Whatever anxiety I had about seeing Aurum again melted away as I wandered toward the bright vortex.
“Hold on a minute, we’re not going the same place you visited last time. I need to work some of my soul magic.”
Soul magic?
I didn’t know what Skye was talking about, but I stopped to let her do her thing.
A look of concentration overtook her face, and after about half a minute of silence she lifted an arm toward the portal. A tendril of white light leaked from her fingertips and leisurely floated through the air. When the light reached the vortex, the whole portal pulsed and then turned a beautiful lavender shade.
Wow.
“All right, now we’re ready,” she said.
“What did you just do?” I asked.
“I changed this portal’s destination to a new location in Avalon. It’s only temporary though, so we should get going.” With that, she bounced forward and then jumped into the portal ahead of me. I only paused a moment before following after her.
There was a tug at my navel, a serene feeling spread over me as a golden light flashed, and then my feet hit the ground. I looked up and gasped. I was standing in the middle of the most beautiful meadow I’d ever seen. It was like I’d been transported to New Zealand or something. Tall grasses and lavender bushes blew in the wind as the flat meadow gave way to a hill. Off to the left was a giant mountain with a trickling waterfall. It was so peaceful I could lie down and take a nap right here.
“Hello, Tatum.” Aurum’s voice pulled my attention to my right. He stood before me fully covered in battle gear, and I gulped. Skye was at his side, hand on a weapon, and I was shocked to see that she was no longer semi-transparent but looked fully corporeal.
“Skye, you’re…”
She grinned. “This is how I look here. How all Watchers look when we pass from the Earth realm and return home.”
Whoa.
“Hey.” I waved shyly at Aurum.
Aurum nodded to me and then stepped forward, lifting up his paw before slamming it to the ground. The grass shook, and suddenly metal walls grew up from the soil and started to stack sky-high.
What the…?
I ducked, crouching in case one of the panels fell on me. One by one, the pieces of steel stacked on top of each other, creating a dome around us and only stopping to leave the top open for natural light. We were now encased in a giant stadium of sorts, and I no longer felt like a peaceful nap was on the agenda. Armor suddenly appeared on my body as well, seemingly out of nowhere.
What kind of crazy Avalon magic is this?
“Welcome to the arena,” Aurum bellowed. “Here you will go through simulations and training to prepare you for the task ahead.”
I was already tired just thinking about it. Couldn’t we have some coffee and just get to know each other first? He was jumping right into the hard stuff, and my muscles were still sore from my sparring session with Marlow.
“The task of freeing the trapped souls of the Netherworld?” I confirmed.
His upper lip quirked, baring a sharp fang. Was that a smile or did he want to eat me?
“And also destroy the Netherworld and defeat Apollyon,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Yeah we can’t forget that,” I added dryly.
The guardian’s wings snapped out, and I bristled. “I have made hardy warriors out of absolute buffoons. I take this job very seriously. I will not fail you.”
Okay, that was kind of sweet… minus the buffoon part. He and Skye shared some personality traits.
“Thanks,” I smiled.
Skye stepped away from the guardian and began to circle behind me as Aurum’s eyes lit up with an eerie bluish glow.
Please don’t eye laser beam me.
