The Isle of Mists Read online

  He whistled sharply, and dozens of Ninns jammed into the room, swords held high, grunting as they formed a fierce red wall.

  “I guess they escaped the gruffle,” said Julie.

  “But they’re still not happy,” whispered Djambo. “Look at those sad faces!”

  Sparr’s fins darkened as he grinned at Keeah. “Your parents are caught in my storm, Princess. But if the Red Eye doesn’t delay them, my Wasp will!”

  He hissed briefly. “Ssssrrrss!”

  The Wasp jerked back away through the halls.

  Through the cracks in the ceiling above them, Eric saw the Wasp zooming into the red storm.

  Keeah stared at Sparr. “You’re already so evil. Whatever you hope to find here, you’d better think again —”

  “Oh, I have thought again,” Sparr snapped. “Again and again and again! Since the very first time we met, when I found the Red Eye of Dawn after so long, all I have thought about is gathering my Three Powers again. Now that I have them, a great new adventure begins!”

  A great new adventure? wondered Eric. Meaning what?

  Sparr stepped slowly across the hall, toward the throne chamber. “Four centuries ago, the magical empire of Goll was defeated. Galen saw to that. Ko was wounded, and the dragon ship flew him here to the island where he was born —”

  “Tell us something we don’t know,” said Neal.

  “What you don’t know,” snapped Sparr, “is that in his final days, Ko summoned his greatest magic ever!”

  Eric stared into the chamber. The wall flames moved first one way, then the other.

  “Yes, Eric Hinkle. You know, don’t you?” Sparr said quietly.

  Keeah turned to her friend.

  As he watched the flames flicker, Eric kept going over the clues Salamandra had given them.

  Not a supermagical thing?

  Not a thing.

  No, he thought. It couldn’t be —

  “Tell us what you are thinking, Eric,” said Sparr.

  Eric swallowed hard. “The legend says that when Ko was near death, the dragon ship would bring him right here. But maybe … it’s crazy … but Ko didn’t come here to … you know … die… ?”

  Neal laughed nervously. “Didn’t come to die? Eric, did you eat the green part of the string cheese?”

  “Go on,” said Sparr, still grinning.

  “I don’t know, maybe Ko has been waiting,” Eric continued. “For four hundred years he’s been waiting. For you. Maybe that old statue isn’t really a statue. And that breeze …”

  He paused as it wafted across the room and back again.

  “It’s not even a regular breeze, is it?” Eric said. “It’s … breathing —”

  “Yes! Yes! Correct!” crowed Sparr. “I knew you were special, Eric Hinkle! You’ve guessed it! Ko put himself into a deep slumber — a four-century sleep! — waiting for, oh, but you say it!”

  Eric trembled. “Waiting for the Viper to go into the past … and bring Ko back again —”

  “EXACTLY!” Sparr howled. He spun on his heels. “Now, Ninns, the time has come. My gloves will protect me, and I don’t care about these children, but you need a charm. Stay behind this and you will be safe. Kara-meloomna-sreee!”

  Zang! A veil of orange light appeared and settled over the Ninns.

  Turning, Sparr raised the Coiled Viper in front of the statue. “And now, how does it go? Oh, yes! Pleth-na-morlin-kananda-pelloh!”

  The Viper glowed with a sudden golden light.

  Its jeweled eyes shone, and two jagged streaks of blue fog shot out from them. They curled around Sparr in larger and larger circles, sweeping over the Ninns and reaching at the friends.

  “Don’t let the fog touch us!” cried Keeah, diving to the floor, pulling Max and Julie with her.

  Djambo yelped, “I like blue, but not blue fog!”

  Neal and Eric dashed away from the misty fingers, leaping from one crumbled stone to another.

  “Yes, run, run!” cried Sparr. “You can’t escape the Viper’s fangs! Time goes back, back, back!”

  The storm of streaking blue fog was growing in the room.

  “Neal, watch out!” yelled Julie. “Behind you!”

  Arching back from a wisp of fog, Neal stumbled against a broken wall behind him, dropping Nelag’s slippers to the floor. The mist came closer.

