CHAPTER NINE: THE HORN OF LIBRIS
"H-He's alive, but w-why do we get s-something now?" Artha got out, as he paced the living room.
Gwen looked at her brother with worry when he started to stutter. Artha normally didn't stutter, so it was a bit worrying for her. Getting up, she quickly pulled her brother to sit down. "Easy, don't pull yourself into another panic attack,"
Artha's panic attacks luckily haven't been that bad. He only had one last month, when they were talking about the rent and money. Athena had been over and was able to help calm him down. Lance had seen it, but with Athena, he was taught what to do if he was ever alone with Artha. Overall, Artha didn't have a lot of panic attacks, it was generally when something stressful came up.
Gwen helped Artha do some breathing exercises Athena had advised him to do if he ever got into a situation.
"I do agree it's strange that we get something now, almost three months later," Gwen began. "But I also think we shouldn't dwell on it too much. The letter says he's alive, and while it's not what we want, at least he's alive."
. . .
Artha was excited for today's race, the Horn of Libris race was a team competition, he knew that he and Gwen would make a great team especially against Khatah and his partner. He found Gwen leaving their tent.
"Hey, Gwen, you ready for the Horn of Libris competition, I know you and I will be able to stand up to Khatah and his partner."
Gwen had a guilty look on her face. "Sorry, Artha, but Kitt already asked me to be her partner for the competition and I said yes."
"Oh," Artha said, dismayed, but he quickly replaced it with a smile. "That's ok, I'm sure Parmon will be my partner."
"Okay, if you're sure." Gwen said despite knowing that Parmon wouldn't be a good partner for this competition on account of his fear of heights.
. . .
Turns out, Artha asking Parmon was not a good idea. As much as he loved his best friend, he did nothing but scream even when Beau magged him a few feet.
Artha sighed, running his hand over his face, when a familiar voice spoke. "You'll need someone who actually knows what they're doing,"
Removing his hand, Artha looked up to see Zaylin walking over, her dragon following behind her. It reminded him that he never asked Zaylin or her dragon's name.
"Do you know what to do?" Parmon asked, looking at Zaylin with unsureness. It didn't help that Zaylin still had her helmet on, not letting anyone see what she looked like, besides her eye color.
Zaylin raised an eyebrow, "I happen to be the best Mag-Jumper on my team,"
"Who's your team?" Lance asked, looking at Zaylin.
"Logan Racing crew," Zaylin said.
Parmon's eyes went wide, as realization kicked in. "You're the one who's won the latest Mag-Jump Tournaments!" he cried out in surprise.
Artha stared at Zaylin in surprise, or shock. He heard about those tournaments, but never paid much to them.
"You up for teaming up then?" Zaylin asked, shaking Artha out of his thoughts.
"Yeah," Artha said automatically. He wasn't teaming up with Zaylin because of her success, that was a plus, he was teaming up with her mostly because she was all he had.
"Artha?" Parmon asked, surprised he said yes right away. "You don't even know her!"
Artha gave Parmon a look, "And at this point, it doesn't matter. If I want to even do the tournament I need a partner,"
"It's either me or you, Mr. Screams-A-Lot," Zaylin pointed.
Parmon opened his mouth but closed it.
"She is right," Lance said, looking up at Parmon.
At that moment Kitt and Gwen passed by practicing, Kitt was steering Tsundra while Gwen balanced herself on the mag-stream, it looked like the two girls were already in sync with each other.
"Drac! Look at Gwen balancing herself on Tsundra's mag-stream." Lance said impressed by his big sister's moves.
Artha looked over in slight worry; as much as he would like to win the tournament, it didn't seem like he stood a chance. But at the same time, doing this would be a good experience for him too.
Zaylin, seeing her new partner was having depressing thoughts, lightly elbowed him, "Hey you're never going to win if you don't believe you can win."
That piece of advice seemed to perk Artha up, "Thanks."
"No problem, now let's get to practicing."
Despite her being the better of the two jumpers, the new partners decided for Zaylin to steer while Artha jumped, it would be a good experience for him. It did take Zaylin a bit to get used to Beau's size, given her dragon was a tad smaller, but surprisingly she quickly took to Beau. Right now Artha was trying to balance himself on Beau's mag-stream.
"Find the mag-energy stream and balance on it." Zaylin advised.
"I-I'm trying!" Artha called before he lost the connection and began falling crashing into another tent.
Zaylin winced as Beau came over to the now crushed tent. "You okay?" she asked.
"Ugh, been better," Artha grunted, standing up.
"This is definitely not an easy thing." Beau grumbled.
