The Key of Kilenya (23 page)

The last feelings Jacob sensed from the beast
were determination, stubbornness, and then another wave of anger.
These emotions were caused by the gaze Jacob held with the beast.
It was not used to small, insignificant humans defying it as Jacob
realized he was doing. He tried not to tremble or show fear,
refusing to look away. But he’d never had a poker face—there was no
chance the beast wouldn’t recognize how terrified he was.

The creature opened its jaws, a hiss issued
forth, and Aloren stiffened. This small movement caused the brute
to lose its eye contact with Jacob and it looked at Aloren instead,
surprised. The creature hadn’t expected a female. Taking a small
step forward, it stared at her.

Aloren’s gaze was directed toward the bend in
the cave, still unable to see the beast. Jacob bit his lip, trying
to maintain his focus. This was disturbing. It was an evil
creature, and yet here was Jacob, recognizing its emotions. What
was wrong with him that he could connect with it?

He suppressed a growl, recognizing that if he
didn’t maintain his focus, they’d all be toast. Taking a deep
breath, he forced himself to put aside any speculation on the
matter. He looked back into the creature’s huge eyes, again sensing
its emotions. A sudden feeling of protectiveness came over him when
he saw its plan to get rid of Akeno and Jacob first, leaving Aloren
for last—like dessert.

Jacob put his hands on the wall behind him,
bracing himself against the cold stone. The wall warmed under his
palms, and he gritted his teeth, wishing he’d spent time figuring
out this ability of his. It might’ve helped him right now.

His hands sunk into the stone, and he
straightened in surprise—of
course
the ability could help
him! There was no reason why it couldn’t! If the wall became
squishy at his touch, wouldn’t it let him pull out chunks? Chunks
which he could then mold into rocks to throw?

An excited smile crossed his face, and,
keeping his eye on the monster, Jacob dug his fingers into the
now-soft rock. It gathered easily into his hand, and he pulled
several sections of it from the wall. This was so cool!

He started molding the lumps into a large
rock, but stopped himself when another idea hit him—wouldn’t a
sword be better? He and Matt used to swordplay all the time with
sticks—if he got the weight close enough to one of those sticks,
theoretically, he’d be just as good with it . . . right?

Squeezing and pulling, he tried to make a
sword, but couldn’t get the edges sharp enough. Instead, he twisted
it into a club. Not as cool, but he could at least defend himself
and the others with it. He hoped it would hold its shape long
enough for him to distract the beast.

He was surprised that the rock seemed to know
what he wanted and went cold, becoming solid once more. Wow—that
was awesome.

Jacob focused his concentration back on the
beast’s feelings. Its anger had been replaced by determination. It
hadn’t noticed what Jacob had done, and Jacob moved forward,
realizing he was, in essence, challenging the feral creature. The
monster sensed the challenge, and a deep rumble came from its
chest. Jacob scowled, recognizing a laugh. He tried not to think
too much about the extraordinary strength the beast most likely
had, focusing instead on the fact that he now had something with
which he could fight.

The creature dropped into a crouched
position, getting ready to attack. Jacob felt a burst of adrenaline
shoot through his body, along with intense fear. He took a deep
breath, doing his best to appear self-assured.

Using his right hand, Jacob grabbed Aloren
and pulled her behind him, pushing her toward the entrance of the
cave. “I guess it doesn’t matter if we talk, since this ugly thing
knows we’re here,” he said.

“It’s in the cave with us, isn’t it?” Akeno
asked just as Jacob grabbed him as well, pushing him next to
Aloren.

“Careful not to get too close to the
entrance,” Jacob said, trying to sound confident. He was glad his
voice didn’t crack. “There’s no sense in being attacked on both
sides.”

Holding the creature’s gaze, Jacob
strode—glad he didn’t trip—to the center of the cave, keeping the
weapon behind his back.

“Hdakr djksla bi skr!” Low, gutteral words
came from the creature’s throat. Jacob took a step back—he didn’t
know the thing could talk. The words didn’t make sense, but Jacob
could sense their malicious intent. His body was tense, ready for
an attack to come at any second.

The brute took a couple of small steps to the
center of the cave as well, then stopped. A long pause—was the
creature waiting for Jacob to do something first?

