Ever since he can remember, Sebastian Phillips has felt as if he is a special person meant to do something great. As soon as he turns eleven, he finds out why. Even though he was born with cystic fibrosis, Sebastian still lives a normal life. But when Sebastian and his two best friends, Parker and Hunter-who are also growing up with lifelong illnesses-begin having unexplained dreams about a phoenix, a bear, and a dinosaur, they approach Sebastian's scientist father with the news. The three boys are about to receive shocking news from Sebastian's father-they are members of a secret order controlled by The Book of the Phoenix and have been blessed with supernatural powers used especially to keep a balance between good and evil. As The Book of the Phoenix leads the boys on a quest to attempt to defeat an evil witch in Norway, they soon uncover her true intentions and must use their special powers to stop her-before it is too late.

The Book of the Phoenix

Rise of the Warlock PrinceBy M. Dwayne Jones

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2011 M. Dwayne Jones
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4502-9061-6

Chapter One

Ever since I could remember, I felt as if I was a special person, as though I was meant to do something great. When I turned eleven years old, I found out why. My name is Sebastian Phillips, and these are my adventures.

I woke up in the morning gasping for air as I tried to breathe through my mouth and then my nose. I knew I had to make another trip to the hospital to get on a breathing machine so that I could breathe easier.

"Wake up, Sebastian, it's time for school!" said my dad in a cheerful way, like always.

He cracked open my door and yelled into my room. He had no idea that I was already awake. My dad is great! He is a scientist who studies unusual occurrences. He travels around the world looking into things that people report as suspicious, and in the summer he allows my two best friends and me to go with him. He has looked into everything from ghosts in haunted houses in New England to walking mummies in Egypt, and has been recognized by some of the leading minds in the world.

Yep, my dad, Dr. Martin Phillips, can solve any mystery, except for the mystery of the disease that I was born with called cystic fibrosis. Sometimes my lungs fill up with thick fluid that makes it hard for me to breathe. This has never been too big of a problem for me; I live life just like any other eleven-year-old.

After my dad yelled and woke me up, I let him know that I was having trouble breathing, and off we went to the hospital for my treatment. It went well as usual. When we got home, my mom was cooking breakfast. I could smell the eggs and bacon from outside. When we walked in, I sat down at the kitchen table beside my dad while he read the newspaper while my mom finished cooking. My mom fixed my plate, placed it in front of me, and kissed me on the forehead.

"It's your last day of school, Sebastian—are you excited?" she asked as I tried to peek over my father's newspaper to see what he was reading.

"Yeah, I'm excited to go on my next adventure with Dad. Dad, where are we going first?"

My dad lowered his paper and moved his glasses to the tip of his nose and said, "Well, son, all signs point to Norway."

"What are we going to do in Norway?" I asked.

"I received a call from a friend of mine. It seems as if he thinks that they have a problem with witches. Imagine that, witches in 2011."

My eyes lit up. I couldn't wait to tell Parker and Hunter that we were going on a witch hunt, just like the ones we had read about in books, and that we would get to do it in Norway!

Norway is in Europe near the countries of Russia, Denmark, and Sweden. I had never been to Norway and was looking forward to it. I was all about adventure, and it sounded like this one would be great.

I made it to school and ran into Hunter and Parker, who were in the hallway standing by their lockers. We had known each other for five years and were close as close could be.

Even though she was a girl, Parker was fearless. She had practiced karate since age five and had never met anything that she couldn't beat, but she suffered from cancer. Cancer caused Parker to feel really sick and weak at times. She had to have chemotherapy to help fight it. The therapy caused hair loss, and that was the reason she was bald. She always wore a skirt with combat boots. Freckles covered both of her cheeks.

Hunter was the cool one. He had always been popular and really smart. His hair was short, and he had a dimple on his left cheek that stood out when he smiled. Everywhere he went he always wore a jacket with the letter H on the shoulder. He played every sport you could name even though he had a disease known as juvenile diabetes.

Juvenile diabetes caused Hunter to have to eat food that had carbohydrates in them to get his blood sugar at a normal level. Instead of his body storing the sugar for energy, his body released the sugar into his bloodstream. When his blood sugar was low, he could become confused and could even pass out. He had to take insulin injections from a needle or use a pump so that his blood sugar wouldn't get too high. A lot of people thought that he had diabetes because he had some type of problem overeating, but that wasn't true. He was born with the disease through no fault of his own.

As for me, I was just like my dad. I was a scientist in the making. I always wore khaki pants and a polo-type shirt. My big ears always bothered me. Most times, if I could get away with it, I would try to wear a hat that would cover them.

They could see the excitement on my face as I quickly walked up to them. Parker walked to the middle of the hallway, stopping me in my tracks.

"Hey, Sebastian. What are you so excited about?" she asked.

"Yeah, what gives?" asked Hunter.

"Guess what, guys! We are going to Norway to hunt witches," I answered with a smile on my face that was as big as the ocean.

