Free The White Fox by James Bartholomeusz

into the air by the throat. Jack was ripped out from behind the rock, unable to move, as the figures closed in.

Chapter VII
the ritual
    “Mr. Steele,” said the man. “From all I’ve heard, I really expected more of you.”
    Alex was suspended in the air by his torso, his limbs flopping uselessly by his sides. A thin trickle of blood ran down the left side of his mouth and neck and under his top, but he didn’t try and wipe it away. The wind blasted in his eyes, making them sting, but he made no attempt to scratch them. He kept his gaze firmly fixed on the taunting figure before him. The figure was entirely covered in black, just like the others. The only visible skin was his pale mouth under the shadow of the hood. Currently, it was smirking.
    “You come back, and yet you allow yourself to be captured instantly. Some heroic attempt to save your friends? What is heroism without strength, but folly?”
    Alex scanned the hilltop. By the sparse moonlight, he could make out nine figures dotted around him and the figure in front of him. There were several more on the other side of the pit, though he wasn’t sure how many. He knew that the normal Chapter consisted of thirteen sorcerers, but this was no normal mission. There could be many more lurking beyond sight in the deep shadows of the trees. He looked behind him as far as he could. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Jack and Lucy, their school uniform and sports kit brightly branded against the cloaks. They were held in a similar way to him, with black cloaks standing directly behind their levitating bodies.
    “What are you planning?” he snarled.
    The man turned his head, as if studying Alex from a different angle. He pondered him for a moment, then seemed to decide. “I don’t see the harm in it. You will, after all, be playing a vital role.” The man turned and walked over to the edge of the pit.
    Lifted by some unseen force, Alex floated after him, still unable to operate his muscles. He reached the rim and was lowered to hover next to him.
    This pit was at least thirty feet across and larger than the one at the bottom of the hill. Where below, there had been an intricate weave of gears, what had been unearthed here was much simpler. What had appeared to be a circular altar from farther down the hill was in fact the topmost of a series of rough stone discs piled on top of each other in size order to form a cylindrical stepped pyramid. Each level had chutes carved into it at seemingly random intervals and directions, all fitted with the same ancient-looking piping. The pipe chute from the lower pit ran up to the edge and dropped downwards, the end left unconnected to anything.
    “Beautiful, isn’t it?” The man laughed greedily.
    Alex couldn’t exactly see what he meant. “What is it?”
    “A marker. A gateway, denoting the location of a Door into the Darkness. Its creators and custodians may have faded into extinction and myth, but this is still as fine a piece of invention as it was the day it was created.”
    Alex traced the patterns laid out before him, trying to mentally assemble them. There was a small hole at the center of the highest stone slab. A hole just big enough for …
    “How did you get here?” Jack whispered to Lucy, trying to turn his head the minimal amount for her to hear.
    She continued staring straight ahead at Alex, unblinkingly. It took Jack a moment to realize she was giving muffled whispers through her gag. “They … they picked me up on the way back from netball … They knew where I live … I was walking home, and a group of them were waiting for me … They picked me up without even touching me. How the hell is that possible? And then you show up with Alex. Where? How … ?” She faded into silence.
    Jack glanced at her. She was unusually pale. Her clothes were torn and muddy and had leaves and twigs stuck in them, as if she’d fought through bushes trying to escape. He’d never seen her this frightened before.