Request #180

A portal fantasy (late 90s, but more likely 00s. Before 2010.), set in either the UK or USA, with a teenage (high school aged) male. His mother has been missing for years, there’s a portal in the forest (a fallen tree trunk) that only opens every decade(?), and he meets a student or substitute teacher (young and female) who is somehow aware of the portal/other world. They train together in sword-fighting/fencing, in preparation to enter the barbarian world on the other end of the portal to rescue the missing mother. They are immediately enslaved and separated, forced to do manual labour (clay pots feature?), and then there is a rescue by another group of warriors. There is a battle with wooden(?) airships (steampunk/Zeppelin/pirate ship-like?), and monolithic God(s). The main character is returned to his own spacetime but love interest (the young teacher) is trapped or left behind somehow (and we don’t recall what happens with the mother). THANK YOU for ANY suggestions – we are utterly stumped with this. Suggestion: The Beginning Place by Ursula K. LeGuin
Solved: “Flight of the Mariner” by Paul Ware