Eyes of the Sun (6 page)

“Whoa,” Matt said. “Isn’t it gonna be hard to figure out where they all are?”

Azuriah shook his head. “No, we keep track of the location of every Shiengol. The hard part will be convincing them to come. As you all know, I’ve been trying to recruit for several months now.”

“Have you had any luck?” Dad asked.

“Some. They’ll be arriving soon. And I have no doubt that eventually, I’ll be able to convince them all.”

As was his fashion, Azuriah left the meeting before Dad had finished tying things up.

Later that day, Jacob decided to see what the Lorkon were doing. Since he’d been partially deceived where Lasia was concerned, he hadn’t felt as inclined to watch. No one blamed him, but he knew they’d still appreciate him checking up on things occasionally.

He Time-Saw to the castle and immediately discovered that something was wrong. He couldn’t see the throne room. And he tried going in from the sides, past the curtains, under the door—it didn’t matter what he did—that room and certain parts of the castle were no longer visible to him. Not only that, but he couldn’t find the Lorkon anywhere. Then it occurred to him that they were probably in the parts he couldn’t See. He’d just have to go back in time to find them.

He returned to his room and dashed to the window to look at the sun for ten seconds. Hopping back on his bed, not waiting for the springs to stop bouncing, he quickly searched the castle over the past several days, watching for Keitus. When he found the Lorkon, he made the king glow.

Jacob followed as Keitus wandered the halls, studied in the throne room, and ordered Molgs, Dusts, and the other Lorkon around. Then Keitus disappeared—Jacob couldn’t penetrate a part of the castle. He reversed again, this time by a week, then pulled away so he could See a larger section of Gevkan. Finally, a brief bit of golden light flashed in the Molg tunnels, showing Jacob where Keitus had gone.

Jacob followed as the Lorkon king walked to Fornchall. It was weird to see him walking, but apparently, Sindons couldn’t fit in the Molg tunnels.

When he got to Fornchall, Keitus went straight to a farming area placed up against a small mountain range where thousands of human slaves were mining and working the fields. Jacob watched as the Lorkon king waited to be noticed. A servant scurried up to him, bowing repeatedly as he approached. He gave something to the king—a bowl full of greenery with bushy leaves and bulbous trunks. Weird. Maybe Keitus wanted a salad? Jacob recognized it as the same plant that grew in the Fornchall fields.

Keitus laughed deviously as he took the bowl. Apparently, he really liked salad.

He said something, and a bunch of servants rushed to follow him into a room of a nearby building. Keitus gave orders and a man took the bowl from him. This servant, and others, started breaking open the plant trunks one at a time and dripping liquid from them into cups. It took only seconds for them to go through the bowl of greenery, and there was barely any liquid in the cups. Someone then brought in a barrel full of the plants, and they got to work again.

After they’d gone through the huge barrel, they only had half a cup of liquid.

“More!” Keitus yelled, loud enough for Jacob to hear
and
understand, and the people rushed out and rolled in several more barrels. While waiting, Keitus turned to a man and made another command. The servant dashed out of the room, and Jacob backed his vision up so he could keep an eye on Keitus
and
watch what the servant did.

The man ran through the fields as fast as he could, straight toward a mine shaft. He entered and Jacob lost interest in Keitus, wanting to follow the man.

The lighting in the shaft wasn’t nearly bright enough, and it took forever for Jacob’s eyes to adjust. When they did, he saw that the tunnel was full of men with pickaxes and shovels. Many were digging at the sides of the tunnel with the pickaxes, while those with the shovels carried the excess dirt to a large, hollowed-out room with several huge storage bins. People were there, sitting on the ground, sifting through the dirt. The stuff that remained in their cloth sifters, they tossed aside, and the finer particles that had fallen through, they put in bags.

The man opened one of the storage bins. He pulled out several small cloth bags. Someone tried to stop him, but he shoved the guy away, babbling in a different language. The other man lowered his head, then sat on the ground again, continuing his sifting of dirt.

Jacob followed as the servant ran out of the mine and rushed back to the building where Keitus still waited.

Keitus grabbed the cloth bags from the man’s hands and poured their contents—a dark gray powder—into a large bowl. Then he sat and waited, watching as the others continued their hacking and squeezing of the plants. Finally, they had three cups of liquid.

Keitus took the cups, shoved a few people out of the way, and strode to the bowl. He poured all the liquid in, then chanted something over it and mixed the ingredients together.

A woman handed Keitus a thick paintbrush, and the Lorkon smeared the contents of the bowl over the walls of the room. He laughed as he did so, bright green for excitement swirling in the air around him. Once every wall had the stuff slathered on it, he stepped back to watch.

Jacob watched too. Either Keitus had lost his mind, or he was starting up a new profession as a painter. The liquid started drying, darkening in the process. Almost as soon as it darkened, a black spot in Jacob’s vision appeared over the dried section of the wall. At first he thought something was in his eyes, but as he blinked, the spot grew. And it continued growing as the rest of the walls dried. Jacob gasped. His vision was completely fading.

Then the room was totally locked from his view.

Jacob pushed against the blackness that replaced the room, but nothing he did allowed his Sight to enter again.

He pulled back in frustration and sat on his bed, arms folded. This was stupid. Obviously, what he’d just seen was how Ramantus had kept Jacob from Seeing into his workroom back in Troosinal. He couldn’t believe it had been something so simple. A stupid plant and some dust would keep Jacob—and the Shiengols—from Seeing anything.

Was it possible to break through? Jacob shook his head. He
knew
it wasn’t. He’d tried way too many times before.

