Kilenya Series Books One, Two, and Three (9 page)

Jacob raised an eyebrow. “Poisonous trees? What else are we going to come across here? Animal-eating flowers?” The Minya ignored him. “At least the tree didn’t hit me too. One of us had to stay sane.”

September shook his head, watching Early and Akeno. “Brojan said Akeno isn’t acting that way because he got hit. The trees—their influence—are poisonous to him, like they were to the adult Makalos. He must be getting older.”

Jacob rolled his eyes. Of
course
the Makalo was getting older. “Was there anything else?” he asked.

No response. Jacob waved his hand in front of September. “Hello? Was there anything else?”

“Oh, yes, there was.”

“Well?”

September finally turned back to Jacob. “Brojan said, ‘Absolutely do not go into the forest.’ And Kenji said, ‘Don’t tell Akeno you’re moving him. Just grab him and go.’”

“Okay. And that’s all?”

“Yes, that’s all.”

Jacob motioned toward Akeno. “Have Early bring him back.”

Akeno’s ranting became louder as he and the Minyas drew closer. Jacob waved his arms. “Hey, Akeno!”

“You stay out of this, you good-for-nothing human!” Akeno screamed, spittle flying from his mouth. “Who cares who you are? Who cares where you come from? I could’ve done this just as well as you, only I could’ve done it alone!”

Jacob frowned, trying to decide the best way to move the Makalo. Bribery? He dismissed that idea as soon as it came to him. Akeno wasn’t acting logically right now, and wouldn’t respond well to a verbal approach. That meant there was only one thing Jacob could do. Grab Akeno and run—just as Kenji had suggested. “I’m really sorry for doing this,” Jacob said, and then he rushed forward, picked up Akeno, and swung him over his shoulder.

“Put me down! Put me down right now!”

With a sudden squirm, Akeno turned and clawed at Jacob’s face. Surprised, Jacob dropped him, and Akeno took off, running full speed into the forest.

“Oh, no!”

Jacob dropped his bag and sped after Akeno. He wasn’t surprised when the trees started thrashing around him.

Dodging branches, dead animals, and stumps, he stumbled through the forest, doing his best to ignore the angry, moving trees. He kept his eyes on Akeno, but the Makalo was much faster than Jacob had given him credit for, and it was difficult to keep up.

The forest was much thicker now, with almost no visibility. Panic hit Jacob when he noticed that the distance between himself and Akeno was growing. He couldn’t tell for sure, but it seemed that while the trees were still trying to stop him, they were now letting Akeno through. The air tasted stale and dirty, and each breath he took was agonizing. Jacob tried to limit the amount of air that entered his lungs, but the stench of death was unavoidable.

The forest grew thicker, making it nearly impossible to see, and what little light there was danced around as the branches thrashed. After only a few minutes, Jacob could no longer see Akeno, and very soon couldn’t hear him, either. The trees thinned and he stopped running, not sure where to go since Akeno hadn’t exactly been running in a straight line.

Something cold and smooth brushed against Jacob’s cheek. He frantically wiped it off his face, spinning to see what had touched him. Nothing was there but the moving branches.

He started forward again, cautiously peering ahead. He gasped as another cold, smooth thing ran through his hair. He bent over and shook his head as hard as he could, trying to rid himself of the animal—or whatever it was.

Seconds later, an extra weight slid across his shoulders and over them, circling his neck. Reaching up to grab it, he recognized the feel of the creature. It was a snake about two feet long, and in the dim light, he could see that it was pale in color. He yanked, flinging it off. As it flew through the air, Jacob stumbled from shock as he watched it flatten and float swiftly to a nearby tree.

The trees stopped moving. With the stillness, the light no longer danced, and Jacob could see better. Nearly every surface was covered with snakes—the ground seemed to have come alive. Several of them floated through the air.

Worried that the trees had stopped moving because something even larger and scarier than flying serpents had entered the forest, Jacob peered through the darkness, gingerly treading forward. He tried not to step on any of the snakes and grimaced when he did, but they weren’t reacting to him now that the trees were still.

