There was a moment of freefall that made Virginia scream as she felt like she was plummeting to her death.
There arose a great sound like the singing of an angel. It was magnificent, glorious, and captivating. Virginia opened her eyes. Two bright, large, and beautiful wings appeared overhead, followed by a bright light bursting forth from within Charles. She closed her eyes and turned her head away from the blinding radiance.
The light faded, and the angelic language came to a slow dissolve. All was quiet.
Virginia opened her eyes and saw that Charles was still holding her, but they were on solid ground. She looked over his shoulder and saw that the cliff they were on earlier was now behind them. They had made the jump.
She looked into his eyes, demanding an answer.
He just smiled at her. "Just trust me."
She looked behind them at the cliff once more. "What was—"
"No time to explain," interrupted Charles. "Can you walk at all?"
Virginia's agonizing pain froze the many questions soaring in her mind. "My leg hurts too much. It's stiff."
"If you use me as a support, do you think you could walk on just your other leg?"
"I think so."
Charles carefully set Virginia back on her feet. She could hardly bend her right leg. Charles placed her right arm over his left shoulder and held her close to his side. "We have to hurry."
Virginia only took one step, barely using her right leg.
"Ow!" she cried.
She fell to the ground, nearly pulling Charles down with her, and placed her hand over her wounded leg. "I can't! I can't walk. It hurts too much."
Charles did not say a word. He knelt down beside her and picked her up in his arms, holding her close to him.
"That's not going to stop me," he said.
Cradling Virginia close, Charles took her deep into the heart of the woods. The farther they went, the darker the forest became.
Virginia looked around her. Pine trees were everywhere, and at first, everything in the dark seemed disorderly and chaotic against her blinding pain, but the more her eyes began to adjust, the more she saw they formed an arrangement she had overlooked. A row of pine trees on either side of her and Charles proceeded before them with their branches stretching out overhead like a canopy resembling the structure of a large hallway. It ran ahead of them until it faded into the darkness of the woods.
"Charles, where does this lead to?"
"You'll see."
Aniatha, Dark Cry, and their other companion stood on the cliff's edge where Charles and Virginia once were.
Aniatha's lips curled in bitter rage as she stared across the gorge and into the dark woods in the far distance. Her one hand tightened into a fist, and the other gripped tighter around the handle of her pistol.
Dark Cry and the Indian stood a step behind her, looking with timid anxiety at the gun clenched in her fist. Their hearts quickly began to rise.
"Do you remember what I said would happen if they made it there first?" she asked.
A long moment of silence haunted the air around them before Dark Cry finally summoned the strength to speak. "I know another way across."
Another minute of silence chilled the air around them while Aniatha continued to stare ahead of her. She pressed her thumb against the mag release on the side of the gun. The pistol's magazine slid out of the handle and fell to the ground. She pulled out another from her belt and placed it inside her firearm.
"The Gate is still far off into the woods," continued Dark Cry nervously. "We might still have a chance."
Aniatha placed her hand on top of the gun's slide and racked a new bullet into the chamber. "Then lead the way…like your life depended on it."
Virginia held on to Charles tighter as the woods became pitch black. Uncertainty weighed on her heart, and she wanted to turn back. Charles continued to keep as fast a pace as he could, refusing to stop.
"Charles!" cried Virginia. "Where are you taking me?"
"Trust me," he replied. "Look ahead."
Virginia focused her eyes on what appeared to be a small, orange light in the distant darkness. "What is that?"
"You'll find out." His voice was more excited and enthusiastic than it was earlier.
They drew closer to the light, and Virginia was starting to make out an image. They approached two large oak trees at the end of the corridor of pine trees. Both trees overlapped, with their branches twisting around each other, creating an archway. Hanging from the top of the archway was a small lantern with a wooden sign containing a series of unknown letters that formed words underneath the light. On either side of the arch were two other lanterns that were not lit.
"Hamekhapsim yim'tzeh'u," said Charles.
"What was that?" asked Virginia.
"That's what the sign reads," replied Charles, pointing to the words on the archway.
"What does it mean?"
"'They that seek will find.'"
Charles carefully lowered Virginia to the ground. "This is it. The Gate to the South."
He felt his phone buzz. He pulled it out and saw a new text message from Andrew.
Andrew: "I'm on my way. If I'm not there by the time you arrive, then continue on as we planned."
Charles looked this way and that, hoping to see Andrew walk out from behind a tree at any moment. "Okay. We keep moving then."