The Stolen Queen: Chapter 7

Once I was outside, I was able to figure out where the queen and I were and take us to the beach.

Naomi was not there anymore, but there were a lot of police officers and rescue boats. When they saw me, everyone ran over and my parents grabbed me by the shoulders and hugged me.

“We thought you were dead!” Mom signed, tears rolling down her face. “How did you get back to shore?”

Then, she noticed Mira.

“Mom, we have some work to do,” I said. I pulled Mira — her eyes still closed — into the water and swam her out on my surfboard to the sandbar where I’d found the trap door, leaving the officers and my parents to follow us, once they realized where I was going.

I took them down the mysterious stairs, and Mira opened her eyes at the bottom.

We stopped everyone there and explained what little we knew about the villains and what we needed to do.

“We think,” Mira said, “that killing the villain will ruin the portal he has created to bridge our worlds. So half of us will set out to find him and the rest of us will go through the city and search for survivors.”

Most of the police officers stared at us like we were joking. “This is a joke,” one said, and turned to leave.

Mira shut the trap door with a mysterious energy and told him firmly, “We need to do this.”

We all entered the city through the hole I’d created in the wall.

Some people ran off after Mira to find the killer, and the rest followed me into the wreckage of the city.

We found some survivors, but not many. That’s when some in our group heard screaming from the corner of the city.

We ran over to aid the team on the hunt for the bad guys and found most of them fleeing.

He stood from the ground, a rising terror. Everyone ran.

But I felt my powers coursing through my veins. I felt myself floating, and I knew what I had to do.

Then, everything went black.