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  He burst through the front door and didn’t bother to dry off. He could think of one thing now—the closet. He had to get back there, to the warmth and peace he had felt before.

  He rushed up the stairs, leaving a trail of wet splotches on the carpet, and burst into his grandmother’s room, making his way to the back of the closet. The mural had again been replaced by the gold-and-silver panel with the impression of a hand. He stood there, dripping, wondering when the good feeling would return. He waited and waited, but he felt no better.

  Frustrated, he bashed his fists against the back wall. Why was this happening? Why wasn’t it working like before? Then he remembered. He raised his hand and put it back in the impression. Again, it conformed to his hand, and the mural appeared, accompanied by the chessboard. His vision, however, had not improved this time, and the mural looked like a collection of multi-colored blobs.

  A faint whisper echoed in the cramped closet. Rich glanced around, craning to make out what it was saying. It was joined by another whisper, and another, and another until it sounded like a large crowd speaking all at once, their voices rising and falling with heightened emotion. He glanced again over his shoulder, but somehow he knew that the voices were coming from the painting.

  In the jumble of conversation, he caught the occasional word here and there, and none of it seemed to make sense. At the height of frustration, he slumped and dropped his head into his hands. “What are you saying?” His voice cracked from the strain, and the voices died off a bit.

  He grew silent and felt his racing heart start to slacken. Then he caught an entire sentence. “Come. Place your pawn at the table.”

  It was a man’s voice, deep and resonant, and for an instant, a feeling of warmth and well-being swept over him. His eyes focused, and he could see the mural clearly. The figures had shifted, but the blank spot in the canvas remained. He glanced down and saw that the pieces on the chessboard were arranged in a rectangle. All of them were white knights, with the exception of two—a white king and a white queen.

  Rich squinted and tried to make out more. “What does that mean?” he called to the picture. “How can I do that?”

  Before anyone could answer, a sound from the other direction broke his concentration. A high-pitched whine pierced the air, demanding the attention of all within its reach. For a moment, Rich forgot the strange picture and the chessboard and cocked his head to one side.

  He stiffened as it dawned on him—the fire alarm. It had gone off a few times when his mother’s cooking experiments went awry, but since he was alone in the house, that couldn’t be the cause. He cleared the closet in a single bound, sniffing. It hit his nostrils in the same moment that he saw the first wisp of smoke creeping out from under his mother’s door.

  Acting on instinct, he rushed to the hall closet, his eyes searching for the fire extinguisher they kept there. Praying it wasn’t already too late, he snatched the heavy red canister and ran down the hall with the nozzle outstretched.

  Without hesitation, he kicked his mother’s door and it flew open, revealing a bed engulfed in flames. He aimed and fired the extinguisher, moving from side to side in an attempt to fight the entire blaze. He froze for a moment when he saw the smoke forming into a familiar shape—the black pawn.

  Maybe I really am going crazy. Can’t get therapy if I burn to death, though.

  White foam flew everywhere and the fire gave in, snuffed out before it could take hold of the rest of the room.

  Rich stepped back, letting the extinguisher clatter to the floor. His breath came so quickly, he feared he might hyperventilate. He took one step back, and then another and another until he was dashing down the stairs and to the phone in the kitchen. He dialed 911, hoping he could remain calm enough to let them know what had happened.

  He explained the situation with surprising clarity. The dispatcher promised that help was on the way, and Rich hung up. He placed the phone on the table, followed by his head.

  He blinked his eyes again and again, trying to clear his vision, and realized that in all the commotion, he had forgotten about his glasses. “Two pairs down already this week. That leaves...” He rubbed his eyes, feeling a headache on the horizon. “The emergency pair.”

  He slunk back into his room. With a halfhearted grunt, he rummaged under the bed and withdrew a battered orange shoebox that had once been his father’s. After lifting the lid, he felt around for the pair of glasses he’d sworn he would never wear again.

  The emergency pair had been one of his first pairs of glasses, with thicker lenses and frames. They had been broken multiple times and repaired with a combination of tape, glue, and a bit of twine. He might as well strap a billboard to his face that read “Nerd for Hire.”

  Reluctantly, he slid them onto his face, and his vision sharpened. For old time’s sake, he examined the remainder of the box’s contents, most of which had been gifts from his father or things to remember him by. Photos, a pair of tickets to Disneyland, a few old coins his father had brought back from a trip.

  He paused and felt his already-low stomach sink further.

  “Where is it?”

  He turned the box upside down and rummaged through the contents on the floor. After scrutinizing each article, he searched under the bed. Nothing.

  Though he could not remember receiving it, that Mickey Mantle rookie card had been his favorite birthday present from his father. He rarely took it from the box and had only shown it to a handful of others.

  Defeated, he slumped onto his bed, wet clothes and all.

  “I hope the rest of the semester is better than this,” he muttered. And for the last time that day, he sighed.