  “I don’t want to be three years old again!” said Neal. “I had weird hair! Get back!” Grabbing the slippers, he swatted wildly at the fog. “Back —”

  The blue mist seemed to clutch at the slippers.

  All of a sudden — pooomf! — something in a long robe with silver trim shot out from Neal’s hands.

  It was Nelag! He tumbled to the floor, then jumped up holding the old battered scroll in his hands. “I’m ba-ackkk!”

  “Holy cow!” Eric pulled the pretend wizard down behind a tumbled column. “I can’t believe it! The Viper just took your slippers back in time. To when you were you —”

  “Nelag, read the scroll!” said Keeah. “Or we’ll all go to when there was no us!”

  The pretend wizard whipped opened the scroll, giggled some backward words and — ploomf! — the kids were showered with orange light, too.

  “Yay!” said Djambo. “We’re saved —”

  “Not quite,” said Max. “Look … look….”

  As Sparr laughed and Kem howled, the friends stared through the cracked ceiling. They saw the storm outside lessen and a pale sun appear. It slowed in the sky. Then it began to move the other way, edging across the clouds from west to east. Soon light and shadows streamed across the stones. The room went dark, then light, then dark again.

  “The days are going backward!” said Djambo.

  “Four hundred years,” said Keeah, trembling. “To the day when Ko was awake!”

  Seasons went by faster and faster. Years, decades, centuries!

  Dust exploded from the floor. The crumbled stones rolled from where they had lain for centuries, then lifted up into place in the walls.

  The palace was building itself back together!

  When a nearby column shot upright, the friends jumped behind it.

  Sparr laughed, raising the Viper even higher. “You cannot hide from this! Galen’s victory is being undone. My magical crown goes back into the past for one single moment, and brings it forward to us. Ko — come to me!”

  The room sparked and popped and crackled.

  Even hidden, Eric felt his breath being sucked from him. If not for the spell, he felt as if they would all be drawn into the spinning wind.

  Sparr braced himself. “Now, the great tower shall rise, and so shall Ko himself!”

  The jagged tower did rise. Massive black stones shot up, course upon course, until the giant black horn was like new.

  The blue fog spun faster and louder.

  “Close your ears, everyone!” chirped Nelag. “My Fizzling Fizzler was four centuries old. It’s now four centuries ago —”

  “Ko!” cried Sparr, “Emperor! Rise up — huh?”

  KA-BOOOOM! A burst of pink sparks exploded from Sparr’s cloak, flying up into his face.

  “Ackggg!” he spun around and thudded to the ground in a heap, twitching under his cloak. His gloves flew off, and the Viper fell, rolled across the floor, and stopped at the statue.

  The blue storm faded instantly.

  “Hooray for Nelag and his Fizzler!” whooped Julie.

  “Not quite a dud after all!” Max chirped.

  Eric trembled as he peeked around the column. “It doesn’t matter. Look.”

  With a sound like stone grinding on stone, the statue began to move. It raised its giant bull’s head from the floor. Its three black eyes opened. And the friends knew it wasn’t a statue anymore.

  Slamming his great feet on the floor, Ko pushed with his four massive arms and rose up. He stood eight feet tall. His twin white tusks gleamed in the torchlight.

  Then with a sound that shook the room, he bellowed.

 
“AAAAAARRRRRR!”

  The ancient emperor of the beasts was awake.

  Flames shot from the tips of Ko’s horns when he set the Coiled Viper on his head.

  Whimpering, Kem crawled under his master’s cloak, tugging it completely over both of them.

  The Ninns stood under their orange veil, stunned and quaking.

  At first, Ko’s words sounded like the growling of an animal. “Spar-r-r … graaah … thrrr …”

  Soon enough, real words sounded.

  “Sparr!” said Ko, gazing at the lumpy cloth on the floor. “You did well to wake me. Now, come, Fintop and Grayclaws! Wake, old Witherbreath! Come, Snarly. The Empire of Goll begins anew. Soon, we will raise our black banners in Jaffa City!”

  “Oh, no, please no,” moaned Max, tugging on Keeah’s sleeve.

  “They won’t!” she whispered.

  The floors shook suddenly, and a creature thudded into the room. It was like a lion, only twice the size, with a fringe of spikes down its spine. It slapped eight gray paws on the floor.

