The Book of the King Read online

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  The Wormling I: The Book of the King

  Copyright © 2007 by Jerry B. Jenkins. All rights reserved.

  Cover illustration copyright © 2007 by Tim Jessell. All rights reserved.

  Designed by Ron Kaufmann

  Edited by Lorie Popp

  Published in association with the literary agency of Alive Communications, Inc., 7680 Goddard Street, Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the authors or publisher.

  For manufacturing information regarding this product, please call 1-800-323-9400.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Jenkins, Jerry B.

  The Wormling I : the book of the king / Jerry B. Jenkins ; Chris Fabry.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Guided by a mysterious book and invisible guardians, meek high-schooler Owen Reeder learns that there is another world besides his ordinary one, where he is destined to face an evil dragon in order to make his own world safe and whole again.

  ISBN 978-1-4143-0155-6 (softcover : alk. paper)

  [1. Adventure and adventurers—Fiction. 2. Books and reading—Fiction.

  3. Conduct of life—Fiction. 4. Good and evil—Fiction. 5. Dragons—Fiction.]

  I. Fabry, Chris, date. II. Title. III. Title: Wormling one. IV. Title: Book of the

  king.

  PZ7.J4138Wor 2007

  [Fic]—dc22 2006024475

  To our children.

  May you find your adventure in Him.

  “We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”

  Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

  “Life is pain, Highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something.”

  Westley in The Princess Bride

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1: The Beginning

  Chapter 2: The Dragon

  Chapter 3: The Arm in the Night

  Chapter 4: Voices

  Chapter 5: Blackstone Tavern

  Chapter 6: Small Fears

  Chapter 7: Hidden Fears

  Chapter 8: Whispers

  Chapter 9: Constance

  Chapter 10: Finding Medusa

  Chapter 11: Beyond the Bookcase

  Chapter 12: Still Waters

  Chapter 13: Dodging Bullets

  Chapter 14: The Mysterious Visitor

  Chapter 15: The Book

  Chapter 16: All There Is

  Chapter 17: The Shield

  Chapter 18: The Search

  Chapter 19: The B and B

  Chapter 20: In the Closet

  Chapter 21: Beneath the B and B

  Chapter 22: Through the Bookshelf

  Chapter 23: The Man on the Knoll

  Chapter 24: Home

  Chapter 25: The Discovery

  Chapter 26: The Realization

  Chapter 27: Opening the Tome

  Chapter 28: Mucker

  Chapter 29: Missing

  Chapter 30: The Lair

  Chapter 31: Hurry

  Chapter 32: Two Worlds

  Chapter 33: The Date

  Chapter 34: Secret

  Chapter 35: The Departure

  Chapter 36: Into the Abyss

  Chapter 37: The Vortex

  Chapter 38: Escape

  Chapter 39: Deep Slumber

  Chapter 40: Toward the Portal

  Chapter 41: The Council

  Chapter 42: The Rumbling

  Chapter 43: Old and New Friends

  Chapter 44: Mustering for Attack

  Chapter 45: Bardig’s Home

  Chapter 46: The Day of Dreadwart

  Chapter 47: The Return

  Epilogue

  About the Authors

  To tell the story of Owen Reeder—the whole story and not just the parts that tickle the mind and make you laugh from the belly like one who has had too much to drink—we have to go into much unpleasantness.

  So if you are faint of heart and can’t stand bloody battles and cloaked figures in the darkness and invisible creatures (or visible ones who don’t have much of a sense of humor), and if you don’t like to cry over a story when someone you love is taken, then perhaps our tale is not for you. But if you’d like to read about a young man with seemingly no future but dreams he can barely hold in his head and about a war between opponents as far apart as east is from west—one side that loves evil and seeks to kill and destroy the hearts of good people and another that wants desperately to free those good people from tyranny and injustice—and about the deepest love the heart can imagine, then we welcome you.

  Since this story concerns a young man named Owen and it occurs today in our time, you might think we would begin on some basketball court or in some school hallway, and I suppose we could have begun there, for Owen certainly found himself on many courts and in many hallways.

  But we begin in a world far away, in a castle lit by candles, in darkened stone hallways that echo sadly with memories of a baby’s cry and a mother’s tender kiss. A man stands on a parapet, which is not two pets but a low stone wall on a balcony meant to keep those foolish enough to stand out there from falling to their deaths. The man is regal, which is to say he has good posture and wears embroidered robes and a crown, so anyone with half a brain can guess who he is. He looks out at his kingdom shrouded in darkness and shudders. Perhaps it is the chill wind coming across the water or the moonless night. Or perhaps he has a cold.

  But as the man turns and walks into the inner chamber, there seems to be more wrong than the weather or his health. He silently slips into the hall, alerting guards standing at attention on either side.

  “Anything wrong, sire?” one whispers.

  “No, I simply have a request.” The man speaks quietly, not wishing to wake his wife or any of the nobles in the castle. He imagines their making the discovery in the morning, but for now he focuses on the task and gives simple instructions.