  Chapter 4: Good Knight

  The firemen combed the room, but they couldn’t figure out the source of the blaze. Rich had told them about the intruder, but not the strange way he had appeared. The police who came concluded that they could find no signs of a struggle. His mother hadn’t so much as called.

  When the phone did ring, a feminine voice spoke on the other end. His heart fell as he recognized it—Angela. In all the commotion, he had completely forgotten to wonder what had happened to her. He was worried she'd be calling from a hospital bed, having been bludgeoned senseless with water balloons and left to develop frostbite in the bitter cold.

  “Angela, uh, I... I..." He couldn’t think of any words to mask the guilt of having left her behind.

  She cut in. "Hey, I'm the one who’s supposed to stutter, remember? Don't worry about it, Rich. I'm fine. Are you okay?"

  "Yeah. But my day only got worse after school."

  "How?" Angela asked, her voice heavy with concern. "Did you get grounded for life for losing your glasses?"

  "No. At least, not yet. My mom's missing, and my house caught on fire."

  "What?" she gasped. "How?"

  "They don't know. There's a bunch of firefighters over here right now."

  "That's crazy! How bad was it?"

  Rich let out a deep breath. “Pretty much just my mom’s room. It could have been a lot worse.”

  “No joke,” Angela said. “But why would your mom be gone? That’s so weird. Do they have cops out looking for her?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well,” Angela said after a long pause, “I'm glad you're okay.”

  "Yeah, me too."

  The line went quiet except for the sound of their breathing. "It sounds kinda silly now," Angela began, "but I have a confession to make."

  "What's that?" Rich asked, pretty sure that nothing she said would surprise him today.

  "You know how we have that big history project coming up? I was wondering if I could work with you. You're the b
est student in the class, and for some reason, I'm not getting it this semester." She chuckled nervously. "I really did want to talk to you at the creek, though. That was fun until the bullies showed up."

  Rich remained silent for a few moments. He wasn’t used to people being nervous talking to him. Usually, it was the other way around. Then he realized that his silence could be interpreted as indecision.

  "Yeah, that would be great. What did you want to do it on?"

  "I don't know. It has to be about a war, right? Is there one war you know more about than the others?"

  Rich paused, and a smile broke over his face. He was tempted to mention something about Star Wars or Middle Earth, but settled on an actual war. "The Crusades, I guess. I know a lot about knights, even though I don't always act like one."

  "Don't worry about it, Rich. I dodged most of their balloons anyway. Most of them couldn't make a Little League team."

  "Except Nadia. She could probably pitch for the Majors. I kind of wish they’d followed me home—those water balloons would have come in handy during the fire."

  "She's a real jerk. I don't know what her problem is. I mean, water balloons? You would think maybe snowballs this time of year, but water balloons?"

  "Anyway, when, uh..." Rich suddenly felt flustered. "When do you want to meet? I don't have much going on after school, so anytime works for me."

  "Would Thursday work? I've got cross country on Wednesday and Friday. Right after school?"

  "Great. Come on over. Most of the house is still standing."

  They talked for another few seconds and then said good-bye. Rich hung up and let out a deep breath. Then he smiled in spite of himself. Who said that having brains never got you any friends? There would always be people who needed help with their homework.

  After a hot shower and a fresh set of clothes, he tried to sit down to study, but his mind kept wandering to his mother. She had never stayed out so long. Whatever else was going on, she was always home for dinner, even if it was just take-out or something reheated in the microwave.

  Not knowing what else to do, he called his aunt, Laura Tinney, who lived on a farm about twenty miles down the road. She agreed to come stay with him that night in case his mother didn’t make it back. Laura’s dusty green pickup truck rumbled in half an hour later with his twin cousins, Marie and Erika, stuffed in the back of the cab. They had just celebrated their tenth birthday and shared their mother’s intensely blonde hair that served as excellent camouflage when they ran out into the cornfield.

  "Hi, Rich," they said almost in unison as they entered, their long hair bobbing like stubborn dandelion fluff. They proceeded to the living room, where they attacked an unfinished jigsaw puzzle laid out on the coffee table. Rich smiled as he watched them for a minute, figuring they would have it pieced together within the hour.

  Aunt Laura was a kindly woman with a round, cheerful face and a bob of bright hair to match. She had grown up on a farm and could whip up a delicious dish out of whatever she had on hand. As it was, she was already mixing dough for a batch of her uncommonly good butterscotch cookies.

  Rich toyed with the idea of telling her not to burn down the house, but thought it might be in bad taste. Instead, he helped her find what she needed as she chatted about a wider range of topics than Rich thought possible in such a short amount of time. He listened and nodded, content to keep his thoughts to himself.

  The night drew on, and they helped themselves freely to milk and a stack of warm cookies. Rich barely tasted them. Between his mother’s absence and the day’s strange and awful events, the worry center in his brain was working overtime. Eventually, he decided to go to bed.

  Sleep didn’t come easily either. The darkness did little to mask the pictures swimming around in his imagination. He kept seeing the empty place at the table in the painting that he had been invited to fill. He sat awake in bed and resolved to try again.