  “I saw his statue in the ruins outside!” said Djambo. “Except it wasn’t a statue.”

  The beast bowed and growled. “My Emperor Ko!”

  Next came a mass of woolly fur. In the middle was a face with glistening eyes. It hopped to Ko, leaving slimy spots along the floor behind it.

  Max winced. “I remember him, too.”

  Next came a twin-beaked bird. Trailing it was a beast with five tusks, two up, three down.

  Ko’s three large eyes blazed like fire.

  “More! More!” he bellowed.

  “Less … less …” Neal whispered.

  But more came.

  Beasts of every size and description stomped and waddled and thudded into the palace, taking their place and bowing before Ko.

  The Viper had woken them all from sleep.

  “My beasts!” shouted the bull-headed ruler, gazing from one creature to another. “This Viper shall wake more of you, all over Droon. We shall cover this world! A new horned tower shall rise from Jaffa City! I shall rule!”

  Eric felt trembling next to him. He turned to see Keeah shuddering. “We have to do something,” he said. “Stop this.”

  “Stop it how?” whispered Julie. “Your sparks blast your own toes!”

  “Our sparks do blast themselves,” said Keeah. “But if we know that, and aim carefully …”

  Eric watched Ko move between a set of giant pillars.

  He began to smile. “Let’s try it….”

  Djambo crawled over and grabbed Sparr’s gloves. “If you are going for the Viper, take these. They will protect you.”

  Eric grinned. “Thanks. Everybody ready?”

  Neal’s eyes were wide. “Not exactly —”

  “Now!”

  Blam! BLAM! Eric and Keeah blasted bright silver and violet sparks together.

  Even as Ko bellowed, the blasts shot to the ceiling, then curved back at the two running wizards.

  “Keeah — jump!” yelled Eric.

  Zzzzeeeoooorr — booom! The columns on both sides of Ko exploded before he could move, showering him with large stones. He swatted them away, but his golden crown tumbled from his head. It clattered to the floor.

  Eric slid across the stones and grabbed it. The moment he did, the Viper’s eyes began to glow.

  Ko roared. “Clinkface, Nobclaws, get them!”

  “Get yourself!” boomed a loud voice. “You should be in a cage, you four-fisted, three-eyed horntop!”

  The giant doorway was suddenly filled with the large shape of the bearded king of Droon.

  Zello and Relna burst into the room with an army of royal guards, all sparking with a protective spell.

  “Mother, Father!” called Keeah.

  “No little storm or wingy wasp will stop us!” said Relna. “Now get that Viper out of here!”

  “We’ll take care of these big boys!” said Zello. “This is a two-club job. Hey, you, Stinkface —”

  Ko was enraged. “Ninns! Finish the small-fry!”

  “Ha!” shouted Neal. “Nobody finishes the fries while I’m around. Come on, people!”

  The Ninns broke from the orange veil, waved their swords at the kids, and charged.

  Keeah swung around. “To the tower!”

  As Zello, Relna, and the guards took on Ko and his beasts, the Ninns charged up the stairs after the children.

  When Keeah reached the top step of the tower, she dashed into the uppermost room. Everyone piled in. Max shut the door and barred it.

  It was a small room, perfectly round and pointed at the top.

  There were no windows, only a thin stream of light shining from the tip of the ceiling to the floor below.

  “Dead end,” said Julie. “No exit. Now what? Destroy the Viper?”

  “I don’t know,” said Keeah. “What if we need it to send Ko back?”

  “Make a fort!” said Djambo. “We love forts!”

  “That we can do!” Keeah sent out a quick blast of sparks. It veered around at two large pillars, tumbling them to the floor. Everyone leaped behind them and faced the door.

  “Okay. Now what?” asked Neal.

  Eric’s heart pounded like a drum. He heard the stomping feet of the charging Ninns. Hiding there reminded him of the closet that morning.

  Only now, all of his friends were jammed in there with him.

  Neal, Julie, and Keeah were on one side. Max and Nelag crouched just behind him. Djambo was right next to him.

  “My second game of hide-and-seek today,” the Orkin whispered. “Except we’re hiding and my own brothers are seeking —”

  Eric blinked.

