Like he was dying to tell me something.
What?
It was amazing how a good photographer could make a person come to life. I had to glance away. “Did anyone find the place Wenders was talking about?” Marco asked.
Bhegad shook his head. “No, alas. We believe it exists, or it did. Our transcription told of a deep fissure at the center of a valley. The source of the continent’s extraordinary power. A connection to the spirit of the earth. Before the creation of the Loculi, for generations the Atlantean king and queen made pilgrimages there, to find peace, wisdom, discernment.”
“I had a new version of the dream—our dream,” I said. “I was there at the destruction of Atlantis again. But I had a brother. He was calling to me. Did any of you guys have that one?”
Cass, Aly, and Marco shook their heads.
“Was it Karai or Massarym?” Bhegad asked, his eyes intent behind his glasses. “Which one were you?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t remember.”
“You must start writing these things down.” Bhegad took a deep breath, his brow deeply creased. “As for the source of the great fissure, there are none on this island that we know of. We do know that there was a severe geological cataclysm when the island sank, which might well have changed the landscape considerably. We worry that the fissure is underwater. Some scholars thought Wenders’s mysterious rock might be some sort of key. But it is likely the delusional ranting of an aggrieved father.”
With a sigh, I put the rock down on the oak table.
As soon as I let go, I nearly jumped. That strange feeling jacked up a notch. Like a mild electric shock.
Look closer.
I swallowed. I wasn’t sure where the suggestion had come from.
“Um, Professor Bhegad?” I said, placing my hand back on the rock. “Can I take this back to the dorm to examine?”
He looked at me curiously. “Of course. You’re not going anywhere out of my purview for a long, long time.”
I shuddered at that comment.
As I slipped the rock into my pocket, it was warm to the touch.
“I hate the way he talks about Wenders,” I said, holding the rock up to the great Medusa chandelier in the dining room.
“I hate the way he talks about everything,” Marco said. “What’s a purview?”
We were sitting at dinner now, in a table by a corner. According to Aly, the chandelier mikes couldn’t pick up our voices here. The great banquet table for my welcome dinner had actually been lots of square tables pushed together. Now the tables were dispersed throughout the great hall, and people were huddled together over papers, laptops, tablets, and all kinds of handheld devices, chattering busily.
“‘Delusional ranting of an aggrieved father,’” Cass said, imitating Professor Bhegad’s voice. “What does he know about losing someone?”
Aly shrugged. “He might. He’s old enough to have lost parents, or at least grandparents.”
“He’s a cold fish!” Marco shouted. “And I don’t care if he heard that.”
I was staring at the poem, noticing the shape of the lines. “Guys,” I said. “Do you think this thing is some kind of code?”
Aly looked at it closely. “It’s worded funny. But it could just be old-school Victorian poetry. You know, like he couldn’t stand to see the light of day. The dawn brings life and light, but it also burns—very Romeo and Juliet. The best version being Zeffirelli’s, IMHO, but that’s another discussion. Anyway, the brightness reminds him of his son’s life and makes him feel bad. Also, you know, there’s a similarity in the words son and sun? Another thing—he says ‘I burden west.’ The sun sets in the west. So maybe he’s, like, wishing for his own sunset. His own death.”
We all stared at her. “Did you just think of that?” Marco asked.
“Gnizama,” Cass said. “I’m sitting next to you in English class.”
Aly’s face turned red.
“But notice the shape,” I said. “The three lines of the poem are arranged funny. Like they’re in two columns—one column under Burt, the other under Wenders.”
Cass leaned closer. “He kind of had to write it that way. The rock is bent.”
They began changing the subject, talking about Marco’s martial arts exploits and Aly’s improvements to the Karai security system and Cass’s ability to re-create a topographical map of the sea floor around the island by memory. They were all psyched about going back to their training tomorrow.
The geek movie buff, Mr. Memory, and Athlete of the Century.
No one was taking my idea seriously.
