The Portal in Her Kitchen

Success tastes like ashes when you're standing alone in someone's kitchen, watching their cats circle the dimensional rift you've just torn through their refrigerator.

Cody has done his job perfectly. Gladys is on her way to help Luke, walking deeper into Guardian business without understanding what she's truly entering. The manipulation was textbook—every word calculated, every touch strategic, every suggestion disguised as her own conclusion. He should feel satisfied. Instead, he feels hollow.

Now he needs to get back to Clivilius, back to Belkeep and the children waiting for him and the crises accumulating in his absence. But opening a Portal in Gladys's house reveals something he hadn't accounted for: her cats. Snowflake settles obediently when commanded. Chloe darts forward, curious and fearless, drawn by the swirling colours and the energy that calls to animals the way prophecy calls to Guardians.

Cody lunges, blocking her path, heart hammering. If one of Gladys's cats went through, she'd follow. She'd have to follow. And then she'd be in Clivilius whether she chose it or not.

The thought sits there, dark and insidious. An accident. So easy to arrange. So effective at solving his problem.

Standing in the Portal Cave's frozen silence, Cody slaps himself hard enough to sting. This is where desperation leads—to thoughts you can't take back, to lines you can't uncross, to the realisation that you've become exactly what you swore you'd never be.

Sometimes the person you need protection from is yourself.