"Yep, it's not," Zaylin said, nonchalantly, surprising Beau.
The red and blue dragon looked at Zaylin in surprise; he had not expected there to be another person who could understand him besides Gwen and her mother who was no longer around. Before he could say something, he heard Tsundra come over. Not wanting to show that Zaylin had spoken to him, Beau kept quiet.
"Nice moves, stable boy." Kitt said, laughing slightly.
"You alright Artha? Gwen asked, looking a bit amused. "Anything hurt?"
"Only my pride." Artha said looking embarrassed.
Zaylin got off Beau and walked over, "You did better than I did, when I first started. I lasted less time than you. Of course, I had started before I officially entered the racing circuit," she said with a wince.
"Who's this Artha?" Gwen asked.
"My partner, Zaylin," Artha said; he looked over to Lance, before moving closer, "She's the one who found Lance when he ran away." he whispered.
Gwen nodded understanding, before offering Zaylin her hand. "I'm Gwen, and thanks for finding Lance," she added in a whisper.
"Zaylin," she said, giving a nod to the second part, and shaking Gwen's hand. "Hey, Kitt,"
"Hey, Zay," the blue-and-pink-haired girl said. "So you're with Stable Boy?"
Zaylin raised an eyebrow at the nickname, not fully understanding it, but didn't question it. "It was me or Mr. Screams A Lot," she said, pointing her thumb over to Parmon.
"Hey!"
Artha, Kitt, and Gwen all turned and gave the teen a look. "She's not wrong," Gwen said.
"You do scream," Kitt mentioned.
"A lot," Artha added.
Parmon opened his mouth to retort, but found out they were right. Instead of answering, he crossed his arms and huffed.
Lance snickered at Parmon.
"Well, we just came to wish you guys good luck for the competition." Gwen said.
Zaylin smiled, "You as well,"
"May the best team beat Khatah and his Inner Order Crew." Kitt said as all four teens put their hands together.
It was a good moment until Parmon started fangirling about Khatah's accomplishments.
Zaylin nearly slammed her hands on Beau, before remembering he was there. "Will you shut up?! You're not helping anyone! We know he's a champion, we know he's the leader of his crew. We know he's this amazing racer! We get it!"
The dark-skinned teen quickly shut up. Gwen, Artha, and Kitt stared at Zaylin in shock. They were slightly surprised, but at the same time, surprised.
"Oooh!" Lance teased Parmon, he hadn't seen anyone really talk back to Parmon, especially when he got into one of his rants. It was actually quite funny.
Right after Zaylin got Parmon to shut up, the man himself appeared. Parmon looked awestruck at seeing his idol that he began stuttering.
"Say hello Parmon." Gwen told the stuttering teen.
"Hello Parmon."
"Hello, my name is Khatah." He introduced with a slight bow. "But you probably already know that, it's so great to meet my fans." He gave them an all teeth smile and a wink. "Well I wish you good luck, you're going to need it."
The four main racers were immediately put off by Khatah's arrogance. Zaylin made a face at Khatah, slightly annoyed by him. Her dragon appeared from around and gave Khatah a growl as well.
The purple haired teen didn't say anything and just simply walked off.
"Same old Khatah." Gwen said.
"Yea, I seriously hope one of us beats him." Zaylin said. "Then we'll see who needed the luck."
. . .
"You're what?!" Moordryd exclaimed looking at his sister.
Later that night, both of the Paynn twins were back home. They were getting ready for bed when Zaylin brought up her news. Moordryd nearly pulled his brush harder than he should as he stared at his twin sister.
Zaylin gave her brother a questioning look, her hands paused in tying her hair. "I'm entering the Horn of Libris tournament with Artha Penn," she repeated.
"But he..."
"But what?" Zaylin asked, tying her hair, and giving her brother a look.
"N-Nothing, just be careful around him,"
Zaylin stared at her brother, before shrugging her shoulders. "Whatever,"
. . .
Despite both Zaylin and Gwen's hopes to defeat Khatah, it ended up with Moordryd and Cain winning. Zaylin and Artha had been close, but something caused Khatah and his partner's dragon to crash, which in turn made Beau crash, no matter how hard Zaylin tried to steer. Since Beau had been very close to them Khatah was quick to blame Artha and Zaylin for the loss.
Zaylin glared at him, and let out a sound that sounded like a growl, surprising everyone. "Don't you even dare blame us! We were running the course, you crashing caused us to crash! So don't even dare blame it on us!" she growled, coming close to stabbing him in the chest with her finger. Luckily for Khatah, Zaylin's dragon had appeared and literally pulled her away from the older teen. Everyone stared in slight surprise as the Black Psi-class dragon dragged her away.
