In the Shadow of Goll Read online

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1: The Magic of Friends

  2: Name the Bad Guy

  3: At the Horns of Ko

  4: Meet the Blugs

  5: The Pirate King

  6: The Ink-Dark Sea

  7: Snake Island … Again

  8: The Storm Rises

  9: Smiles of the Skorth

  10: From Hand to Hand to Hand

  The Adventure Continues …

  Also Available

  Copyright

  Eric Hinkle stood under the rafters of his dusty attic and read aloud from a large golden scroll.

  “Okay. Sit on the floor, cross your legs, close your eyes, touch your knee, tap your nose, and nod your head.”

  With a giant blue turban pressed low over his brow, Eric’s friend Neal Kroger plopped down on the floor and began tapping and nodding. “You mean like this?” he asked.

  Eric glanced at him, then back at the scroll. “That seems right. Now say, ‘Tembo-lembo-polly-molly-zoot-boot!’”

  Continuing to tap and nod, Neal drew in a long breath and said the words.

  All of a sudden — fwoosh! — he floated straight up to the ceiling, nearly grazing his head on the rafters.

  “Awesome!” he cried.

  “Now it says to lean forward,” said Eric.

  Neal did. Whooom! He shot across the attic, narrowly missing Eric’s head. Leaning to one side and then the other, he zigzagged back between towers of cartons and storage boxes.

  “This is amazing!” said Neal. “It’s stupendous! It’s terrific! It’s —”

  “Magic?” said Eric.

  “You got that right!” Neal slowed, tilted his head, and began spinning over the attic stairs.

  Eric laughed. It was magic. It was genie magic, and Neal had gotten it from the mysterious land of Droon.

  Droon was the magical world Eric, Neal, and their friend Julie had discovered one day under his basement stairs. It was a place of enchantment and adventure, a land of close friends and powerful enemies.

  It was there that they had met the young wizard Princess Keeah, her teacher, the great wizard Galen, and their spider troll friend, Max. It was there that they had battled sorcerers and beasts of every kind imaginable.

  Droon was where Julie had been scratched by a creature called a wingwolf and had developed the ability to fly and to change shape.

  Because of Droon, Eric was discovering that he himself had the powers of a major wizard.

  And finally, Droon was where Neal was revealed to be none other than the magical, time-traveling First Genie of the Dove!

  “Wait until Julie sees me do my stuff!” said Neal, zipping by Eric again and snatching the scroll from his hand. “Man, I really love this!”

  Laughing, Eric realized he loved it, too. Having powers didn’t only mean that Neal could use ancient genie magic to help battle the bad guys. It also meant that since each of the three friends now possessed special powers, it wasn’t even about magic anymore.

  It was what it was supposed to be about — being plain old friends.

  Neal paused over Eric’s head, chuckled to himself, then whispered some words from the scroll. Pooof! A small steaming pie appeared in the air in front of him.

  “That was fast!” said Eric with a smile.

  Neal took a bite of the pie and grinned. “I think this genie thing is going to be good.”

  But just when Neal was about to conjure a glass of milk — stomp! stomp! — someone opened the attic door and started up the stairs.

  “Holy cow!” gasped Eric. “It’s my dad —”

  Neal flailed suddenly, then dropped to the floor in a heap. Both boys turned to the stairs to see a tall man wearing a flannel shirt and paint-stained pants, staring at them over his glasses.

  “Uh, hi, Dad!” said Eric nervously.

  “Ditto, Mr. H!” added Neal. “I mean, not the ‘Dad’ part, but the ‘hi’ part —”

  “Neal,” said Mr. Hinkle. “I saw you flying! You must be a … a … genie!”

  Neal gasped. He and Eric looked at each other with wide eyes. “But … how did you know?”

  A long moment of silence was followed by a bright laugh. Then Mr. Hinkle started to wobble and shrink and blur. A few seconds later — floop! — it wasn’t Eric’s father standing there anymore. It was their friend Julie.

  “Julie!” said Neal. “You scared us to death! I thought our secret was out. Nobody’s supposed to know about Droon.”

