Читать книгу The Hidden Kingdom - Tracey Hecht - Страница 33

THE NOCTURNALS

allowed himself to fall on his rear so he could keep a firm hold on Dawn. Then, scooting on his scaled backside, Tobin inched his way closer to the strange, swirling sand.

“Hurry!” yelled Dawn.

Bismark kept sinking down into the goop. Now, only his eyes peeked over it as it twisted and twirled in thousands of flecks all around him.

“Almost ready!” huffed Tobin. “Just let me dig my claws back in….”

“I’m choking!” Bismark used all his strength to reach out to Dawn. With a mighty jerk, he grabbed onto her. But Tobin had not yet dug his feet into their new position—and the pangolin and the fox went tumbling forward into the quicksand with Bismark!

“Tobin!” cried Cora.

“Oy!” The armadillo buried his face in the tree bark—he could not bear to watch.

“Helllllp!” Bismark sputtered, managing to lift his head for a moment. But as quickly as it had surfaced over the sand, it sunk back beneath it.

“What do we do?” yelped Tobin. He struggled to rise above the swirling earth, but he couldn’t move. He tried to curl his body into a ball—the position he took whenever he was frightened—but even that was impossible. He was totally stuck.

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