I felt like Herman Wenders. Burnt. And not looking forward to dawn at all.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THE ONES THAT DON’T BELONG
AT 6:00 A.M. my alarm went off at an ungodly volume. Which was just barely loud enough to wake me.
As I rose out of bed, I untied a string from a hook I’d screwed into the wall. The string was part of the pocketful of junk I’d borrowed from the garage. The other end of the string was tied to a wooden hanger—by way of a small pulley hooked into the ceiling. And on the hanger was my shirt. Now the shirt plunged down until its tail just brushed the sheet on my bed.
Not bad.
I took off my pajama top and thrust my arms into the sleeves of the shirt, pulling it off the hanger. Then I slid my body toward the foot of the bed, where my jeans lay waiting. The legs were held open by clothespins attached to two strings I’d hung from the ceiling on hooks. I’d clipped socks to the cuffs of the jeans, and just below the socks I’d left my sneakers open. Super-easy access for all.
Pants…socks…shoes.
I pulled off the clips, tied the shoes, and checked my watch. “Sixteen seconds,” I murmured. I’d have to improve that.
I was not looking forward to another day of Find Jack’s Talent.
Today I was to help the head chef, Brutus, in the kitchen for breakfast. And I had to be on time.
I ran across the compound toward the Comestibule. I passed the athletic center, a sleek glass two-story building with a track, an Olympic-sized pool, indoor basketball courts, weight rooms, and martial arts rooms. Through one of the windows I could see Marco in climbing gear, making his way up a vertical rock wall. It seemed to take no effort at all. I liked him, but I hated him.
Veering toward the back of the octagonal Comestibule, I entered the kitchen. It was enormous, its walls full of white shelves groaning with the weight of flour and sugar sacks, cans of oil and vinegar. Thick doors in the back of the room opened to meat lockers and freezers, blasting cold air every time the doors opened. Kitchen workers were preparing omelets and fruit bowls with blinding speed.
Brutus arrived late, flushed and out of breath. He had a round, doughy face and an impressive stomach. He glared at me as if his lateness was my fault. “Make the biscuits,” he said, gesturing toward a long table jammed with ingredients. “Two hundred. All the ingredients are on the table.”
Two hundred biscuits? I didn’t even know how to make one. “Is there a recipe?” I asked.
“Just leave out the ingredients that don’t belong in a biscuit!” Brutus snapped, scurrying off to yell at someone else.
I gulped. I grabbed a cookie sheet. And I said a prayer.
“I can speak again—the dentist unglued my teeth!” Marco said, bounding into the dorm after breakfast.
I plopped onto my bed in a cloud of pastry flour. I was trying desperately to flush the morning’s biscuit-making experience down my memory toilet.
Except for one thing. One comment by Brutus…
“I think the cinnamon-mint-mushroom combo was…different,” Aly said cheerily, following me into the room.
“They tasted like toothpaste!” Cass added. “But I happen to love the taste of toothpaste.”
I ignored them all, leaning over to take the Wenders rock from my desk drawer. The other three were just noticing the various strings hanging from my ceiling. “You making a marionette sho
w?” Cass asked.
Just leave out the ones that don’t belong…Brutus had said.
I held out the rock. “What if some of the letters are supposed to be left out?” I asked.
“Huh?” said Cass.
“What if this is a code, but not one where you have to substitute a letter?” I pressed on. “What if it’s about taking away letters?”
We looked at it again:
I was seeing things in the words, recurring letters. And I had an idea what to do with them.
“Bhegad said this might be a key to the center of Atlantis—whatever that means,” I said. “So maybe Wenders got to the center. Imagine being him. Imagine finding the thing you’ve been looking for, the find of a lifetime—and you think, so what? It’s a hole in the ground. His son, Burt, had died! Think about how he would have felt.”
Marco nodded. “I’d have thrown the key away.”