  “Sorry!” she said, laughing. “I couldn’t resist! I don’t get many chances to use my shape-shifting powers —”

  Boing — boing — boing — thunk!

  “Eric!” called a deep voice from downstairs. “What did I tell you about playing soccer in the house? Do I have to come up there?”

  The three friends stared at one another.

  “It wasn’t me this time!” Julie whispered.

  Boing — thonk — boing — boing!

  “What’s going on?” said Eric. He looked down just in time to see a soccer ball bounce across the floor below. It rolled to a stop at the foot of the attic stairs.

  “What is that doing here?” asked Neal.

  The kids’ soccer ball had been charmed long ago by Princess Keeah. When she wanted her friends to join her in Droon, she often used the ball to send a coded message. But the kids always kept the ball in Eric’s basement.

  Boing! The soccer ball bounced up onto the bottom step.

  “Eric!” Mrs. Hinkle called.

  “Sorry!” In a flash, Eric ran down the stairs, scooped up the ball, and carried it up to the attic. As he did, words began to appear on its surface.

  Roov-Harga

  The kids knew the letters were in reverse.

  “Agrah-Voor,” said Julie. “The city of ghosts. Sparr told us to go there the last time we were in Droon.”

  Right, thought Eric. Sparr.

  Droon was about him, too.

  The first time the three friends had ever met Sparr, he was a superpowerful, black-cloaked, fish-finned evil sorcerer. Not long ago, however, Sparr had fallen victim to his own magic and been transformed back into a boy.

  As a boy, Sparr had been helping the kids. He had even become their friend.

  Right now, Sparr was with the wicked beast ruler, Emperor Ko, and his second-in-command, Gethwing, secretly hoping to defeat them. He had sent a secret message to the kids that the emperor’s armies were gathering for battle in the terrible Serpent Sea. He’d also told them that something bad was happening in nearby Agrah-Voor.

  Eric hoped their friend wasn’t in danger, but as hard as he tried to think otherwise, he knew it was only a hope.

  Sparr was in the very heart of evil now.

  “Keeah, Galen, and Max are probably already in Agrah-Voor,” said Neal, folding his magic turban and rolling up his scroll to the tiniest size imaginable. Then he stuffed them both into his pocket. “If they need reinforcements, that means us, and that means now.”

  In a few quick moments, the three of them had run down the attic stairs, down the main stairs, through the kitchen, and into the basement. Eric placed the soccer ball — which was normal once more — on the workbench. Then he turned to the little storage closet under the basement stairs and smiled.

  “It’s Droon time again!” he said.

  The three friends turned on the closet light, piled in, and closed the door behind them.

  “Let me,” said Julie. She reached for the ceiling light and pulled its short chain.

  Click. The light went out. The closet was pitch-black for a moment. Then it wasn’t.

  Whoosh! In a blaze of color, the floor became the top step of a long, curving staircase. As always, Eric’s heart beat faster whe
n he saw the magic stairs appear.

  The fabulous world of Droon — and a new adventure — were waiting for them.

  They started quickly down the rainbow-colored stairs, curving into the sky below. But no sooner had they climbed down through Droon’s wispy pink clouds than the air grew thick and dark around them. It began to feel close, as if they were inside. By the time the kids climbed down the last few steps, the space surrounding them was as black as night.

  Stepping onto solid earth, Eric paused and sniffed in every direction. “It smells wet.”

  Neal slipped his turban on his head and moved forward in the dark. “I sense a stream of water very close. It’s five, no, six inches deep.”

  Julie peered over his shoulder. “Your genie powers can tell you how deep the water is?”

  “No, but my genie feet can,” said Neal, looking down. “I just stepped in it up to my ankles.”

  Sure enough, they could just make out the glinting surface of a narrow stream. It wove down a tunnel ahead of them. Bobbing next to the bank not far away was a small wooden boat.

  Julie gasped. “We’ve been in that boat before, guys. It sails to Agrah-Voor —”

  “Shhh!” Eric turned his head. In the distance, he heard an eerie humming sound. It echoed against the walls of the tunnel.

  Then something moved in the dark.

