Lucas Foden: The Hidden Legacy

Blind No More

Vance gasped as soon as he heard those words that resonated with echoes of hope and recovery in his ears.

“The Divine Healer is here?!”His eyelids flickered, but his blinded eyes were not going to see Lucas.

“Are you sure you brought him, Lola? I heard he was killed in a fire.”

“He is standing right here in front of you, Father,” Lara assured, turning to Lucas with an assuring smile.

Vance nodded, and then he started gripping, trying to sit up.

The two stewards behind him quickly grabbed him and helped him up.

“Divine Healer? If you are truly here, please save me!” His voice was laced with pangs of pain, but he still tried as much as he could to hold onto the hope that his daughters had given to him.

Lucas stepped closer to the old man, still making his observations while everyone turned their attention to him.

“Your Brain, Mr. Phoenix.”

“What about his brain?” Lola asked the same question that her father would have asked if it had been possible for him to get rid of the confusion that besieged him.

Lucas cleared his throat. “The reason why your father is blind is that one of the nerves attached from his brain to his eyes is damaged.” He saw the doubt in their eyes as soon as he was done talking, but it didn’t matter as long as they heard the truth from him.

The Phoenix daughters exchanged glances with each other, and it didn’t look like any of them was going to say even a word.

“The Doctors who came to me told me that I had been poisoned, Divine Healer. That’s what they said to me.” Vance’s voice was unstable as a result of the weakness that invaded his bones, but he still sounded very convinced of everything he said.

Lucas scoffed. “They told you that you have been poisoned because that’s the easiest thing to say about such a condition, Mr. Phoenix.”

“Then help him, Lucas! I beg you!” Lara pleaded.

She didn’t care what it was, all she wanted was for the old man to get better.

“We will give you whatever you want, Lucas!” Vance added with a desperate tone, but his daughters already knew that there was nothing that the heir of the Foden family lacked.

Vance was ignorant of this, and felt like Lucas was just the same person he had been told about; a simple, handsome, and shabby fellow without so much to his name.

Lara and her sisters were afraid that Lucas was going to take offence at what their father said, but they were relieved when they looked at him and saw that he was not offended.

“What do you want us to do?” Lana broke her silence, eyes fixed on Lucas while she waited for his response with the same desperation as her sisters.

Lucas grabbed his box, and the moment he opened it, he took out a blue feather and an ancient stick that had strange markings all over it.

Thinking that he was about to perform some dark magic on their father, Lara and her sisters couldn’t hide their slight nervousness, but he didn’t bother to look at them.

Slowly, Lucas returned to the old man, made him lie back on the bed before he placed the blue feather above his eyes.

Vance felt the tingle from the feathers, but because he was eager to be cured, he couldn’t complain.

Gradually, Lucas lowered the stick he was holding with the other hand to Vance’s head, and as soon as he got to his forehead, he gave him a slight knock with the stick.

“Open your eyes.” He instructed, but Vance thought he was trying to make fun of him.

“I have not seen anything for months, son! Are you trying to make fun of me?” He had some irritation in his tone, but Lucas insisted.

“Open your eyes, Mr. Phoenix.”

Vance was offended, but because opening his eyes was not something so difficult to do, he decided to oblige the Divine Healer.

Seeing that the old man was about to flicker his eyelids open, Lucas slowly lifted both the feather and the ancient stick from him.

Vance gasped. “I can see!” He exclaimed, moving his head from one corner to the other.

No one believed him, not when the only thing Lucas had done was to touch him with a blue feather and hit him with a stick with some strange markings on it.

“Lola! I can see you!” Vance turned to his youngest daughter who was still kneeling beside him, grabbing her face with both hands.

Lola’s jaw dropped.

She saw her father’s blue orbs. They were no longer cracked, but as bright as the blue ocean.

Her sisters joined her at once, surrounding the old man to be sure that he was not trying to prank them.

“You can really see us, Father!” Lana exclaimed when her father recognized her.

Everyone turned to Lucas, staring as he returned his tools to the box and closed it.

Then he grabbed the handle and got ready to leave.

“My work here is done, Mr. Phoenix. Here…” He handed a small bottle containing a white liquid to the old man. “This is a rare mixture I have made. It should help you get better.”

Vance didn’t take the bottle from him.

From the way he was staring, he had something deep going on inside him. “Why do you look so familiar?” He asked, trying to get up from the bed.

But because he was still weak and needed to recover, he reclined back to the cozy bed.

“What is your name, son?” Vance couldn’t get rid of his curiosity, struggling with the thoughts of the strong familiarity.

“His name is Lucas, Father,” Lola responded, seeing that Lucas was not eager to answer.

Vance arched his brows. “You mean Lucas Foden?” He asked, and Lola nodded.

Confirming his thoughts, the old man returned his gaze to Lucas, eyes wide while he struggled to find his words.

“I knew that it could be you! You look so much like your father!”