"Agravaine, let me go!" Zaylin cried at her dragon. "I need to tell this jerk-face off!"
Gwen's eyes went wide, she only knew one person who had the name of Agravaine, and it was her mother's dragon. What? Her dragon is named Agravaine... No don't get ahead, someone can name their dragon any name. But... it's also close...
Shaking her head, Gwen instead turned to Khatah. While her attention was on Khatah, she, and pretty much everyone else failed to see Agravaine growl something at Zaylin, making her slightly calm down. Though now calm, Zaylin stayed back, continuing to give Khatah the evil eye.
"Khatah, you and I have raced against each other and have developed a mutual respect for each other, so believe me when I say that my brother would never do anything to sabotage another racer's chances of winning. Artha doesn't need to cheat to win." Gwen said, looking Khatah right in the eye.
Gwen and Khatah held each other's gaze before Khatah looked away, sighing. "Very well Gwen, I will accept your word only because you are an honorable racer."
"Don't go blaming the first person you see," Zaylin said, speaking after a few moments of silence. "It could be anything but that person,"
"If anything we should be looking at Paynn." Gwen said.
Zaylin looked at Gwen in surprise. "Why do you say that?"
"Because in all the Horn of Libris competitions Dragon Eyes have never competed so why now."
Zaylin looked at Gwen in slight confusion. But she didn't say anything. Moordryd, what did you do...
. . .
After the group went their separate ways, Gwen, Artha, and Lance went to talk to Mortis to find out more about the Horn of Libris.
"This is very serious." Mortis said solemnly, after listening to Gwen and Artha. "The horn is able to call a Grey-bone dragon."
"Grey-bone dragon? What's that?" Lance asked.
"The grey bone dragons are the only dragons that can turn the colors of draconium against each other. During the war each side hunted for one." Mortis explained, making the Penn siblings stare at him in surprise, or horror.
"So, you're essentially saying these dragons could start another Dragon-Human War?" Gwen asked.
"Yes."
"No wonder Moordryd and Word went to the trouble of cheating." Artha said.
"It also explains why Khatah was so upset about losing the competition, he knows what the horn is capable of." Gwen said in realization.
"We need to get it back, before Moordryd and Word use it!" Artha said. "Lance, stay here with Mortis."
Before their brother could complain, Artha and Gwen were running out of the temple, Beau and Tsundra following them.
. . .
"So you're telling me that trophy is actually a horn that can call a Grey-boned dragon to start a Dragon-Human War?" Kitt asked incredulously.
She and Parmon had been quite surprised when Gwen and Artha showed up at their respective homes asking for their help to break-into the Dragon Eye's Compound.
"That's the story," Gwen said, peeking over a ledge to stare at the Dragon Eye's Compound. Beau poked his head wanting to see, but only to nearly squash the teens.
"Why are we here?" Parmon asked nervously. Gwen and Artha quickly pulled Beau back, to avoid being spotted.
"You guys are here for back-up, in case Gwen and I run into trouble." Artha explained.
"Hey, looks like Khatah has the same idea." Kitt said, pointing in a direction.
The group looked over the ledge and saw Khatah and his partner Sarjo approaching an open window and performing a complicated flip that put the two of them directly inside.
"Do you think we can do those moves?" Gwen asked her brother.
Artha nodded to his sister, before turning to Kitt and Parmon, "You guys stay here. If we're not out in say fifteen minutes, then come get us. Beau, stay here,"
Gwen gave Beau a firm look, knowing if something would happen, he would go after Artha. She also eyed the other dragons, giving them a look. They didn't need the others to come.
With that, the two siblings made their way down to the entrance where Khatah and Sarjo had entered.
. . .
"Well, this isn't good," Gwen stated, as she and Artha ducked to avoid being spotted by the spotlight.
"You're telling me," Artha murmured, as the alarms went off. They'd been going off for a bit, at least after they officially entered the compound.
Getting it seemed easy, minus the fact Artha had fallen into a trash can. The rest of the sneaking in had gone well, until they got further and the alarms started off going. The compound was now on high alert which made sneaking a lot harder.
After avoiding another spotlight, Artha found a way out of sight of the spotlight. Unfortunately, the hiding spot ended up being inside a large statue of Moordryd, which was extremely creepy. Despite that, it allowed Gwen and Artha to be out of sight.
. . .
Looking around, Moordryd saw everyone else busy. Pulling his comm-wrist up, Word appeared on-screen immediately.