  When he is finished, the man steps back inside the chamber and gazes at his sleeping wife. His face contorts, and it appears his heart will burst from some long-held emotion. He leans over the canopied bed and gently kisses the woman. She has an anxious look, even in sleep. The man slips something she will read in the morning under her pillow.

  If you were to inch closer in the flickering candlelight, you would see a tear escape the man and fall silently to the bed. The man’s gaze sweeps the room, as if this is the last time he will see it, as if he is saying good-bye to the lampstands and the velvet curtains and the map of a huge kingdom mounted in a massive wooden frame.

  He walks to a baby’s crib in the corner and runs a hand along its dusty coverlet. The man appears to have lost something valuable, to have spent years searching every nook and cranny of his kingdom. He seems to be longing for something from his past.

  But what?

  If your eyes were to linger on that crib, on the fine wood inlaid with exquisite detail, you would miss the man’s instant exit, not through the main door past the two guards but through another passageway, secret and cloaked from view.

  The man pads down narrow stone stairs, feeling his way in the dark, reaching for support from the cool walls on either side. You might be scared that a rat would scurry past, but the man walks resolutely, hurrying.

  We will not tell you how many level
s he descends, but when the air changes to a musty dankness and he feels water on the walls and mud under his feet, his gait slows and he reaches a chamber that looks and feels rarely visited.

  He pulls around him a dark curtain fastened to the wall, hiding himself from view. We see no other living being, and the room is totally, blindingly dark, yet it appears the man is hiding. Let us be clear. He is in the bowels of the castle, behind a thick curtain, in total darkness. We hear scurrying and the flap of heavy clothing falling to the earthen floor. Then grunting and something heavy being pulled or pushed from its rightful place and the fluttering of the curtain as a soft breeze enters.

  One more sound—a click and the opening of some compartment. Something is removed and placed heavily on a stone, and fabric is tied. We hear more struggling—as if someone is trying to squeeze through a small space—then stone upon stone again.

  Inside is still, save for a trickle of water down the wall and the soft whirring of insects inside the stone cracks. But if you were to put your ear to one of those cracks, or if you, like an insect, were to crawl between the stones and reach the chill of the night air, you would hear the soft lapping of water against a shore and the even softer sound of oars rowing away in the darkness.

  This man, now in tattered clothes with a heavy blanket over his shoulders, does not look as if he deserves to live in a castle. When he reaches the shore on the other side—and it has been no small feat to row to this distance against the wind—he steers into a small inlet and covers the boat with branches and dead limbs that appear to have been gathered in anticipation of this very trip. The man slings a wrapped pouch over his back and quickly walks away, the food stuffed in his pockets telling us he does not plan to be back for breakfast.

  You may ask, if this is such a cloudy, moonless night, how is the man able to navigate the soaked earth and craggy rocks without falling off the sheer cliffs only yards to his left? Has he walked this route in his mind, planning it from the parapet of the castle?

  By the time the sun casts crimson shadows, he is at the wood and into the thick trees. A fox scurries to its den with a twitching rabbit hanging from its mouth.

  When the sun peeks over the horizon, the man is deep in shadows, adjusting his pack as he glides through white-barked trees as thick as clover. He reaches an ivy-covered wall on the other side of the grove, out of place in the wood. He scans the mountain, taking in its majesty, then reaches to move the ivy to reveal a circular crest bearing the image of a beast, a dragon. To some this would appear to be an entrance, but it is not. It is a barrier, a rock so thick that the man could work a lifetime and not move or dislodge it.

  The man places his pack on the ground, unties it, and pulls out a book, the edges of its pages golden, the thick leather cover creaking as he opens it. He runs a hand over a page and the letters carefully inscribed there.

  He turns as if he has heard something behind him, then pulls the blanket closer to his face and turns back to the book. As he begins to speak, the words come to life and something magical—and wonderful—happens.

  We will turn to Owen shortly, for his story is the reason we are writing, but the image on the rock brings another scene we must visit—the actual dragon the image represents. The image comes to life in the Dragon’s invisible realm high above. We call it invisible, but it is so only for humans and only when those who live above stay above. You should be happy you cannot see this kingdom, which invades your own and is all around you.

  As you moved closer to this beast—if you could stand the stench—you would see pure evil. It is not easy to describe such a vile, despicable being to adults or children, but it is necessary in order to see the truth about him and understand what Owen is up against.

  Imagine a creature so horrible, so terrifying and hideous that he makes repugnant sound like a compliment. Sulfurous breath—which means he exhales something akin to burned charcoal and smoke from a thousand campfires gone bad. And that’s on a good day. Huge nostrils flare with each breath, and a drool of yellow saliva—yes, yellow—slithers down a crusted chin. Red, glowing reptilian eyes are shrouded with scaly lids, and a great tail stretches from the massive, undulating body. The monstrous head looks like a cross between a horse’s and a human’s. And the wings—veined, cracked, and enormous, though he has them tucked away when he’s resting—are able to propel him with frightening speed.

