And that brought Aidan back to the canvas in front of him. It was a scene from The Realm like the others, but not a place he had been personally. It had come from another one of his visions—the visions that came in dreams or when he traveled between earth and The Realm, like tonight with the lightning. Some of the visions had been foretelling, but not all had come true yet. There was one vision that Aidan desperately hoped would never come to pass. In this vision, there was a cavernous hall, lit from above by a flaming chandelier. Beneath it, raising goblets as if in victory, were soldiers dressed in the dark armor of Paragory. Some of the Glimpse warriors had eyes that glinted green, the color of the undecided. Most of them had eyes that glinted red, a sign of service to Paragor. One of these red-eyed knights, Aidan recognized all too well. It was the Glimpse of Robby, his best friend from Maryland.
Aidan picked up the paintbrush, and instead of giving red eyes to the painted version of his friend, he dipped the brush into a clear cup of water and watched the color bleed away to nothing. If there is a way to reach Robby, he thought, then King Eliam will show me.
SLAM!! Aidan jumped, almost knocking over the stool and all his paints. Heavy footfalls bounded down the stairs, and there, looking breathless and feverishly excited, was Aidan’s dad.
“Aidan!” he said. “I’m glad you’re still awake. You’ve got to come see what I’ve found!”
“What?!”
“Well, I was boxing up some of Grampin’s stuff in his old study, and I got this weird feeling I was being watched. When I looked up, one of the books on Grampin’s bookshelves was sticking out.”
Aidan smiled, but shrugged.
“Aidan, it was Grampin’s diary. Inside, there’s a note for you.”
3
GRAMPIN’S DIARY
The first entry is dated March sixth 1940,” Aidan’s dad explained, holding the diary in both hands. “Can you believe Grampin wrote in this diary for more than sixty years?”
“It looks old,” Aidan replied. Stains, cuts, scrapes, and smudges marred the dark brown leather cover. It had a tarnished coppery color at the binding. A ragged reddish tassel stuck out from the pages. “But how could he fit sixty years of writing into just one book? There can’t be any more than three—four hundred pages in there.”
“Well, from what I can tell, he didn’t write every day. There are some places where he skipped whole years between entries. Maybe he just wrote about special occasions.”
“So where’s the note for me?” Aidan asked.
“It’s at the end,” his dad replied. “It’s the last entry.” As Aidan’s father flipped through the yellowed pages, Aidan caught sight of innumerable passages written in Grampin’s bold handwriting, as well as hand-drawn sketches and maps. Finally, Aidan’s dad reached the last entry.
“I haven’t read it yet,” he said, closing the diary just enough to send Aidan’s curiosity off the charts. “As soon as I saw the date of the entry and realized it was addressed to you, I came to find you. Do you want me to read it out—”
“Read it already, Dad!” Aidan interrupted.
“Okay, okay! Here goes!”
Dear Aidan,
I trust you’ll find this when you get back from The Realm. I don’t expect I’ll be able to talk to you again, and that’s a pity. This old heart of mine is about to quit, I think. Took every last bit of energy I had to send that bundle of scrolls into The Realm after you!
“Remember, Dad? I told you about that!”
“I still can’t believe he got himself up and down the stairs,” Aidan’s father replied, shaking his head. “I guess I shouldn’t be so shocked. Dad still had some strength in those arms of his.”
“Keep reading, Dad!”
So I thought I’d best leave this old journal of mine to you, Aidan. It has been a long journey for me, and if my hunch is right, you’re going to need a lot of what I discovered along the way. You might even be able to figure out some of the riddles I came across. At the very least, use the journal to convince your stubborn parents that The Realm is real. King Eliam has a heart for them. They just need to wake up and hear his call!
Aidan smirked. His father shrugged. “Okay, so I was stubborn!” he said. “But I came around.”
“So what’s keeping Mom?”
“I don’t know, Aidan. She gives me an odd look every time I open up the scrolls to read. But you know how she is. She’s a math teacher—everything has to be logical for her. If she can’t see it, she won’t believe it.”
“But she’s seen the scrolls, my scars . . .”
