Bryan Davis - Eye of the Oracle

Acacia’s face twisted in pain. “My leg’s on fire!”

Sapphira brushed a strand of hair from Acacia’s forehead. “It’s the venom. I can see red lines crawling up your skin.”

“My heart!” Acacia gasped. “It’s jumping like crazy.”

Sapphira whispered for the cross to darken and laid it on Acacia’s chest. “Don’t die on me, now. Just hang on.”

Acacia’s voice fell to a whisper as she labored through convulsive breaths. “Morgan said. . she has the only cure.”

“Morgan’s a liar!” Sapphira dug into her pocket and retrieved the fruit. “Maybe this will help.”

“But we said. . we weren’t going to eat it unless. . we were starving.”

“You’re not going to eat it.” Sapphira squeezed the fruit between her palms. Now that it was wet, it smashed easily into a thick, pasty poultice. She held the mash in her palm and picked up her cross again. “I’m going to rub this stuff in, but first, I’m going to open up the wound a bit more to make sure it gets into your bloodstream.”

“What makes you think. . this will work?”

“It healed the rash on my palm, so I think it’s worth a try.” Bringing the cross near Acacia’s ankle, she whispered, “A small flame, please, right at the tip.” The top of the cross ignited with a conical flame. “Okay,” she said, looking back at Acacia. “This is really going to hurt.”

“Go ahead. It can’t hurt more than it already does.”

Sapphira pushed the tip of the fire into one of the puncture wounds on Acacia’s ankle.

“Aaaauuugh!” Acacia gritted her teeth. Her words barely punched through. “Okay. . I was. . wrong.”

“Shhh! The dog might show up.” The flame sliced a nearly bloodless gash, the heat cauterizing most of the vessels as they blistered open. With the wound now raw and gaping, Sapphira rubbed in the poultice, hoping she could massage it into Acacia’s bloodstream.

Her entire body trembling, Acacia bit her shirt and let out a muffled scream.

Sapphira grimaced. “I’m sorry. I have no idea if I’m doing this right. I’m no surgeon, you know.”

“No kidding.” Acacia shook even harder, but after a few seconds, her tremors subsided, and she let out a long sigh.

Sapphira kept her hand over the wound. Heat radiated through the mash and stung her palm. “Is it feeling better?”

“A little. Now it’s more like Nabal’s whip hitting me on the ankle about a thousand times.”

Sapphira lifted her hand. The goop had turned pink, but a small white spot stood out in the mixture. She plucked out a tough, yet flexible bead about the size of a baby’s tooth. Tiny red stripes encircled the bead three times.

“The fruit had a seed in the middle,” Sapphira said, stuffing it into her pocket. “I’ll save it for later.”

“So what are we going to do now? We don’t have any food to give Shiloh.”

“I guess I’ll tell her I’ll come back once I create a safe portal.”

“Okay.” Acacia folded her hands over her waist. “I’ll wait here for you.”

“No. If Morgan doesn’t find you, that dog probably will.”

Acacia pushed up to a sitting position. “Then I’ll go with you.”

Sapphira touched Acacia’s leg just above her wound. “You have to drop through a hole and land pretty hard. I don’t think your leg could handle it.”

“Okay,” Acacia said. “Do you have a plan?”

“I thought of a way you might be able to go home without fighting those snakes again.”

“Go on. I’m listening.”

Sapphira nodded toward Morgan’s castle at the top of the hill. “Remember the three doors I told you about in the dungeon up there? Usually one of them opens to a dimension I’ve been to before. Elam, Gabriel, and I went through a portal we found there and ended up at Patrick’s mansion.”

“So you think I can find the exit portal?”

“It’s easy. A skeleton marks the spot.”

“A skeleton?” Acacia rolled her eyes. “Wonderful. Sounds like a safe place.”

“Don’t worry. It seemed safe while we were there, and I’ll help you.” Sapphira stood and held out her hand for Acacia. “Think you can walk?”

Acacia pulled up on Sapphira’s hand and tested her ankle. “Maybe. We’ll see.”

Sapphira helped Acacia sneak up to Morgan’s house. Sapphira had to climb into the window by herself, but since no one seemed to be home, she unlocked the door from the inside, and the two of them took their time descending the dungeon’s staircase.

As darkness flooded their surroundings, Sapphira reignited the cross. When they arrived at the lantern gateway, she illuminated and extinguished the lanterns in the usual numbered sequence, and the gate creaked open. Acacia leaned heavily against Sapphira as they passed through. Every few seconds, she breathed a muffled groan.

“Are you going to make it?” Sapphira asked.

Acacia sat down in front of the trio of doors and extended her sore ankle. “I’ll rest while you open the doors.”

When Sapphira swung open the first door, the endless field of grass appeared. Stepping over to the second, she turned the handle and opened it more slowly. Behind this one, she found the hole that led to the sixth circle. “Here’s my door,” she said.

As she crept toward the third door, her hand trembled. This had to be the forest! It just had to be! She reached for the knob and slung the door open. Tropical trees arched over a winding dirt path that slipped under dozens of low-hanging vines. She spun around and dramatically swept her arms toward the doorway. “Acacia, I give you the path home.”

Acacia rose slowly to her feet and hobbled toward Sapphira. “Well, it’s not the wardrobe to Narnia, but it’ll do.”

Sapphira helped Acacia limp along the path until she got her bearings. Running ahead, she located the portal and searched through the ferns until she found an extra long bone. She plunged it into the earth next to the skeleton and hustled back to Acacia.

“Okay,” Sapphira said, catching her breath. “When you pass the fifth tree on the right, turn ninety degrees and you’ll see a grassy mound. The portal is about fifty paces on the other side. I stuck a bone in the ground to make it easy to find. Just open the portal and you’ll fall into Patrick’s house. You can take your time, but I want to hurry back and find Shiloh.”

Acacia embraced Sapphira, then pulled away and pressed her finger into her sister’s chest. “Don’t take any chances. If I don’t see you by tomorrow, I’m coming to find you.”

“Fair enough,” Sapphira replied. “Did you bring your sunglasses?”

“No. I don’t have a hat, either.”

“I guess you’ll have to go anyway.” Sapphira combed her fingers through Acacia’s white locks. “With the styles I’ve seen in Glastonbury lately, no one’s going to say anything about your hair. If you keep your head down, maybe no one will notice your eyes. Just walk slowly.”

Acacia grinned. “Yes, Mother.”

Sapphira turned and headed toward Morgan’s dungeon, frequently glancing at Acacia as she limped down the path.

The doorway back to the dungeon seemed to hang in the air, suspended a foot or so from the ground by an invisible force. Sapphira jumped into it and hurried to the middle door. Standing at the edge, she gazed down into the darkness. “Okay,” she said out loud, grasping the cross. “Don’t think about it. Just jump.” Closing her eyes, she leaped in.

Squatting low, Acacia rubbed her finger across a jewel mounted in the skeleton’s belt. How strange that the man’s flesh would rot, while the leather in the belt showed no signs of decay.

A deep voice pierced the silence. “There are many mysteries in the land of the dead.”