The Race to Doobesh

  “Yeah,” said Neal. “Not the usual beast hangout.”

  “Just so,” chirped Max. “I see no Doobeshians. They are short, furry creatures always dressed in long, green capes. But the city looks deserted. What’s going on?”

  “Let’s keep to the shadows and try to find out,” said Keeah. Leaning first one way, then the other, she set them down gently in a narrow alley between two low shops. As soon as the blue light flickered out, they slipped under the shadow of a striped awning.

  A moment later, a wisp of blue-tinted fog rolled down the street toward them.

  Keeah gasped. “Oh, no —”

  “What?” said Sparr. “What is it?”

  “Fog pirates!” whispered Keeah. “They plunder the towns of southern Droon.”

  “Fog pirates?” said Julie. “What are they doing here —”

  “What are we doing here?” growled a deep voice suddenly. “What are you doing here?” An instant later, the fog dissolved and there stood a stout, bear-faced man. He was dressed in a ragged coat, with a red bandanna around his head and a black patch over one eye. Wisps of fog clung to his tall black boots.

  Behind him stood several other mean-faced pirates as well as some furry, green-caped Doobeshians. They carried a big black net that Eric feared was not meant for catching fish.

  “Fog pirates!” said Sparr, his eyes wide.

  “Captain of the fog pirates!” snapped the patch-eyed man. He looked down on the kids with a broken-toothed grin. “Princess Keeah! You might remember me. I’m Yoho. I fought you and Galen more than once, I think!”

  “More than twice, I think!” Max grumbled.

  The pirate laughed. “And we’d be crossing swords now if we didn’t have bigger problems. Here, take a look that way!”

  The kids turned around and glanced down the alley into a small square beyond. Even as they looked, they saw the square fill up with creatures of all shapes and sizes. They slithered in from the side streets or dropped suddenly from the sky. They came in ones and twos. Some had great dark wings, others had hooves. Some were covered with ragged fur, while still others bore spikes, scales, and fins.

  Eric felt his heart beat faster. All the creatures, no matter how strange, had one thing in common. Each had deep red eyes, burning in their heads like fiery coals. It was their burning red eyes that marked them as beasts — servants of Emperor Ko.

  “Beasts!” Keeah gasped. “Dozens of them. Hundreds!”

  “They’ve been gathering for weeks,” said Yoho.

  “But why?” asked Sparr. “Why are Ko’s beasts here? And why now?”

  The pirate grunted. “Because of the dragon!”

  “The dragon!” repeated the Doobeshians.

  Eric blinked. “You mean Jabbo the pie maker? He’s already here —”

  “I mean Gethwing the moon dragon!” grunted Yoho. “He flew in a little while ago. All the beasts that have come are going to the palace to see him. Doobesh, my young friends, has been taken over!”

  “Taken over!” said the Doobeshians. “And we don’t like it!”

  Keeah turned to her friends. “If Jabbo was brought here to Gethwing, we’d better get to the palace and rescue Jabbo before … well, just before.”

  “And who will rescue us?” asked Yoho, blinking as he shifted his patch from one eye to the other. “We’re pirates, sure, but times have changed. Back in the good old days — well, last month — we ruled the seas. The sea witch Demither used to help us attack ships for treasure. But even she’s gone now.”

  “Gone?” asked Sparr. “Where did Demither go?”

  Yoho shrugged. “This is what I’m saying! The beasts must have scared her away!”

  “Not only that,” said one of the green-caped creatures. “But the beasts have stolen all the magic from Doobesh!”

  “They’ve even stolen the stolen magic!” growled Yoho. “Those red-eyed monsters found our secret treasure hideout and stole everything! I ask you — what’s happening to good old Droon?”

  “Good old Droon!” echoed the Doobeshians together.

  It was strange to hear the fog pirates talk like that, Eric thought, but he found that he himself felt the same way. Since the beasts had come back to Droon, things were getting stranger and stranger. For one thing, he would never have believed he and his friends would be chatting with the dreaded fog pirates!

  Suddenly, the beasts gathering in the square gave out a great howl. “To the palace! To see Gethwing!”

  At once, they all began to crawl, slither, and stomp out of the square, heading away from the group in the alley.

  “We have to go to the palace, too,” said Eric. “We still have to find the dragon. Whether that means Gethwing or Jabbo, I guess we’ll find out.”

  “Wait until the beasties leave,” said Yoho. “Then, if you really want to find the palace, all you have to do is follow the slime. But be careful. With those beasts here, and no magic, things are different in Droon now!”