“She can invent explanations for those too easily. No, for her it’s going to take something she can’t rationalize away.” They were quiet for some time, and then Aidan’s dad continued reading from the journal.
The red tassel marks the first journal entry about my adventures in The Realm. I spent almost two years there, as Glimpses reckon time. I suppose you’ve already figured out that time works differently there. I guess I was gone about a month, our time, but anyway I learned a lot while I was there. I discovered that my Glimpse was named Valithor, and from what I learned, he was a formidable warrior. But then again, so was I. In my scrolls I read that Valithor eventually became Sentinel of The Realm! Imagine that! I wonder if you met him while you were there?
Anyhow, read this journal, Aidan. Start at the tassel. You’ll find my adventures, sketches, and notes—even some maps I drew. There’s a lot here that I figured out about The Realm, but much more I haven’t figured out. So get all you can out of it. Study it. Read it to those hardheaded folks of yours. Maybe King Eliam will give you some wisdom beyond what I was able to learn. As I said before, I have a hunch you are going to need all the wisdom you can get. You see, Aidan, I think there will come a time when you will go back to The Realm.
“Go back?!” Aidan blurted out. “But Gwenne said—”
“Shhh!” Aidan’s father said. “There’s more.”
But beware, Aidan. If I’m right and you do go the second time, it won’t be the same way you went before. And it may be that grave challenges await you in The Realm if you return. Take heart, son, and fear no darkness. You are never alone. My love to you and your parents. This is not good-bye—only until later. The Sacred Realm Beyond the Sun waits for me. And at last, I’ll be able to get up out of this old wheelchair once and for all.
Aidan sat back in a daze. “How am I going to go back to The Realm?”
Aidan and his father sat in silence, each busy with his own thoughts. They agreed to take turns reading Grampin’s diary. Mr. Thomas would read it first.
“How am I supposed to focus on anything with all this stuff going on?”
“Stuff ? You mean Grampin’s diary?”
“Yeah, that. That and the visions,” Aidan replied.
“You had another one?”
“Yes, but I don’t know what it means.”
Aidan told his father all about the flashback vision he’d had.
“I’ll think about it, Aidan,” Mr. Thomas said. “But it’s late, and you’ve got to get some sleep. School starts tomorrow.”
When Aidan finally laid his head on his pillow, he still had no answers—only questions.
4
THE BLUE-EYED
MICROSCOPE
The rain the night before had left enough moisture to cause a swirling fog to form. The sun, a blotchy pale globe, rose and fought to burn through the drifting orange haze. Feeling like he too was in a fog, Aidan stood alone, waiting at the bus stop.
Things had seemed so clear when he left The Realm. He’d just come back, tell his parents and Robby about his amazing adventures serving King Eliam as a knight, and they’d all just believe. Right. So far, Mom thinks I’m going through a “stage,” and Robby seems to have dropped off the face of the earth! And the only reason Dad believes is because of Grampin.
And then there was Gwenne. Aidan had thought he’d come up with a clever plan to see her again. “See you soon!” he had said just bef
ore kissing Gwenne on the cheek and leaving The Realm. He had figured that since every Glimpse had a human twin, he’d just find Gwenne’s double, and everything would be happy ever after. Good thinking. She could be anywhere in the whole world! And I might not even recognize her since time works differently between The Realm and earth. She could be three or thirty for all I know.
The visions he’d been having and Grampin’s diary had muddled things further. And to top it all off, Aidan’s mom—a high school math teacher—had called the math department chairman at Aidan’s new school to get Aidan bumped up to honors math. I barely scraped by with an A in general math, and she puts me in honors? At last the bus turned onto Aidan’s street. As it hissed to a stop, just inches from the curb, Aidan issued a silent plea to King Eliam for help.
Aidan boarded the bus. Great! No open seats! He’d just about given up hope of finding a seat when he reached the back of the bus and noticed that the second to the last seat on the left was occupied by only one person. It was a very tall male student wearing a black long-sleeved T-shirt and the baggiest jeans Aidan had ever seen. He had his knees and feet up on the dark green bench seat. The boy’s hair was spiked and dark except for blue highlights on the pointy ends. He wore headphones and was completely oblivious to Aidan standing there.