  Rich waited a few minutes to make sure everyone was asleep and then crept out of bed. Holding his breath, he pulled on a pair of slippers and made his way down the hall, strategically avoiding the floorboards that creaked.

  As he approached his grandmother’s room, a knot formed in the pit of his stomach. Was dealing with the painting and chessboard dangerous? It had almost been as if someone or something was trying to keep him from finding out the truth about it. Who was to say that the rest of the house wouldn’t burst into flames the next time he tried to learn more?

  His hands trembling, Rich grasped the doorknob of the closet and opened it. Once again, a faint glow greeted him, and he felt a bit better. Retracing his path to the back, he wasted no time inserting his hand into the proper place. The mural reappeared, its colors as visible in the dim light as ever.

  Unlike the last time, his vision improved, and the feeling of warmth returned, though not as powerfully as before. Rich stepped forward and gasped as he saw what had become of the scene.

  The knight in the center had vanished. In his place lay his helmet, and his armor was draped on the table in front of his sword. Beside the chair, his grandmother stood robed in black, her hands raised to the heavens and her mouth opened wide in a wail. Around the table, the other figures joined in similar expressions of loss and mourning.

  As Rich stood there, the wails and cries echoed from the painting, creating a chorus of inexpressible sadness. The feeling weighed down like a sopping-wet blanket on Rich’s shoulders, bringing an involuntary tear to his eye. Who was this man who had apparently died? Who were these people who mourned him, and why was his grandmother among them?

  Suddenly, the unfinished section of the painting glowed, a golden light laced with blue and white sparks. The light floated down and fell over the chessboard. The sparks traced an empty square in the second row on his side. Once again, a distinct voice sounded from the painting. “Come. Take your place at the table.”

  A sudden thought struck Rich. He reached into his pocket, withdrew the white pawn, and stretched out his hand toward the glowing square. The voice spoke again with undisguised urgency. “Come, quickly. Take your place at the table!”

  His hand gripped the pawn, but before the piece touched the board, he felt something tap him from behind. Startled, he whirled about to face a familiar, ominous black shape silhouetted in the doorframe. The dark chess piece had come alive, changing into a creature of blackness that hissed and reached toward him with shadowy tendrils. Rich tried to call out, but found the sound frozen in his throat. In fact, his entire body refused to move any farther, as if he had become a living statue.

  The sinewy strings of darkness grazed his skin, leaving it cold and deadened. Depressing thoughts made their way into his mind, thoughts of failure, loneliness, and isolation. He saw the faces of all those who bullied him at school circled around him, and heard their laughter and taunting cries. The water balloons seemed to be pelting him again, and every drop felt like acid on his skin. His eyelids grew heavy, willing him to surrender to unconsciousness. He fought the urge with all his strength, but he could still feel himself slipping.

  He thought of the intruder and his promise that he wouldn’t look the same the next time he showed up. Could this be what he meant? If this was the game, Rich wanted out now.

  The voices from the painting behind him stopped moaning and instead raised a clamor, urging him to come to them. He turned his focus to them and felt the safety and warmth that accompanied them. He inched his hand toward the empty space on the board.

  Seeing his progress, the black form hissed violently and reached out again. Rich winced as the creature ripped him away from the painting, and his vision faded fast.

  Behind him, a warm hand reached out and grabbed him by the shoulder, and a voice he knew spoke into his ear.

 
“Heinrich, come with me.”

  There was no mistaking the old Austrian accent. For a brief instant, he felt the grip of the black creature loosen and warmth return to his limbs. He turned around to see the concerned face of his grandmother. She pulled him toward her, and he finally succeeded in placing the pawn on the glowing space. The entire room went fuzzy, and he felt as if he was careening through the air. For a fleeting instant, he saw the entire mural before him, but instead of a blank spot, he saw a figure resembling his own, complete with unruly hair and rumpled pajamas.

  Chapter 5: Four Quests

  The next instant, he landed hard in a chair. He cried out, finally giving release to the fear and frustration of the past several minutes. He breathed like a steam engine working overtime, ready to flee at a moment’s notice. However, as he took a look at his surroundings, his breathing and his pounding heart slowed.

  He sat at the table depicted in the painting. All around him, men clad in armor and women in robes stared at him as if he were an especially interesting exhibit at the zoo. Beside him, his grandmother still gripped his arm, and next to him loomed the great, empty chair where the old knight had once sat.

  “Welcome, Heinrich,” Grandma Minerva said. “We expected you’d make your way here eventually.”

  Rich blinked and let his gaze wander from face to face around the table. No one said anything.

  “Where am I? I mean, is this where you’ve been all this time? We’ve been so worried.” He felt a lump in his throat, feeling so relieved he could cry, but not in front of all of these people. Swallowing hard, he fought back the feelings and settled for a big smile.

  His grandmother nodded. “I’m sorry, my boy. I’m afraid there is cause for worry. But there will be time to explain that in a bit. Come here.”