Jacob closed his eyes, trying to figure out
what he could do. Concentrate on what the beast was feeling—an
obvious thing—but hard to do when he needed to figure out how to
defend his companions.

A thought crossed his mind.
Touch its
skin
.

Jacob opened his eyes. Touch the creature’s
skin? Where did that come from? He hesitated, appraising the beast.
Nearly every inch was covered in needle-like hair. Only its
cheekbones and forehead were clear.

He looked the monster in the eye, trying to
gauge where the thought had come from. The monster was
concentrating on its hungry stomach about to be appeased and was
amused by Jacob’s show of bravery. But Jacob was able to see
something else—something the beast seemed positive he’d never
figure out.

Jacob almost took a step back in surprise.
The monster’s main source of protection was its ability to remain
invisible to its prey, and for some reason Jacob could see the
creature, which had shocked it. Touching the skin would somehow
minimize the creature’s defense, thereby allowing Aloren and Akeno
to see it as well.

As soon as this occurred to Jacob, he was
ready for action. Defending two helpless individuals from something
they couldn’t see would be next to impossible. However, if they
could see the creature, they wouldn’t be helpless. They’d be able
to do something.

Jacob was four feet away. He pulled the bat
from behind his back and held it in a defensive position in front
of him.

The creature sauntered to one side of the
cave, and Jacob got the feeling it wanted to play with him first.
He had no desire to give the monster any sense of enjoyment, and
put all his concentration on what he had to do.

The monster cocked its head to the side.
Another laugh came from inside its chest when it seemed to notice
the weapon for the first time.

Jacob tossed the bat from hand to hand,
ignoring the brute’s laughter. He leaped forward, swinging the
blunt weapon. It connected with the monster’s head with such force
that Jacob almost dropped it. His bones jarring from the impact, he
moaned when he saw that it didn’t even stun the monster.

No longer laughing, the beast grabbed the
weapon and tried to rip it from Jacob’s grasp. Jacob, holding onto
it, was swung into the air.

He kicked his legs, but couldn’t get the
weapon out of the beast’s grip. Deciding instead to use it as
leverage, he flung himself around the back of the monster, landing
on its shoulders, the weapon falling to the ground. Aware of the
sharp sting of thousands of needles piercing the skin on his shins
and arms, he reached around and touched the monster’s face. Aloren
gasped, and he heard an exclamation of surprise from Akeno.

Visions of the beast’s memories flashed
before Jacob’s eyes—dark tunnels, fire, a huge city under a bright
sky, a large, poorly lit cavern full of other beasts like this one,
humans, animals. Then he saw one thing that would get them out of
this situation.

“Lirone!” he shouted. “The beast is afraid of
Lirone!”

The creature’s loud, responding roar erupted
in the cave, and Jacob felt himself being thrown across the small
enclosure. Hitting the wall hard, he bounced off and knocked into
Aloren and Akeno. He jumped to his feet as the beast charged
them.

Jacob ducked the creature’s massive arm as it
swung around to hit him. “Akeno, you’re going to have to shrink
it!”

The creature swung again, this time at Aloren
and Akeno, who tried to scramble out of the way. They were barely
fast enough to avoid being hit, and the monster growled.

“Hurry, Akeno!” Jacob yelled, attempting to
kick the monster in the stomach, doing his best to buy Akeno some
time.

The monster, in a quick movement, grabbed
Jacob by the leg and swung him across the cave. Jacob slammed hard
against a wall and fell to the ground. Dazed, he couldn’t get up
for a second.

“Shrink it? Now?”

Jacob shook his head to clear his thoughts.
“Just do it!” He got to his feet as the monster came after him. He
spotted the club lying where it had fallen and grabbed it, running
to meet the monster. Swinging with his might, he brought the weapon
across the monster’s head, not inflicting any damage.

The monster turned on Jacob and shoved him
over, growling. Jacob jumped to his feet as Akeno rushed toward the
entrance of the cave, attempting to put space between himself and
the beast.

Jacob turned back, hesitating, unsure what
his next move should be. Nothing seemed to affect the creature.

The monster reared on Aloren, grabbed her
around the neck, and thrust her against a wall, holding her a foot
above the ground.