“Part of him would want to come back announcing, ‘Yo, we found the center!’” I said. “But that would have sent everyone running. It would have been disrespectful to Burt’s memory. So he didn’t do it. Still, Wenders was a professional, one of the best in his field. He had to feel some obligation to the Scholars of Karai. So he made it a little hard. He created a delay, a barrier to prevent people from rushing off to find the fissure.”
Marco was staring oddly at me. “What made you think of all this? It’s like you’re reading the guy’s mind.”
I shrugged. I didn’t know. The feeling was blindsiding me. “This was before the discovery of G7W, before the treatments,” I said. “It must have felt to Wenders like a part of himself had been ripped away. So maybe he meant for the name Burt Wenders to be taken from the words of the poem—the way the kid was taken from him.”
“Let’s try it,” Cass said.
I began writing the words of the poem on a sheet of paper. “Cass, you said something about the shape of the lines. It’s like they’re in two columns. And on top of them, there are the two words of the son’s name.”
“So maybe take the word Burt from each line in the first column and Wenders from the second?” Cass asked.
Exactly.
Then I wrote out the remaining letters:
“Looks Greek to me,” Marco said. “Maybe Swedish.”
I exhaled. I was ready to crumple up the paper and toss it, when I looked at the bottom two lines. The word on began the second row. And the third began with ni, which could easily be in.
“I think they’re just scrambled, that’s all,” I said.
I smoothed out the paper and carefully began writing.
“On peak!” Aly shouted. “That could be Mount Onyx! Maybe that’s where we’ll find the other half of this rock.”
Marco scrunched up his brow. “So all we have to do is find…a tub? On the top of a humongous mountain?”
“Maybe that part is a mistake,” Cass suggested. “Or maybe it’s supposed to be but, not tub.”
“In but?” Marco said. “That scares me.”
Cass shrugged. “An alternate spelling for butte?”
“That scares me less,” Marco said.
“Tomorrow,” I said, folding the paper and putting it in my pocket, “we will find out.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
MOUNT ONYX
“THAT’S SPLENDID, JACK!” Bhegad said, looking at my analysis of the poem. We had managed to find him walking across the lawn toward the Comestibule for a late breakfast. Even in the morning, the low clouds seemed to trap the heat. “Very impressive. Thanks for this tip. I will have Torquin mobilize a search team at once. Come. Let’s discuss today’s training agenda over some of your biscuits, shall we?”
Training agenda? With my luck, they’d be testing my skills on cleaning the Karai sewer system today. I was hoping Bhegad would have had a different reaction. “I was thinking we would go up there,” I said.
Bhegad looked alarmed. “You want to go on a hike in the jungle on a hot day like this? To find a rock?”
“Actually, some speed swimming in the pool with the Karai trainers would be great,” Marco said.
I kicked him. “We’re the ones who figured out the puzzle, Professor Bhegad,” I said. “Isn’t it our right to be the ones to find the other half?”
“Exactly my thinking,” Aly said.
“It is kind of high up there…” Cass said dubiously.
Professor Bhegad turned and looked toward the distant black giant. “Mount Onyx looks formidable, but it’s actually not terribly difficult if you use the paths our trackers have marked. Torquin, of course, knows those paths well.”
“The other half of the rock may provide some clue to the big secret we’re looking for!” I said. “Isn’t that why we’re here?”
Without breaking stride, Bhegad whipped out a walkie-talkie. “Hello, Torquin. Changing today’s schedule. You are to take the children to the top of Mount Onyx…Oh, dear, it was your day off? Well, we’ll make it up later…Really? Well, you know what I say to that response. See you at breakfast!”
“What did he say?” I asked as he hung up.
“Over his dead body.” Bhegad mopped his brow with a handkerchief. “I can see this will be an illuminating experience.”
My hiking shoes alone felt like they weighed forty pounds. My feet hurt from pounding into the hard-packed soil. My shoulders ached from my backpack, which was loaded with extra water, a change of clothing, spare ropes, some trail gorp, a flashlight, bug spray, and sunblock.
And we hadn’t even reached the mountain.