Six other kids filled the seats near Mr. Bluehair. Black seemed to be their favorite color. Some wore leather jackets. Others wore trench coats. Most wore military boots. But it was all black. The most disturbing thing to Aidan, other than the group’s black attire and various shocks of technicolored hair, was their makeup.
The boys all wore eyeliner, eye shadow—even lipstick. Black of course. There were two girls. The one with short, spiked, white-blond hair wore fierce blush and deep purple eye shadow. She had double eyeliner that streaked back from the corners of her eyes. Cleopatra! Aidan thought. She looks like a punk version of Cleopatra. The other girl, the one with very long, very red hair, didn’t wear much makeup at all. Her wide eyes were startlingly blue.
The bus lurched. Aidan lurched. Finally, the girl with the long red hair glanced up sideways at Aidan. She brushed a wave of red hair over one ear that was pierced more than once, and she continued to stare. Aidan felt as if he was being sized up, analyzed, measured—like he was an insect under a blue-eyed microscope. Her stare felt oddly familiar, but uncomfortable at the same time.
At last, she reached over the seat and pushed Mr. Bluehair in the back of the head. He looked up and suddenly realized that Aidan was standing there. Without a word, he put his feet on the floor and scooted over so Aidan could sit down.
Although he felt very much alone in the back of the bus with the trench-coat clan, Aidan knew he was not alone. Recent events had taught him that much.
“Honors math. Great . . . just great!” Aidan grumbled as he left the main office. He looked down at his new schedule and wondered why his mom thought this was the best class for him. The bell rang. Now he was late for class! After bounding up a flight of stairs, he finally found the honors math classroom. Aidan eased open the door and tentatively walked in. The teacher had her back turned and was writing on the chalkboard.
“Uh, excuse me, Mrs. . . . , um—” Aidan looked down at the schedule. “Mrs. Van Der Ick?”
“That’s VanDerEyck,” said the teacher as she turned. “It’s Dutch. Like eye with a ‘k’ at the end. VanDerEyck. And who are you?”
“I’m Aidan. Aidan Thomas.”
“You aren’t on my class list.”
“I . . . I’m a new add.”
“I see,” said Mrs. VanDerEyck. She picked up a chart. “Thomas. That will put you in the seat behind Ms. Reed. We’ll have to move Ms. Timmons, Mr. Young, and Ms. Zook.”
She glanced up and three students immediately stood and moved to different desks.
The teacher nodded and then looked back at Aidan. “Order, Mr. Thomas. Get very used to order. It is the foundational principle that makes math worth our study. Keeping my seating chart in strict alphabetical order makes it possible for me to learn your names immediately. And in much the same way, I will teach you to recognize the order of all the operations of math, and you will learn deeply and at great speed. Now, Mr. Thomas, take your seat behind Ms. Reed.”
Aidan looked nervously about, wishing he’d been watching the students who moved. There were two empty seats now, and he wasn’t sure which student had left the seat he was now supposed to occupy.
Finally, the slightest of waves caught his attention. To Aidan’s surprise, it was the red-haired girl from the bus. She waved again, more a ripple of fingers than a wave, but Aidan hurried over and took the seat behind her.
“Thanks!” he whispered to her.
“No problem,” she whispered back. “You looked a little lost.”
“She seems kind of strict,” Aidan said.
“Confident, I think,” she replied. “I like her.”
And those were the last non-math-related words anyone said the rest of that class. Mrs. VanDerEyck became a hurricane of information, and it was all Aidan could do to hang on to a pencil.
In the hall after class, Aidan felt a tap on his shoulder. “Hey, it’s Aidan, right?” It was the red-haired girl, Ms. Reed.
“Yeah, that’s right, um—”
“Antoinette. I’m Antoinette Reed,” she said. “You aren’t from Red Rocks Middle—that’s where I went last year. Are you from Breezewood?”
“No, I’m from Maryland. We just moved here in July.”