Anger coursed through Jacob, and he screamed,
charging. He slammed hard into the creature’s side, surprised when
the beast dropped Aloren and almost fell over. Without hesitation,
Jacob grabbed Aloren’s arm, pulling her up and away from the
beast.

“Shrink it!” he yelled over his shoulder as
he ran with Aloren to the back of the cave. Turning around to face
the beast again, he swung Aloren behind him.

The creature roared, making Jacob’s ears
ring, and charged them. It smashed hard into Jacob, knocking him
into Aloren. They both fell to the ground. Jacob threw his arms
over her just as the monster reached for them. Suddenly it jerked
and disappeared.

“Got it!” Akeno yelled.

Jacob grabbed Aloren’s arm, helping her up,
wincing at the pain all through his body. “Run to the entrance!” he
shouted to Akeno.

Akeno turned and ran. Aloren and Jacob
followed, but Jacob’s leg gave out, and he collapsed on the cave
floor. Pushing the pain aside, with Aloren’s help he lurched to his
feet and continued on.

Akeno yelled in surprise as Lirone’s
explosions erupted all around him. He turned back to Jacob and
Aloren, a panicked expression on his face.

“Put him out in the storm!” Aloren yelled.
“Put him out in the storm!”

Akeno spun around, holding the monster at
arm’s length, then threw it. The monster landed on its side in a
small clearing about forty feet away from the cave, now large and
fully visible to Lirone.

Aloren and Jacob grabbed Akeno, pulling him
back into the cave entrance just as Lirone sent a ball of flame
smashing toward the ground where Akeno had been standing.

Jacob looked over his shoulder as they turned
and ran the length of the cave. The monster jumped to its feet and
roared, starting to charge.

“Come on, Lirone, come on!” Jacob said.

The monster bellowed again, but the din was
cut off. Jacob glanced back in time to see the aftereffects of an
explosion. The monster was no longer there.

They stopped and collapsed to the ground,
gasping for breath.

“Wow,” Jacob said. “That . . . was
close.”

“Yes . . . it was,” Aloren wheezed.

“What was that thing, anyway?”

“It was . . . a Molg,” Aloren said.

Jacob frowned. “A what?”

“A Molg. They’re a race that . . . lives in
the Dunsany Caves and . . . as you figured out, they eat humans.”
She paused for a minute, taking a couple of breaths. “They never
leave their caves, and I’ve never seen one. I’ve heard of them but
wasn’t even sure they existed—that’s why I forgot about them.” She
gasped. “There are probably more! We can’t stay here!” She tried to
jump to her feet, but Jacob grabbed her arm.

“No, no, we’re fine,” he said, holding her
down.

Aloren stopped trying to get up, and Jacob
let go of her. “How do you know?” she asked.

“The other ones aren’t even near where we
are.”

“The other Molgs?”

“I’ll explain—”

“And another thing,” Aloren said. “Why could
you see it, and we couldn’t?”

Jacob sighed. “I’m not sure. When it first
came into view, it didn’t even notice us. I could clearly see it
and was surprised you two couldn’t.”

“Of course we couldn’t,” Aloren said. “There
wasn’t any light.”

“What changed?” Akeno asked, brushing the new
dirt off his shoes.

It took Jacob several minutes to explain to
Aloren and Akeno what had happened, from sensing the Molg’s
feelings to touching its skin, causing him to see that the Molg had
just come from a meeting with other Molgs.

He tried to keep the worry he felt out of his
voice. Being able to connect with something evil was disconcerting
to him. He didn’t want to let on to feeling that way—not until he
figured things out.

“So, let me get this right,” Aloren said.
“You pulled rock out of the wall? How?”

“Well, I’ve got this ability to feel heat in
things. I don’t know why, or where it came from, but I can mold
things with my hands.”

Akeno scratched his head. “I’ve never heard
of someone being able to do that before—let alone sensing
warmth.”

“Neither had your dad. He told me to figure
out when and how the heat comes.”

“Have you?”

Jacob shook his head. “I had completely
forgotten about it before going back to Taga yesterday, and since
then I haven’t had the chance.” He paused. “Akeno, your parents are
just as bad as my teachers at school. They’ve given me a ton of
homework. ‘Jacob, figure out your abilities. Jacob, read the
journal. Jacob, get the Key. Jacob, save the world.’ The pressure
my teachers and parents put on me is nothing compared to this!”