  Before anyone could speak, the tall, shadowy figure of a man appeared in the passage, dragging a dark sack on the ground behind him. The man wore a ragged black cloak from head to foot. A deep hood covered nearly his whole face, except for a pair of burning red eyes staring from beneath its quivering folds.

  Purple mist swirled all around him. It coiled about his cloak tails and fluttered around the frayed ends of his hood like smoke stirred by heat.

  He saw the children and kept coming.

  Tensing, Eric pointed his fingers at the man. They sparked with silver light. “Stop where you are,” he said. “I’m a wizard —”

  “And I’m Zabilac, the genie!” said Neal, frantically searching his scroll for a charm. “And I’m a really fast reader —”

  The man stopped and raised his hand toward the children. His fingers were thin and pale. In a faltering whisper, as if struggling to get even the smallest sound out, he spoke.

  “Ny … Ny … Nyora!”

  Then, in a breath, with no more than a tiny movement of the air, he was gone.

  “But … where did he go?” asked Eric.

  “Never mind — that sounded like a spell!” said Julie. “Brace yourselves!”

  Ten seconds went by. Twenty seconds.

  The boat bobbed in the stream. The black water lapped quietly against the banks.

  When two minutes had passed, Eric turned to his friends. “So maybe ‘Nyora’ wasn’t a spell after all?”

  Neal snorted. “I guess seeing the official First Genie of the Dove scared him. Even though I sort of lied about being a fast reader. He and his stinky purple cloud are long gone.”

  But Julie had already started toward the boat. “Guys, I smell something else — smoke. What if it’s coming from Agrah-Voor? What if Agrah-Voor is on fire?”

  “We should get down there!” said Eric.

  Without another word, the three friends raced down the bank and jumped into the boat. As it had done the first time they rode in it, the boat mysteriously pulled away from the bank and sailed swiftly down the river to the ghost city of Agrah-Voor.

  Remembering what he did once before in the boat, Eric dipped his hand into the stream. At once, the dark water turned crystal clear.

  “There it is!” said Neal, pointing down through the water. “The land of ghosts. Where the dead people live.”

  The great walled city of Agrah-Voor was an imposing mass of stone on the gray plains below the water. Many centuries old and many miles across, it was a place of towers and bridges, palaces and fountains. As the children looked now, they saw a plume of smoke twisting up from its far wall.

  “I was right,” said Julie. “It is on fire —”

  “Hold on tight!” said Eric. “Going down!”

  Just as it had the first time they went to Agrah-Voor, the little boat began to dip.

  Silvery waves rushed over the boat’s bow, completely drenching the children. Then, a moment later, they were completely dry again and floating through the air underneath the river.

  The closer they got to the city, the better they could see that the tall column of smoke was tinged with purple mist.

  “I guess we know who started the fire,” said Julie. “That creepy shadow guy.”

  “I think I’ll call him Shadowface,” said Neal. “Because we couldn’t see his face. A creepy name for a creepy guy.”

  The boat drifted inside the city walls, then thudded down amid a group of ghostly soldiers trying to douse the flames. Among them, Eric caught sight of Princess Keeah and her parents, King Zello and Queen Relna.

  “Eric! Julie! Neal!” Keeah called, running to them. “This fire is magical. The more we try to put it out, the more it grows!”

  “So Shadowhood can do magic,” said Julie.

  “Shadowface,” said Neal. “I call him —”

  “Stand back!” boomed a great, deep voice. There was a sudden rush of wind, and the wizard Galen swept in among them, icicles dripping from his long blue cloak. Right behind him were his little friend Max, whose orange hair was covered with giant snowflakes, and Kem, Sparr’s two-headed pet dog.

  “Hello, children!” chirped Max. “We’ve just come from the far north. The very far north!”

  “Purple fire needs the purple water of Tembish-Pa!” Galen shouted. Then he murmured a mystical charm and swung a large frosty bucket out from his cloak.

  A splash of purple water rolled through the air and grew and grew until it was as tall as a wave. It crashed against the fiery wall with a great hissss! and the flames went out.