“Oh, Maryland, huh? What’s your next class?”
“Uh, art, I think.”
“Art? With Mr. Kurtz?”
Aidan looked at his schedule. “Yeah, Mr. Kurtz, room 192.”
“Me too,” said Antoinette. “I’ll walk with you.”
Aidan wasn’t quite sure what to say to that. The thought occurred to him that Mr. Bluehair and the rest of the trench-coat clan might not like it.
They easily found the class. Students filed in and checked the seating chart. Antoinette waltzed in and quickly found her seat. Aidan didn’t have a seat on the chart and stood there like he’d just been hit by a bus. He had, in fact—a bus named Antoinette Reed.
Finally, Mr. Kurtz—a tall, slender man with a beak nose and big eyes—came over to Aidan.
“Your schedule, please,” he said, drawing out each syllable ridiculously. “Yup, no doubt about it, you belong here.”
He showed Aidan to a stool. In some ways, Aidan was relieved that it was on the other side of the room from Antoinette. In another way, he was a little disappointed.
Aidan glanced up at her. She immediately looked away. Had she been staring at him the whole time? This is getting strange, he thought.
5
LIVING ART
Look at the book about master artists in front of you,” Mr. Kurtz directed the class. “Each book is different. Your first assignment is to select one work of art and replicate it to the very best of your ability.”
The textbook in front of Aidan was a collection of pencil and charcoal works by English artists.
“You may use pencil, pastille, pen and ink, or even watercolor paints, if you wish,” the art teacher continued. “Do your very best work because I will be grouping you by your level of skill. When you finish, clothespin your work to the line above your head. You may begin now.”
Aidan looked up. And sure enough there was some sort of clothesline-pulley contraption rigged all the way around the art room. Pictures could be hung from the clothesline and then rotated around the room by a master line near Mr. Kurtz’s desk.
Cool! Aidan thought. I wonder if Dad would let me put one in my r—
“You ought to get started, Mr. Thomas.”
Aidan turned three shades of red and hurriedly flipped open his book. The drawings were amazingly well done. But none of them really captured Aidan’s creative eye. He was about to raise his hand when Mr. Kurtz broke the creative silence.
“A student has asked if something original cou
ld be drawn rather than imitating one of the masters. The answer to that question is yes. You may always be original, but be careful not to waste time thinking of what to draw or paint. You have only one hour remaining.”
That was a relief to Aidan. Without any hesitation he grabbed a piece of sketch paper and launched into a rendering of the Seven Fountains of Alleble. Following the frenzied movements of Aidan’s pencil, the fountains came to life. The perspective was from a castle balcony looking out over the dry seventh fountain. The other six fountains followed a gradual curl and nearly disappeared at the horizon. Aidan moistened the ends of his fingers several times and smeared the plumes of water spraying out from the center of each enormous fountain.
Tudor cottages, castle towers, and merchant shops sprang up on both sides of the fountains. Aidan even tried to draw in the cobblestones of Alleble’s main thoroughfare.
It is looking very good, Aidan thought. So real, in fact, that for a few moments, it brought back the vision from the night before. There stood the tall Glimpse warrior Captain Valithor, leaning, staring into the dry fountain. Another vision of that fountain flooded into Aidan’s mind, and there were Glimpse men, women, and children standing waist-deep in ugly black oil. A flaming torch arced into the night sky and plunged inevitably toward the fountain, toward the oil—
“All right, time’s up,” Mr. Kurtz announced. Aidan came racing out of the trance. “Please hang your works of art on the gallery line. And don’t forget your autograph. An artist always signs his or her work!”
Aidan looked down at his work and signed his name at the bottom. He picked up the sketch and was about to clothespin it to the line, when he froze.
Beyond the last fountain in his drawing, beyond Alleble’s outer walls, two dark jagged mountain peaks stabbed up through distant clouds. Aidan knew what they were. They were the mountains of Paragory, The Prince’s Crown. Only, he did not remember drawing them into the scene.
“Mr. Thomas, please hang up your work,” chided Mr. Kurtz.