Hunter walked around me and threw his arm around my neck. We started walking down the hallway.

Parker walked on the other side of me. She tapped me on the shoulder and asked, "You mean we get to hunt real live witches?"

"Well, we get to look for them. I don't know if they really exist," I answered.

We walked into the library as we usually did before class and took seats at a table.

"You guys, I have been meaning to tell you this for a while now," Hunter said as he began to rub his hands together. "Something weird happened to me. I walked past our fireplace, and the logs were lit before I got near it, but when I passed it the fire went out. I got closer to the fireplace and waved my hand in front of it, and poof the fire came back. Weird, huh?"

"Yeah, it's weird that you would have the fireplace on in the summer," I said.

"You know my grandma is always cold," said Hunter.

"Not as weird as what happened to me," said Parker as she leaned forward and began to whisper. "Do you remember last week when it rained hard right after school?"

We both nodded our heads yes.

"Well, I was upset because I left my umbrella at home. So I began to walk home in the rain. I was so upset that I kicked every water puddle I could find. The madder I got the more the rain would stop. I stopped for a minute and looked up at the clouds, and then it began to rain hard again. I don't understand it—it was like I was controlling the rain with my anger."

Chapter Two

I immediately began to think about the dreams that I had been having and wondered if they were as strange as the stories that my friends had just told me. I began to wonder if I should even bring it up. Mine were not as cool as theirs. But then, I thought, Oh, well, it can't hurt.

"You know, I have been having some weird dreams too," I said.

"What kinds of dreams?" asked Hunter.

I told them that I had had about five of them. In each, I didn't really know where I was but it seemed like I was in some type of forest. The most recent dream had been the weirdest. I was walking down a path. A thick fog began to form all around me. Then, out of nowhere came a huge bear running toward me. I walked backward until my back was up against a tree. I was thinking, This is it. I couldn't go anywhere else. The bear's eyes were as big as saucers. He growled, and his teeth looked like thirty knives. When he was directly in front of me, he stood on his hind legs, and suddenly the light became dark. His paws opened wide, and I could see his long claws as the last bit of sunlight bounced off of them. I covered my face with my left arm and stuck out my right arm with the palm facing out, as if telling him to stop.

Suddenly, I could feel warmth on my face and saw a flickering light. I removed my arm from my face and saw a bird on fire. It flew in between me and the bear. It burned, and its ashes fell to the ground. A few seconds later, a bird rose from those ashes and flew to me. It landed on my arm, and its claw cut my arm.

Then something amazing happened. A T. rex came running toward us and scared the bear. The bear dropped down to all four legs and ran off, and the T. rex continued to chase him until they were both out of sight. Then I woke up.

When I was finished telling them about my dream, I asked, "What do you make of that?"

Hunter and Parker had been focused on every word I had said. They were just staring at me, as if I had hypnotized them. I thought that maybe I shouldn't have told them about my dream.

Parker finally spoke. "Wow! And I thought my story was cool. You had a bear, a phoenix, and a T. rex all together. But yours was a dream. I didn't dream mine."

"Yeah, but it seemed so real. I really felt the warmth of the fire from the phoenix on my face. And when his claw cut my arm, it really hurt. I woke up and immediately looked at my arm."

I rolled back my sleeve. Hunter and Parker were staring at my arm as if it was the only thing in the room. Their eyes opened wide when they saw the long, deep cut on my arm. Hunter sat back in his chair.

"No, that can't be real. This can't be happening. Three weird things happening to three best friends. What is going on?"

"I don't know." I answered. "But I know someone who can figure it out."

Chapter Three

As soon as school let out, we all hurried to my house. If there was anyone in the world who could solve our mystery, it was my father. We rushed into my living room with me leading the way.

"Dad!" I yelled, but he didn't answer. "Dad!" I yelled again, but still no answer.

"He must be in his lab," said Parker.

"You're right, let's go," I said. We raced toward the backyard.

My dad's lab looked like a small shed. It appeared no bigger than a walk-in closet from the outside. The metal roof was rusted and the outside panels had dents everywhere. The grass around it was overgrown except for the path in front of the door, which my dad would always cut with a weed-eater. Parker grabbed one end of the old metal door and Hunter the other. They slid the door open and voilà! we could see my dad's trap door to his underground lab.

I reached my hand inside the shed and punched in the six-digit code. The trap door slid open, and up came an elevator. We all squeezed inside and down we went. We made it to the bottom floor, which was twenty feet below the ground, and the elevator-door opened. Computer monitors were mounted everywhere. Bunsen burners, plastic tubs, beakers, unknown liquids, graduated cylinders, and funnels were on the long table that lined the wall. We could see my dad hard at work behind his desk writing something in his notebook.

"Dad, we have something to ask you," I said as we approached him.

Without turning around, he replied, "Okay, son, go ahead and ask."