  My own brothers.

  The red warriors stomped more loudly up the stairs.

  That’s when Eric knew what to do.

  He laughed. “Everything Salamandra did today helped us. We went to the Orkin village because she knew we needed you, Djambo. For right now. When the Ninns chase us!”

  “But Orkins play!” said Djambo. “I can’t fight Ninns. I can’t fight anyone!”

  “Not fight.” Eric pulled Sparr’s gloves tight. Tattered by the explosion, burned, full of holes as they were, he still had to take the chance. “Nelag, read the protection spell,” he said.

  “Eric?” said Keeah. “What are you doing?”

  “We need to go back….” he whispered.

  “Go back where?” said Max. “Downstairs?”

  Eric held up the Viper. “No. In time —”

  Thump! Thump! The Ninns were almost there.

  “This is crazy!” said Julie.

  Even as Nelag read the backward spell from the scroll, twin streaks of thick blue fog flowed from the Viper’s eyes.

  The crown quivered. It burned in Eric’s hands.

  He almost smiled. “Oven mitts,” he said. “Salamandra told us that things would heat up in Droon. I guess that’s sure true!”

  Neal gulped loudly. “Eric, do you know what you’re doing?”

  The sound of stomping feet grew louder. The blue fog whirled faster. Eric felt electricity passing through his hands, up his arms, filling his whole self.

  “Not really,” he said.

  He didn’t know what he was doing.

  But it was as if he knew everything else. Or saw everything else. Everything he had ever done and everywhere he had ever been seemed to be spinning inside his head.

  Spinning, like the blue storm in the room.

  He felt himself falling back into his own past.

  He saw his house, his yard, a school bus. Sounds drifted in and out, sing-along songs, his mother’s words. There was his father flying him around the room. His first haircut —

  Suddenly — BOOOOM-M-M-M!

  Light exploded in the room, the fog vanished, and Eric fell to the floor, dropping the Viper. An instant later, the door flew open and dozens of warriors in black armor piled into the room. The light from a hundred torches shone off a hundred jagged blades.

  And a hundre
d iron helmets.

  And a hundred blue faces.

  “Orkins!” shouted Djambo, bursting up and hugging them. “Brothers! Friends!”

  “Eric, you did it!” cried Max, helping him up. “You returned the Ninns to the time before they were Ninns. To the time when they were Orkins —”

  Blam! Ko burst to the top of the stairs and into the room. He growled at the top of his lungs.

  “You children will pay for this! All of Droon will pay —”

  Ko reached out an arm and grabbed the Viper from the floor. When he turned back, the whole room of Orkins was standing between him and the friends.

  Growling again, his three black eyes burning, his horns flaring and flaming, Ko punched a massive hole through the tower wall and hurled himself to the ground.

  The friends and the Orkins charged down the tower stairs. By the time they raced from the palace, Ko had leaped on the back of the gruffle and was calling his army.

  “Kinjah-preth-no-tah!”

  One after another his winged and hoofed beasts abandoned the battle with the king and queen and tramped to their leader. Turning, the emperor led his terrible army away into the darkening mist.

  Relna and Zello rushed to the friends.

  “Ko and his beasts are back in our world now,” said Relna. “Thanks to Sparr —”

  Fwooosh! There came a sudden streak of green from the jungle shadows, and Salamandra limped out, breathing hard.

  “Do not try to stop me!” she hissed.

  Eric lowered his hands. “You knew all this would happen,” he said.

  “Tell us,” said Keeah, “will we defeat Ko? And Sparr, too?”

  Salamandra stared at the children. She grinned suddenly. “I haven’t been that far into the future … not yet!”

  Then, scattering thorns behind her, she ran after the beasts. Within a few moments, she had vanished into the island mists.

  “We’re just letting her follow Ko?” asked Neal.

  Eric watched the thorn princess vanish. “Salamandra made sure we came to Droon today. She made sure we saw what we did and did what we did. She doesn’t like Ko. But maybe she’s not an enemy of ours, either.”

  “That makes sense!” said Nelag. “And so does this!” He ran off and returned a few minutes later, waving the flagpole of Droon over his shoulder. “Come, now. The island will soon leave us!”