"Is the horn safe?"
"In the vault," Moordryd said, motioning his head in the direction with a slight tilt. "As you commanded,"
"Good. I am sending a team of Wraith dragons to escort you and the horn to my location," Word said. "Do not use the Horn of Libris. You do not want to call a Grey-Born dragon unless you know how to control it! An angry Libris will start a battle, I want him to start a war!"
With a final look at his father, the conversation with his father ended. Moordryd cut the comm-link off and walked off.
Unknown to him, Artha and Gwen had heard the entire conversation.
. . .
Artha and Gwen quietly and quickly moved through the compound. They needed to find Khatah and Sarjo soon. After hearing what Word planned to do, they had to find them now.
As they neared an area, the sound of something banging on a door was heard. Rather than take the front, Gwen and Artha found an upper way to take.
"Khatah!"
The leader of the Inner Dragon order crew looked around at the sound of the voice. He turned to see Artha and Gwen peering down at them from an opening in the ceiling.
"Oh great," Khatah said sarcastically.
"Look, I'm here to help you." Artha said.
"I don't need help from some stable boy." Khatah said. "I am Khatah!"
"Look, Khatah, things are more serious than you think," Artha said, getting tired of Khatah. "We know that trophy is a horn meant to call a Grey-bone dragon named Libris."
"And Libris can potentially start another Dragon-Human War." Gwen added.
Khatah and Sarjo looked at each other in surprise, before Khatah sighed, "So you know the truth, and you can understand now why my crew is counting on me."
"We're here together and heroes don't work alone." Artha said, extending his hand to Khatah.
Khatah looked hesitant before finally accepting. While Gwen got an injured Sarjo out, Artha and Khatah went after the horn. When Khatah and Artha climbed out of the ventilation system and their feet touched the ground the alarms started going off and a group of Dragon Eyes led by Cain appeared and began giving chase. Artha and Khatah found a room and quickly shut the door but a mag-staff blocked the closing.
"I'll get the horn." Khatah said running off leaving Artha alone to hold off the Dragon Eyes.
"Hey! What about me?!" Artha yelled. "Khatah!"
. . .
Kitt and Parmon jumped when the alarms started going off. They stared up at the compound with worry in their eyes and as the minutes ticked, they started to worry even more.
"Oh dear, this is bad, very, very bad!" Parmon exclaimed.
"We need to get in there!" Kitt said.
Parmon brought out his scanner pointed at the wall and began muttering a lot of technical jargon about how he could break the wall, exasperating Kit and the dragons. Beau decided to get in his own way, by leaping over the wall.
"Beau!"
. . .
The second Beau jumped over the wall, one of the vents came down, revealing Gwen holding an injured Sarjo. "Over here! Help me with Sarjo!"
Kitt and Parmon leapt into action, helping the injured rider. Once they got him situated with his dragon, Shuko, Gwen turned to her friends, "I'm going back to help Artha!"
"We're coming with you," Kitt and Parmon said, running over to their dragons.
It was quickly decided for Parmon and Cyrano to use the Green Ramming gear to break open a wall. Gwen and Kitt and their dragons easily made the leap over, just like Beau did.
. . .
Inside the compound, Artha was having difficulty in holding back the Dragon Eye crew, who were slowly, but surely, forcing their way though. Artha would only be able to hold them back for as long as possible.
"C'mon, get that Stable boy," Cain ordered the crew.
Seriously, enough with Stable Boy, I'm a rider now. Artha thought, slightly annoyed.
Beau suddenly appeared behind Cain, and began mag-blasting the Dragon Eyes away. He went to the door that they were trying to force open and easily pushed his way in, laughing at Artha when he saw him trying to keep the door closed. Needless to say Artha wasn't amused by Beau laughing at him.
"Time to go to work." Artha said mounting Beau. "Release the Dragon!"
. . .
Gwen watched as the situation took a turn for the worse as Moordryd blew on the horn. The sound it emitted was horrible, but then they heard an answering roar that sounded terrifying as a massive skeletal dragon appeared.
"Oh no Libris." Gwen whispered, eyes wide.
This situation became more dangerous when Libris focused his attention on Gwen, Kitt, and Parmon. "Run!" Parmon screamed.
To try to confuse Libris, the three split up. Unfortunately, Libris' first target was the slowest member: Cyrano.
"Parmon!"
Parmon screamed in terror as Libris snapped his jaws at Cyrano's heels. The massive dragon was closing on Cyrano until Kitt steered Wyldfyr into hitting Libris causing him to turn his attention to Kitt. The skeletal dragon began chasing Kitt before pulling her off her dragon.
