She smiled innocently, waving at his circle. “Don’t let us stop you. The sooner you get that done, the quicker Omega can have his fun,” she said.

“That would be good, Father. I’m rather interested in visiting the Summer Realm,” Omega said. Now all eyes, including Declan’s and Stacia’s, turned to look at the exercise-ball-sized drone that floated twenty feet away—waiting.

Declan turned back to the unfinished portal and the chalk went back to work, now beginning the lower arc of the circle. With dogged determination, he kept at it, only a clenched jaw and sweat streaming down his face showing what it was costing him.

Five long minutes later, he stepped back, letting out a long breath. Then he sat down on the hard floor. “Okay, ladies. Power it up,” he said.

The witch class exchanged looks then formed a circle around the circle, holding hands. Stacia felt the air get colder, the overhead lights dimming, all of their breaths beginning to steam in the reduced illumination. She started a mental count. Ten seconds stretched into twenty, then thirty. Finally, when her internal stopwatch reached forty-seven, the concrete in the middle of the circle vanished, a mirror-like surface replacing it.

Omega’s big drone floated silently over, moving till it hovered directly over the center of the circle. The surface of the mirror rippled and Declan, who was watching, exhausted but focused, nodded once. Instantly the big orb shot straight down into the portal, vanishing into the looking glass with a little circular ring of disturbance like a pebble falling into a still pond.

Then the mirror vanished and the witches simultaneously let go of hands, opened eyes, and breathed out in relief. But Stacia noted they were all smiles.

“We did it!” Britta said.

“You did. And all the earlier work you did was right, because it powered up properly,” Declan said, a proud smile on his face.

Stacia smiled too, deciding to keep her mouth shut about the fact that her boyfriend would have powered the whole thing by himself in about twenty seconds’ time. But then, as he said, he was a freak of super nature. Her freak of super nature.

“Omega, did you arrive in the right spot?” Declan asked, turning his head to one of the smaller orbs that floated nearby.

“Yes, Father. I came out just north of the Summer Court’s Home Tree. I’m scouting the area now.”

“Hey, can we watch?” Tami asked.

Before the computer answered, Declan shook his head. “Not now. Let him do his work and I need to go rest. Maybe later we’ll see what he can show us.”

“In other words, Teacher doesn’t want us to watch scenes of wanton destruction,” Zuzanna said.