, I could probably send her a picture of Sir breathing fire and she’d accuse me of using a filter.
The only way she would ever admit that magic was real was if she came to this side of the mirror herself, and there’s no way that’s going to happen…
“Maybe we should find shelter,” I call out to Sir because speaking, whether he can understand me or not, makes me feel a tiny bit better.
“Or people. Nice people, preferably. No more witches who speak in riddles. Definitely no monsters. Maybe someone who might be able to tell me what the hell is going on more than ‘surprise, you’re a goddess, good luck!’. ”
Sir’s yip is all the answer I get, and since it sounds a little too far away, I start moving again.
I nod to myself. “Okay. You’re right. That last one might be asking too much.”
He barks, louder this time, if still not that close to where I am.
I jog after him. There are too many things to process, so I decide not to process any of them. That has always been one of my more useful talents. When life becomes overwhelming, I focus on whatever problem I can solve right now while wearing a big grin and showing off my can-do attitude.
At the moment, that means staying with the puppy, so I do.
To my surprise, the forest thins gradually until the trees open onto a river.
At least, I think it’s a river. I hear Sir’s delighted yip, happy that I found him perched along the river snaking in front of us.
It’s wide, the water tinkling softly, but…
I don’t know. This late, the water looks black.
None of the stars reflect in its slow-moving current.
Apart from a… oh, goodness. Is that a whirlpool over there?
Apart from the freaking whirlpool just beyond a row of big boulders shining in the moonlight, it’s eerily still.
Estige, murmurs Persephone. His hound has brought us right to him.
Yeah. I don’t like the way she said that. Don’t know who he is, and I can just guess that, by “hound”, she means Sir, but the trepidation mixed with excitement in her lyrical voice has me backing away from the river instead of inching closer to it.
I hold my hands up. Sir tilts his head, letting out a soft whine. I grimace, turning away so that I can pretend like I don’t instinctively understand that the fire-eyed puppy seems to think I’m going to follow him into that whirlpool.
A mirror is one thing. A whirlpool into—
Estige, supplies Persephone again. It’s an entrance to the Underworld.
What the—
Yeah, no.
Sorry, pup.
I turn, and I do a double-take when I notice that I see… I see smoke. Wisps of grey smoke that are reaching into the night’s sky before it vanishes. I take a deep breath. Over the scent of flowers, I smell fire.
Fire might mean people. People could mean help.
Unless they’re, like, cannibals or something.
I know enough fairy tales to realize there’s always a chance of cannibals. Are there cannibals in Greek mythology? Remembering the cyclops we just managed to avoid earlier, I’m reminded of Polyphemus.
Oh, yeah. He was a meat-eater, wasn’t he?
Sir sees the smoke, too, at the same time that I do. Leaping from the boulder he was perched on, waiting for me, he barks at me once before taking off through the clearing.
He wants us to stay while he checks for danger, muses Persephone. Though what he’s going to do when he’s that small, I can’t say. I’m sure he’s transformed for your sake, but, really, if he’s here to guard us, he should have at least a second head.
What?
I’m tired. I’m achy. When I said I wanted an adventure, I was good with glamping in Mr. Z’s cabin. This might be a step too far for me, and that was before I lost my mind and started hearing a voice that, honestly, isn’t making any sense right now.
That tiny little pup guarding us? No. I have to make sure Sir is okay, and I call out in a soft voice, “Wait for me,” hoping he heard me.
He doesn’t. Or, if Sir did, he definitely doesn’t listen.
I hurry after him, heading toward the smoke since I’m pretty sure that’s where the puppy went.
The ground is muddier here in between the trees, and more flowers bloom in my wake, but I barely notice them.
I’m too busy trying not to lose sight of Sir while telling myself that meeting another person is a good thing.
Cassandra gave me riddles. Aria disappeared after her hero did; so distracted by that interaction, I didn’t even think to ask her for help. I probably would’ve been eaten by that cyclops if he caught me… how much worse can this be?
And if you thought I didn’t jinx myself with that question, you haven’t been paying attention.