The clouds hung over us like a dirty ceiling. The air was stagnant, hot, and sticky. Torquin was leading us through the jungle on a winding path, his bare feet tromping the flora flat. He had a machete, which he swung lazily from side to side.
Marco was directly ahead of me. He had a machete, too, but he preferred to keep it tucked into his belt. Instead he was listening to music through earbuds and whistling tunelessly. His backpack was the size of a small hut. It clanked and banged with each step. “What’s in there?” I called out.
Marco pulled out an earbud and glanced over his shoulder. “Rocks. Stones. Free weights. I figured I’d get some conditioning out of this.”
I knew I shouldn’t have asked.
“I’m starting to have blisters already,” said Aly, who was walking behind me with Cass.
“I love blisters,” Marco said. “They’re fun to pop.”
“That image just ruined my frisky mood,” Cass said.
That was the first thing Cass had said since we’d started out. “How are you holding up?” I asked.
“Fine, as long as I don’t think of heights.” He gazed upward at the black column that seemed to rise out of the mountaintop and disappear into the clouds. “That thing at the top is like Jack in the Beanstalk’s beanstalk. L-like it kept growing for a thousand years and then petrified.”
“AIIEEE!” Torquin shouted. “Look! Poison snake!”
He jumped out of the pathway. Something blue and shiny was slithering through the grass toward us.
I leaped away and crashed into a tree, thudding to the ground. Cass, screaming, fell into a bramble bush. Marco and Aly collided while ducking away and fell together in a heap.
The snake continued past, hissing ominously, and then stopped.
From our left came the wheezing sound of Torquin’s laughter. “Need new batteries,” he said.
I picked myself up and walked closer to the reptile. It was made of metal and segmented. And completely out of juice. “It’s a toy,” I said.
“What?” Marco shot back.
“Marco’s backpack nearly crushed me!” Aly said.
“I want to go back,” Cass said.
Torquin was sitting on the ground, holding his stomach and vibrating with laughter.
I stepped into the pathway and accidentally on purpose crushed Torquin’s toy.
“Robert was old friend,” Torquin grumbled, as we began our ascent up the side of the mountain.
“Ro
bert?” Marco asked.
“Snake,” Torquin growled.
“Your toy snake’s name was Robert?” Aly said.
“What do you expect from a guy named Torquin?” Cass reminded her.
“You will pay,” Torquin said.
“Sorry,” I lied. “I didn’t see it.” I felt a little guilty. But not much. The climb was too serious for dumb practical jokes.
After about an hour of dirt, the path became rocky. We scrambled over boulders, swatting away flies. Torquin soon pulled way ahead of us, but nobody minded. With a wad of gum, Marco had stuck a sheet of paper on Torquin’s backpack that said BITE ME. The flies couldn’t read it, but it made us smile.
“El Torko! You’re too fast for us humans!” Marco shouted.
“Watch me! Learn!” Torquin called over his shoulder.
As Torquin picked up speed, Marco stopped. He held us back and shushed us silently, waiting until Torquin grunted out of sight
With a sly grin, Marco turned to Cass. “You know this path well?”
Cass nodded. “We’re at an elevation of two thousand thirty-nine feet already. The path rises here and continues to circle around, until we actually circumnavigate the circumference three times before our final—”
“Tell me this, Jonny MapQuest,” Marco interrupted. “Is there a shortcut to the top—like right up those rocks?”
Cass’s eyes traveled upward, toward the nearly vertical black cliff. His face took on a tinge of green and he quickly looked away. “Yes, of course, but if we follow this path we go around to the other side of the cliff. It’s a gentler climb.”
“Gentler and longer,” Marco said.
“Right,” Cass said.
“Which is where Chief TurboFeet is headed,” Marco said.
“Torquin? Yeah, probably,” Cass replied.
“So let’s take the shortcut,” Marco said. “We’ll get to the top before that fat frog. He’ll come huffing and puffing, like he’s some kind of superhero for beating us kids. Imagine his face when he sees us, la-di-da, checking our watches.”