As he walked cautiously, watching the trees in case they started to fling their branches around again, something large brushed against his leg. He looked down and made out the shape of a snake, two feet in diameter, as it slithered slowly past him, then stopped.

Jacob’s body stiffened with fear as his mind raced. He flipped through all his Scouting memories—what kind of snake was this? Was it poisonous? He couldn’t remember ever having seen one like it before, even on TV. He gasped when the snake coiled around his feet. He tried to step away, but couldn’t. Not only was the fear overwhelming, but his feet were being held too tightly.

The snake hissed, and suddenly it was eye-to-eye with Jacob, its intelligent green eyes piercing into him. Pressure around his knees told him the snake was increasing its grip there. He tried to move again, but couldn’t—the massive serpent had coiled around his chest and tightened its hold.

The snake’s tongue flicked out, barely touching Jacob’s skin and hair, testing the air around him. Then its body tightened so much that it squeezed the breath out of him. Lifting him completely off the ground, the snake leaned in about a foot from Jacob’s face and gave a loud, menacing hiss, revealing six-inch fangs that glistened in the dim light. It whipped its head away and started dragging him through the forest. Jacob gasped desperately for air and was finally able to pull in a short breath.

After a few moments, they were joined by a second snake just as big as the first. This snake slithered alongside them for a moment, then headed off to the right.

The forest ended as the snake reached the edge of a clearing. Toward the center was a hill with a very large manor sitting atop its crest. There was no sign of Akeno.

The manor must have been impressive in its day. The large columns looked to be made of granite, and the windows, most of which had either been boarded over or smashed open, were massive and elegant. The wide, concrete porch that circled the house was now cracked and disheveled, with vines growing unchecked through the cracks and up many of the columns. The front right corner of the foundation had begun to sink, and rotted wood lay strewn about.

In front of the house, to the right, was a large pit. Jacob thought he could hear Akeno’s voice coming from it, and he struggled to break free of the snake’s tight grip. But the snake ignored his attempts and continued slithering across the ground, up the stairs, and through the open front door of the house.

It was musty and dirty inside. Dim light shone through several of the smashed windows. The front entryway was spacious—at least two stories high, maybe three. The floor was marble, and there were grand marble pillars lining the edges of the room. Stained-glass windows, most of them boarded over, were placed between the pillars.

Just before they went up a large, curved stairway, Jacob caught a glimpse of a side room with sheet-covered furniture. There was a hallway at the top of the stairs, the first half overlooking the front entry and the second half lined with doors on both sides. All the doors were shut, and many of them had a slight greenish glow coming through the cracks. The snake stopped abruptly at the end of the hall. In place of the door was a silvery, translucent sheen that filled the entire doorway.

The snake paused before entering. The moment its head passed the frame, there was a loud clap, and the sheen disappeared. The snake wriggled forward a few feet, then released its hold on Jacob. He stumbled to his feet and whirled, ready to defend himself, but the snake had already slithered back into the hallway and was biting the top, bottom, and sides of the door frame. The translucent veil materialized again, sealing the doorway, and the snake slithered down the hall and stairs.

Jacob rushed to the nearest window, barely noticing the junk and oddly placed rolls of thick cloth on the floor, and watched as the snake disappeared into the forest. He waited a few moments longer, but the snake didn’t return.

The pit was beneath the window. It wasn’t very deep—maybe two or three feet—and Akeno was there, thrashing around with the remains of charred furniture and other debris. Jacob pounded on the window, trying to get Akeno’s attention, but the Makalo didn’t seem to notice.

A cold wind blew on the back of Jacob’s neck, making his hair rise. He turned and nearly yelled—about a foot or so away was a partially decomposed body sitting in a chair, on the verge of tumbling over.

Afraid it would fall at any moment, Jacob kept his hands up as he stepped to the side, barely missing another body that lay across the floor with arms stretched toward the door. He jumped away from it, realizing that what he’d assumed to be rolls of cloth were really bodies sprawled on the ground, reaching for the exit.

He made his way to a clear spot and looked around.