  We would not be telling you this if it weren’t absolutely necessary. But you must come closer to this being, because he is central to the conflict. If this upsets you, perhaps you prefer stories about furry animals running about, speaking funny lines, and playing games. We have only just begun. By the end there will be blood and an attack so vicious that your first reaction will be to turn away from these pages. But we promise—you will like Owen. You will love him from the moment you meet him. His heart is so genuine. He is such a good lad that you would want him as your friend, even if you had scores of them. And so we continue.

  Suffice it to say that this being, the image on the rock come to life, whom we will refer to from now on as the Dragon, does not like to be stirred in the night. You could say he likes his beauty sleep, but there is no beauty about him. Perhaps he needs his ugly sleep.

  Into the Dragon’s lair comes RHM—no, not his right-hand man. This RHM is Reginald Handler Mephistopheles. Think of him as the younger brother to the Dragon, just as ugly but with more human qualities—a beaklike nose, brows that look like a forest of unruly trees, and gnarly, elongated fingernails that resemble the claws of some wild bird. Oh, and a heart so rancid and devoted to his new master that nothing—absolutely nothing—could soften it.

  RHM tiptoes into this sleeping chamber, so cold he can see his breath. He stumbles over a weather-beaten rug (which has bits of rotten flesh and the bones of RHM’s predecessor embedded in it) and tries to regain his balance by grabbing a nightstand sporting a crystal vase. Why the Dragon owns a crystal vase we shall have to leave for another time, because at the sound of the crash the old beast awakens, snorting and sniffing and rearing back as if ready to shoot fire.

  “I’m sorry, Your Majesty!” RHM says. “Please forgive me.”

  “Why do you wake me?” The Dragon’s voice booms through the cavernous room like a cannon, a metallic rasp to it as if his vocal chords have been scraped raw.

  “There is movement in the King’s castle, sire,” RHM says, head down. “Our Stalker said—”

  The Dragon sits up, eyes ablaze and snout now inches from his newly appointed helper’s face. Even the loyal subjects of a tyrant have trouble hiding their trembling fear, for they never know when they will become the enemy. “Yes?” the Dragon explodes. “The Stalker said what?”

  “The King is gone. He slipped into some secret passage, I suppose, and—”

  “You suppose?”

  “The King gave an order to his soldiers and the Stalker followed them, but when he returned . . .”

  The Dragon’s gaze darts, red veins bulging, making the thin, black slit at the center of each eye even more menacing. The old beast makes calculations, sifting through the data in his mind until an impish grin creeps across his face. “It has begun. The King has exhausted his men searching for the boy. He himself has spent more time away from the castle than in it the last few years. He’s finally given in to the truth.”

  RHM rubs greasy hands together. “Which makes him vulnerable, sire.”

  The Dragon looks out on a thousand glowing fires, encampments of his sleeping troops. They are always ready for battle or engaged in one. He raises a corner of his lip, showing a tooth so sharp it makes ice picks envious. “This has been my plan all along. Summon the Stalkers. Send them to the four portals and have them report to me immediately.”

  “With gladness, sire.”

  “Wait!” the Dragon says. “Send one to the castle. Have him look for this book the King has fancied so long.”

  The Dragon stands, putting his considerable weight on legs like boulders. He turns to th
e window overlooking the King’s domain and sucks in a breath. “We have waited for this day. The King has made a terrible error, and I will see him in his grave.”

  “The Son too?” RHM says.

  The Dragon’s crusty, coughing laugh would have made you ill. When the rattle stops, the Dragon sneers, “The King has been protected here. When he dies and his Son after him, this realm becomes mine. Three worlds will unite under my rule.” He sweeps an arm toward the window, bidding his aide to look, and the flutter of a webbed wing sends a puff of air toward RHM that would have turned you away, gasping. But the malodorous smell is like perfume to the aide, and he gazes out the window with rapturous delight.

  “I have waited for this,” the Dragon says. “All our striving will be worth it when I see the last dying breath of the King. And then they will see what it means to have a ruler. A true king.”

  If you were sitting in the small, crowded Briarwood Café on the night our story begins, you might gravitate to where three tables have been pushed together to accommodate high school students having just completed their next-to-last night of the fall musical. Several girls wear long, flowing gowns. The young men wear tennis shoes and sweatpants—they are stagehands and not committed thespians. Their presence at the rehearsals and the play is, in actuality, so they can work with the young females, so you can understand why they are at the restaurant this evening. They are boisterous, excited.

  A few families dine amid the din. Some patrons scowl at the noise, but most endure it with good-natured looks.

  The stools at the front, the kind you see in old-fashioned diners, are full of weary travelers. Some grimace each time the door opens and a blast of cold air attacks, but the general mood of the place is pleasant.

  The boys—the ones in sweatpants and with bad manners—notice the waitress, another classmate, as she scurries back and forth to the kitchen. She’s wearing a dark uniform with an apron tied at the front.

  “She has the best eyes,” one boy says loud enough so she can hear.

  “You’re looking at her eyes?” another says, and the group erupts in laughter.