"Kitt!" Gwen yelled, in fear for her best friend. Laying on the ground, Kitt looked up at Libris in fear, as he got closer to her.
"Libris, leave her alone!" Parmon said hold his mag-staff while trembling in fear.
Gwen stared at Parmon in shock at his sudden bravery. Libris got closer to Parmon and his eyes took on a greener glow as he snarled.
At that moment, Artha appeared as the Dragon Booster. He looked over at his best friend with worry. "Gwen, is there a way you can talk to Libris?"
"You're joking right?" Gwen asked. "Libris isn't going to listen to me, he's too angry, all the fighting has him riled up."
Suddenly Artha got an idea. "Parm, power down your gear! Libris is using your draconium energy against you!"
"Are you sure?" Parmon asked terrified. It was then that Kitt spotted the Dragon Booster, but the situation was too crazy for her to think of how he even got here.
"Trust me!"
"N-nice Libris." Parmon said dropping his staff.
To his relief, Libris lost interest in Parmon, but his attention was quickly pulled to Khatah and Moordryd, who were too busy fighting each other.
"Khatah! Moordryd! Stop fighting!"
Both teens turned to see Libris glaring down at them, they raised their weapons in defense. Once again, the situation was too dire for them to notice that the Dragon Booster was there.
"Khatah! Stop fighting! This isn't about you or the Horn, it's about Dragon City and the whole world! We need your help!"
Khatah held out his staff and dropped it. Moordryd decided to attack a defenseless Khatah, but was stopped when Libris turned his attention to him and his eyes gained a purple glow. Moordryd trembled in fear as the skeletal dragon stared him down.
From the shadows, Zaylin, who had come over to talk to her brother, could only stare in fear at the sight before her. Libris was staring Moordryd down; Zaylin could only pray her brother would use his common sense. Moordryd drop your staff.
Moordryd reluctantly dropped his staff glaring at the ground.
Beau roared at Libris gaining his attention, the grey-boned dragon roared back. Suddenly, a white light emerged from Beau's star-mark, and he began drawing the energy from Artha, Kitt, Parmon, Khatah, and Moordryd. Draconium colors of gold, red, green, blue, and purple all merged into Beau, who sent the energy at Libris, making a single streak of white energy.
Soon, Libris' color turned back to its neutral grey-color.
Everyone could only stare in complete shock. "What, what that?" Kitt asked.
"It looks like Libris' energy is balanced out," Parmon said.
With his energy no longer angry, Libris stepped forward to Beau. The two dragons began speaking to one another, before Libris bowed to Beau, before running off.
From the shadows, Zaylin looked in complete shock at what just occurred. She knew from the books the Dragon of Legend had untold powers, but this was something else. Something amazing.
"Well, that was something," Gwen murmured, turning to face her friends.
She noticed that Moordryd was nowhere in sight, probably having fled the scene, leaving the Horn of Libris behind. Khatah picked up the horn, smiling, happy it was back in his hands.
"Khatah!" Kitt shouted, as she, Parmon, and Gwen made their way over to him.
"Are... you alright?" Parmon asked.
"Where is Dragon Booster?" Khatah asked, noticing the hero not with them. The trio looked between each other before Kitt and Gwen shrugged.
"Hey guys," Artha called, as he and Beau made their way over. "Whoa! Is that the Horn of Libris?!"
Gwen held back a giggle, as she watched Artha play it off that he missed everything. But she made a mental note, they would need to think of other ways to play it off that Artha wasn't present.
"We should probably get this to Dragon City Security," Artha suggested. Khatah slowly nodded his head, but was smiling.
"Where were you?" Kitt asked, "You missed everything. We just stopped Libris with the Dragon Booster?"
"I missed him, again?" Artha faked, "Scales!"
"I owe you an apology," Khatah said. "You were right Artha, heroes need help to be heroes. United we stand!"
Everyone put their hands together, but unfortunately Beau put too much weight and caused everyone to crash into each other.
Everyone burst out laughing at the scene.
. . .
Zaylin waited until Moordryd was alone. About two hours had passed since the Libris, and the rest of the Dragon Eye crew and Cain, had all gone home, leaving the twins.
"Moordryd Drakkus Paynn!" Zaylin exclaimed, watching as her brother tenses up before slowly turning to face her.
"Zaylin..."
"What was that about?" Zaylin questioned. "Why was the great Bone-Dragon out there?
Moordryd stared at Zaylin, unsure how to respond. His father had mentioned it was dangerous, but again why did he do it.