What if every magical creature you'd ever heard of was real, driven into hiding by an army of violent zealots? This is reality for Sarah Heisen and Porter Collins. Sarah is a sphinx living a life of luxury in her family's mansion. Hidden from all da...
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Chapter Twenty Three
(Porter)
"You weren't expecting this, were you?"
Porter groaned and opened his eyes to find himself lying face down on a cold stone floor. His head throbbed with pain, and pinpricks of light danced in front of him when he sat up.
"Where am I?" he groaned, rubbing the side of his head.
The room was tiny, he realized. Even now, sitting upright, his feet still touched the wall at the other end of the room. The only light came from a small crack in the floor to his left, right at the base of the wall...
Wait a minute, he thought, standing up. That's a door!
"Hello?" Porter shouted, rapping his fist against it. The door was made of the same stone as the walls and floor, it seemed. "Who's there? Where am I?"
Silence was his only answer, and after a minute Porter sat down against the wall again. By the light coming in under the door, it looked like he was alone in the room. There wasn't even a bed to lie on.
"Where am I?" Porter asked for the third time. His headache spiked again in reply. With a groan, Porter covered his face with his hands. "Why is it that whenever I have a headache, I wake up somewhere weird?"
At least he hadn't lost his memory this time. Ignoring the pain, Porter thought back to the last thing he could remember. He, Sarah, and Tick had made it to Jellaska Kob Lertan, hadn't they? Yeah, he could remember that much. They'd found the city deserted, but then—
Mythics everywhere. Sarah and Tick taken away. Porter fighting. Pain...
"Oh, crap," Porter whispered as realization finally struck him.
"What went wrong?" A voice asked out of the darkness.
Porter's head shot up and he looked around. The room was dark, but it wasn't so big that somebody could have hidden from him.
"Who's there?" the young man demanded.
There was silence for a few seconds, and then a cruel laugh came out of the shadows.
"I'll tell you what went wrong."
A cold sweat broke out on Porter's brow. He didn't need to ask who it was, he already knew. A figure materialized in the corner of the room, its silhouette even darker than the shadows around it. It stepped forward, into the dim light, and Porter had to fight to keep himself from shuddering.
Other Porter grinned at him. "Your best friend Sarah, that wonderful little sphinx you promised to always protect... she betrayed you."
For a moment Porter forgot his fear, and he stood up. "You're lying," he said, his face burning with anger.
Other Porter spread his arms mockingly. "Am I? Look at where you are! How could you have ended up here if she hadn't allowed it?"