"Well, we have been experiencing some rather weird things in the past two weeks."

"What sorts of weird things?" My dad picked up a glass beaker.

"Well, I had a dream that seemed real about a phoenix, a bear, and a T. rex," I said.

My dad slowly turned around in his chair and opened his mouth wide. His hand began to shake. Then he dropped the glass beaker, and it smashed to the floor. He adjusted his eyeglasses and got to his feet. He paced back and forth across the room scratching his head while mumbling to himself, "I thought we had more time."

I walked over to him and stepped into his path to stop him from pacing and asked, "More time for what?"

"This is a pickle," he said.

"What's a pickle, Mr. P.?" asked Hunter.

"I didn't think it was supposed to happen so soon. Then again, it could have happened anytime between the age of eleven and twelve," said my dad.

Chapter Four

Parker tapped my dad on the shoulder.

"What are you talking about, Mr. Phillips?" she asked.

He placed his arms at his sides and looked down for a few seconds. Then he looked up and pointed at Hunter. "So, you too, Hunter? Have you experienced anything?"

"Yes, sir. I walked past the fireplace, and the fire went out. I waved my hand in front of it, and it came back on."

"And you, Parker. What about you?"

"I got mad, and the rain stopped, and when I calmed down, it started again," said Parker.

"Okay, kids, I think you need to take a seat."

My dad grabbed three chairs and sat them in front of his desk. He walked to his keyboard and typed in a password. All of a sudden, his desk moved to the side, and the wall that was behind the desk opened to a large circular room. In the center of the floor of the room was a podium with a book on it. My dad walked into the room, grabbed the book, and came back to us. He held the book with both hands and showed us the cover. We were amazed to see that the cover displayed a picture of a phoenix on fire.

"Whoa, this is getting freaky," said Hunter.

My dad pointed to the phoenix. "You see, kids, this is what the strangeness is all about. The phoenix. The Book of the Phoenix. You three are members of the order and you didn't even know it." He sat down next to us.

We all were amazed. We looked at each other in confusion. We had no idea what he was talking about.

He turned to me and said, "Sebastian when you were born, we found out that you had the cystic fibrosis and that at times you would have trouble breathing. We felt bad for several months and blamed ourselves. One day, our doorbell rang very early in the morning. A tall, dark man wearing a black wool overcoat and a black scarf neatly tucked into his coat was at our door. He had a small mole on his left cheek that kind of stuck out. He wore black leather gloves and carried a black briefcase in his right hand. I opened the door, and he immediately kneeled down. He opened the briefcase, and the book was inside. He said that one day, between your eleventh and twelfth birthdays, you would receive some type of supernatural power that would help you keep the balance.

Naturally, we thought he was crazy. He went on to tell us that there was an order, an order controlled by The Book of the Phoenix and that you would be the key to this order. He said that the order was two thousand years old, and there had been many members of the order that had been called to keep the balance before you. He said you would know that it's time when you have a dream about a phoenix. The man left, but he told me his name before he left. It was Kenneth Reilles."

Hunter quickly jumped to his feet. "Kenneth Reilles! You mean—" but my dad cut him off.

"Yes, son, your dad was a member of the order, and he passed this book and the knowledge on to me. He knew that Sebastian and you would be members. He also told me about Parker. Hunter, I know your mom works out of town a lot, but she knows the situation and so does your grandmother. Parker, your mom and dad are also aware. That is the reason why they allow me to take you on my journeys."

Dad paused for a second, looked at his watch, and started back in.

"Think of the journeys as training missions. But this one coming up is the real deal. He told me that I would know when the mission was the `real deal' because whatever journey I had planned right before you received your powers would be the start of the new order. I have looked at this book several times, and it says nothing about what you are supposed to do, but it does say that you will keep the balance between good and evil. It says that your conditions act kind of like a channel for your powers."

"Hold on, Mr. P. First you tell me that my dad, whom I have never met because he died after I was born, gave you that book. Then you tell me that I have superpowers and have been called to keep a balance. What kind of fairy tale is this?" said Hunter.

My dad placed his hand on Hunter's shoulder. "No fairy tale, son. Your dad died while trying to keep the balance. Now we must work hard to help you understand your powers and to be able to control them."

"I think it's cool, Mr. Phillips. When do we leave?" asked Parker.

Chapter Five

After my dad told us about our destiny, he packed us into his station wagon and we headed to the doctor's officer for Parker's chemotherapy session. Parker's mom met us there.

The session didn't take long and, before we knew it, we were back in the station wagon. Dad followed the directions in the book, and none of us knew where it was leading us. It seemed like we drove for two days, but it was only seven hours.

Parker was very weak after her chemotherapy, so she fell asleep first. We drove all night, and I also fell asleep. I was woken up by the slow, side-to-side movement of the car.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from The Book of the Phoenixby M. Dwayne Jones Copyright © 2011 by M. Dwayne Jones. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse, Inc.. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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