He sighed in frustration, then Time-Saw again and sped forward, waiting for Keitus to leave the building. Jacob followed the Lorkon back into the Molg tunnels. A large group of humans accompanied him, each carrying a cup of what Jacob assumed was the plant liquid.

Every twenty feet, Keitus would stop and mix the ingredients, chant, then smear the stuff on the cave walls. Jacob scowled at the Lorkon king, wishing he could reach through the vision and smack the guy. Apparently, he didn’t want Jacob watching him as he traveled to and from Fornchall City.

Soon enough, they’d reached the castle in Maivoryl City. Jacob watched as Keitus spread the potion across the walls of the throne room. He wondered why the Lorkon didn’t have someone else do the work—a servant, perhaps. But maybe only he could do the magic and chant the words? Or maybe they were in a language only he spoke.

Pretty soon, Jacob was unable to follow the Lorkon king nearly anywhere. He watched as Keitus covered almost all of the Molg tunnels, nearly the entire city of Fornchall, and then last, most of the castle. Jacob could only imagine just how many plants all that work had required.

He pulled away from his vision, sat on his bed for a moment, trying to decide what to do, and then went downstairs to the kitchen, where Mom sat at the table.

“Mom, we need to go talk to Dad about something I just discovered.”

She didn’t look up from her novel, and didn’t respond.

“Mom?” Jacob said, a little louder.

“Hmmm?”

She still didn’t look up, so Jacob went to the table and peered over her book, into her eyes. “We need to go talk to Dad. I’ve found something.”

“Oh, okay.”

After they’d all settled into chairs at Dad’s work, Jacob told his parents what happened.

Dad leaned forward. “This isn’t good.” He furrowed his brow. “How are we going to watch the Lorkon?”

“At least we now know what they’ve been farming and mining in Fornchall,” Jacob said.

Mom rubbed her face. “If that’s all of it.”

“They’re probably going to be doing something they don’t want anyone to know about.” Dad straightened in his chair, then rested his eyes on Jacob. “I don’t like this new development. It makes me feel vulnerable.”

“Yeah, no kidding,” Jacob said. “Now what?”

Dad slowly shook his head. “I don’t know.” He paused for a moment. “I need to think about it for a while.”

Jacob stretched, avoiding looking at Mr. Coolidge. They’d just finished their last study session, and the man had been acting weird the entire time. While Jacob had been going over assignments and making sure he’d understood the instructions, he’d caught Mr. Coolidge staring at him several times, a concerned expression on his face.

Finally, Jacob couldn’t stand it any longer.

“Mr. Coolidge?”

“Yes?” He didn’t look at Jacob, but kept his eyes on the desk in front of him. The colors swirling in the air around him, however, showed he was paying close attention.

“Are you okay?”

Mr. Coolidge raised his dark, bushy eyebrows. “Of course. Why?”

“You’re acting weird today.”

The teacher shrugged. But he leaned back in the chair, steepling his fingers, studying Jacob. “I want to ask you a question.” The swirling colors changed to nervousness.

Jacob felt his stomach drop an inch—he thought he knew what was coming. “Go ahead.”

Mr. Coolidge rubbed his face and avoided looking at Jacob again. Several moments of silence passed. Jacob waited. He didn’t like the quiet in the study—it was uncomfortable.

Finally, Mr. Coolidge leaned forward, staring at Jacob. “Who are you?”

“Who—who am I?”

Mr. Coolidge gazed at Jacob with an eyebrow raised.

“I’m Jacob Clark.”

The older man shook his head in quick, jerky motions. “No, no. What I mean is,
what
are you?”

Jacob’s mouth popped open.
What
was he? A human teenager. Duh.

Then it occurred to him that he couldn’t say that—he wasn’t even fully human. He’d
known
Mr. Coolidge would figure things out—the guy was way too intelligent. Why hadn’t Jacob prepared himself for this? “I don’t . . . I—”

“Look, Jacob. I’ve seen you do some really weird things. And everyone back in that village treats you like you’re someone special.”

Jacob looked at his hands, twisting them in his lap. Mr. Coolidge had only worked in Taga Village a couple of times, and each time, Dad and Kenji had been careful to make sure the Wurbies were out of sight and the Makalos stayed away—they hadn’t wanted Mr. Coolidge to discover things too quickly.

“I don’t know what—”

“Don’t give me that. Yesterday, a lady bowed to you. I saw. You can’t hide that from me.”

Jacob took a deep breath. He might as well just tell Mr. Coolidge the truth. “I’m a prince—Danilo Leontii is my real name.”

“But a prince of what kingdom? I
know
there isn’t anything on . . . on Earth . . . where you could be . . .” He swallowed, obviously struggling.

“I’m prince of a kingdom called Gevkan on a planet called Eklaron.”

Mr. Coolidge stared at him for several seconds. Jacob couldn’t even tell from the man’s emotion colors if he believed him. “And what about your . . . your
powers
?” He said the word as if it put a bad taste in his mouth. He obviously wasn’t used to thinking in comic-book terms.

“My powers?” Which ones? Jacob didn’t ask. There wasn’t any sense saying more than was needed.

“Yes. I’ve known for a very long time that you could change the shape of things—did you actually think I didn’t notice in math? You nearly destroyed those desks several times.”

He got up to pace behind the chair. “Besides, I read almost all of that journal of yours. While I find it incredibly difficult to believe it wasn’t just fantasy, I’ve actually seen these Ma—Makalos and how they operate. They do strange things when they think I’m not looking. They help the gardens grow—those plants shot up incredibly fast! They light areas later at night. And I met a really tall man with long hair . . . but I don’t think he was human. He looked odd and he was very impolite when I asked him a question.”