The room was very large. There was a massive bed against one wall, a fireplace on another, and several chairs placed in random positions around bookcases, tables, and the fireplace. Nearly every chair held human remains, ranging from full skeletons to decomposing corpses that had been dead for only a few weeks at most. In one corner of the room was a table. On top were two stone jugs and bits of both fresh and moldy food.

The smell of death and decay became so overpowering, Jacob felt as though his lungs would burst. Desperate for fresh air, he steeled himself, then rushed past the dead bodies back to the window.

He grunted, pushing on the lever, trying to open the window. But it wouldn’t budge.

Jacob’s gaze landed on the jugs, and he grabbed one—it was heavy with water. He smashed it against the window as hard as he could. The result was water splashing all over him and the nearest body, the jug shattering, and the window remaining undamaged. He grimaced.

Then he looked down and noticed several other broken objects on the floor below the windows—byproducts of others’ attempts to break the glass.

Jacob groaned. “Oh, man, I’ve really got to get out of here.”

The sound of his own voice startled him, and he looked over his shoulder at the bodies. He felt stupid when he realized he was checking to see if they’d moved. He forced himself to take a deep breath to calm himself, and studied them. What if, like them, his only way out was through the doorway? But why hadn’t the others gone through? They weren’t tied up or anything. They weren’t even near the door. None of them was closer than five or six feet.

Resolving to get out, Jacob crossed the room toward the shimmering doorway. He stopped about three feet away, peering at it. There was a slight movement, a few swirls in the silver. Light pink and blue mists emanated from it, and Jacob was distracted by the color for a moment—it was the first he’d seen since he got here. Reaching toward the portal, something passed over his skin as his hand went through the mist. It was cold—very cold—and a sharp pinpricking sensation started at his fingertips, moving up his wrist to where the mist stopped. Alarmed, Jacob pulled back his arm and examined his hand. No blood, no mark, nothing.

He looked up, took a step closer, and put his hand out again, this time determined to touch the shimmering barrier. The same cold, prickly feeling started at his fingertips and reached his elbow. He held his breath and plunged his arm forward. Nothing happened. But then he saw the sheen separate where he touched it.

Jacob stepped forward, pushing himself into the veil. The cold mist encompassed him, and the pinpricks covered him from head to foot. An enormous pressure enveloped his entire body, making movement difficult, and the air started to swirl around him. As the wind gained speed, his shirt got pulled up and his hair ruffled.

An intense pain suddenly hit him, starting in his chest and moving to his extremities. He felt electrocuted—he couldn’t move, and his body shook. He couldn’t even breathe. His fingers felt pulled from their joints, and there was no sensation in his feet. He tried to back out of the doorway, but it was as if some invisible force was holding him in one spot.

After what seemed like an eternity, but was probably only a few seconds, the feeling left him and he doubled over, gasping for breath. The pain in his muscles was replaced with numbness and he lost his balance, falling back into the room.

Jacob lay awkwardly on his side, no feeling in his body whatsoever. Had he been hit by lighting? Zapped with a Taser? Even his brain seemed paralyzed.

Sensation slowly returned to his limbs and he rolled onto his back, staring up at the ceiling. What on earth had happened? Or, more precisely, what on Eklaron had happened?
Had
he been electrocuted? And why hadn’t it killed him? Did the people in the room try the same thing with similar results? He flipped onto his stomach and gradually got to his knees, ignoring the dead body only a foot or so in front of him.

He stood and turned around to face the barrier. It was the only way out of the room—he was sure of it. Did he dare try to walk through again? He grimaced, imagining going through the pain once more. Or three or four times. Who, after experiencing something like that, would volunteer for a repeat? He looked around the room at the dead bodies. There was no way he was going to stay here and die like they did. He had to get that Key. He had to get Akeno out of the forest. He had to see Ebony and Kenji and Matt and his family again. And he definitely had to try out for the basketball team before he died. A fierce determination hit him. He
would
get the Key.
Nothing
was going to stop him.

With new resolve, Jacob held up his hand and took a step, frowning as the tingly sensation moved from his fingers and up his arm. This time, however, he steeled himself against the pressure of the swirling air and pushed as hard as he could. The same intense pain began, stopping his breathing once again, but he was already moving forward and continued pushing.