  “Hooray!” yelled the warriors. “Three cheers for the wizard Galen —”

  “Wait!” said a voice behind the crowd, and the warriors went silent. They parted and bowed as an old woman wearing a strange crown of antlers came forward.

  It was Queen Hazad, the longtime ruler of Agrah-Voor. Her crown glinted in the dying embers. As the smoke cleared, she sighed heavily.

  “Oh, no … it’s as I feared. No, no, no.”

  “Hazad?” said Zello. “What is it —”

  Then everyone saw what the queen was staring at. In a hole in the wall stood an iron chest. Its lid had toppled to one side, and the chest was empty. Kem approached it cautiously, sniffing.

  Eric trembled. “What was in there?”

  Hazad turned to him. “The Warriors of the Skorth were buried there. They’re gone!”

  The Warriors of the Skorth were magical skeletons brought to life long ago by Sparr at his evil worst. After being destroyed at Agrah-Voor by Galen and the children, their loose bones were entombed in the city wall.

  Max grumbled as he waved away the remaining purple smoke. “Those nasty bone men are back? Who would steal them?”

  “Other than Sparr himself,” said Relna, “who could possibly bring them back to life?”

  Eric glanced at Julie and Neal. “Uh …”

  “Children?” said Galen. “You look as if you’ve seen a ghost, except that the ghosts here are not so frightening, I think!”

  Eric couldn’t get the image of the hooded man out of his mind. “We saw someone.”

  “Who was it?” asked Keeah.

  “No one we’ve ever seen before,” said Julie.

  “We didn’t actually see him this time, either,” added Neal. “He’s seven feet tall and as thin as a stick. His face was hidden under a huge hood. I call him … Shadowface.”

  Kem grumbled at the sound of the name.

  “Did he fight you?” asked Max.

  Eric shook his head. “All he did was say a single word. I had never heard it before. ‘Nyora.’”

  “We thought he was putting a curse o
n us, but nothing happened,” said Julie.

  “Nyora,” repeated Queen Hazad. “Perhaps it is a curse. But whatever language it is, it’s not one I’ve heard before.”

  “Shadowman, eh?” Max snarled. “So now we have a new villain in Droon —”

  “Shadowface,” said Neal. “I think we’ve all agreed to call him Shadowface.”

  Keeah frowned. “What if he’s part of Emperor Ko’s plan?” she asked. “I mean, Sparr already warned us that Ko’s armies were gathering in the Serpent Sea. We’re pretty close to the Serpent Sea here. Maybe Shadowcloak is on his way there.”

  “Shadowface,” said Neal, frowning.

  “When one evil rises,” said Galen, “it brings another evil with it, and another and another. Emperor Ko. Gethwing, the moon dragon. It was only a matter of time before a new evil arose.”

  Neal dug into his pocket and pulled out his scroll. “But don’t forget, we have a new good guy now, too. Even if I can’t use all my powers yet.”

  Galen grinned. “You will be handy today, no doubt. But some of us have known for a long time that the greatness of Neal Kroger has little to do with magic!”

  Neal blushed.

  King Zello nodded firmly. “I will return to Jaffa City at once and bring the Droon navy back with me. Ko’s beast army must not be allowed out of the Serpent Sea. Max, will you pilot the Jaffa Wind and lead our fleet?”

  The spider troll grinned from ear to ear. “At your service, my king. With me at the helm, we’ll be back in no time!”

  “And no time is what we have,” said Relna. “Queen Hazad, there’s no greater library for lost languages than Agrah-Voor’s library of the dead. Working together, you and I may discover what ‘Nyora’ means. And perhaps who this Shadoweyes is.”

  Neal opened his mouth, then closed it again without saying anything.

  “Let’s all meet at the Horns of Ko before the first stroke of battle,” said Galen.

  “Better yet,” said Eric, “let’s hope that battle never happens.”

  “Good words!” chirped Max. “Let’s go!”

  “One more thing,” said Galen. He looked over at Keeah. Around her neck hung the silver Moon Medallion, an object of great power created by Galen’s mother, Queen Zara. “This may be in danger today, my dear. Let your father hide it in Jaffa City under lock and key. For safety.”