  As the children stared at the last of the beasts, a thin fog swept around Yoho and his mates again, and the little group drifted to the corner and vanished.

  Max began to mutter. “Follow the slime? Well, I suppose we’d best be going —”

  “Good idea, Max,” said Keeah. “We’ll follow your lead.”

  “Perfect,” added Sparr. “Thanks, Max.”

  The spider troll blinked. “Well, you don’t all have to agree! But never mind. Follow me, then. And let’s all try to stay in the shadows!”

  With Max in front, the kids moved slowly and carefully to the end of the alley and entered the square. The beasts were gone, but several blobs of slime led from the square and into a narrow street on the far side.

  “These beasts should really wash their feet,” whispered Neal. “If they even have feet!”

  Max led the children into one twisting alley after another, moving from one slimy footprint to the next. Although the sun was shining brightly in the streets, they kept to the shadows cast by the bridges overhead.

  “I still don’t know why the beasts would want Jabbo,” said Eric.

  “Galen always said that everything has a reason,” said Keeah. “The tough part is figuring out what it is.”

  Neal chuckled. “That sounds like me and math.”

  Max stopped at the end of a narrow side street, and the children peered carefully ahead. Before them stood the main city square. Crowded on every side of the square were the dark beasts they had seen earlier, their red eyes blazing. They stood there nearly motionless, as if they were waiting for something to happen.

  All at once, a roar exploded from the beasts. “Gethwing! Gethwing!”

  As one, the beasts bowed, lowering their heads to the ground.

  At the same moment — ssssst! — a great, loud hissing noise came from a street across the square. It was followed almost immediately by the appearance of two huge snakes, slithering from the street and into the square.

  “Come on, quickly!” hissed Sparr, looking up. “To the rooftop. We need to get a better view of Gethwing —”

  “This way!” said Keeah. She jumped onto a barrel in the side street, grabbed a vine dangling from above, and hoisted herself to the corner roof. Sparr went next, then Neal, Eric, Julie, and Max. Looking carefully over the crowd of beasts, they watched the snakes drag a large golden cart into the square.

  Inside the cart was a throne encrusted with jewels. And on the throne sat a dragon wearing a crown and robe of gleaming gold and blue.

  When the cart drew closer, the kids finally saw the dragon’s face.

  It was covered with purple pie filling.

  “That’s not a moon dragon,” whispered Eric. “It’s a pie dragon. It’s … Jabbo!”

  It was Jabbo. He stood up from his throne and glowered at the beasts.

  “Steady on, my snaky fellows!” cried the pie maker. “Left, then right. And not too bumpy now!”

  “Yes-s-s, Gethwing-g-g-g!” the snakes said.

  The beasts o
n every side of the square kept chanting “Gethwing!” and bowing as Jabbo’s cart rolled past.

  “What — what — I mean — what is going on here?” sputtered Julie.

  Glancing over the heads of the bowing beasts, Jabbo suddenly spied the children on the rooftop. His eyes widened. He flinched.

  “He looks afraid,” said Keeah.

  “And maybe glad to see us,” said Eric.

  Keeping his eyes fixed on the kids, and careful not to let the beasts see, Jabbo pointed into his hand and nodded toward where a bridge arched over the square ahead. It was thick with hanging flowers.

  “I think he wants us to go to him!” whispered Sparr.

  While the beasts still chanted — “Gethwing!” — the friends darted across the rooftops until they reached the bridge. When the snakes dragged Jabbo’s cart underneath, the kids dropped into it one by one.

  “Oh!” Jabbo whispered, when they were all huddled inside the cart with him. “Jabbo is so glad to see you!”

  “What have you gotten yourself mixed up in?” asked Keeah. “These are real beasts, you know. Are you playing some kind of trick?”

  “No!” whispered the little dragon. “These beasts — guess what? — think that Jabbo is Gethwing!” He raised his voice and called to the snakes, “Go right!”

  Thwunk! The snakes slammed into a wall.

  “No, the other right!” snapped Jabbo. The beasts backed up and slithered the other way.

  Sparr laughed quietly. “They think you are Gethwing? You don’t really fit the part!”

  “True!” said Jabbo. “Here’s what happened. The beasts were told by Ko to find Gethwing for a special mission. Okay, but after four hundred years of sleeping, all they remembered was that Gethwing was some kind of dragon. Some kind of dragon! When those two brutes saw Jabbo on Firefrog Mountain, they thought they had their dragon. So Jabbo has had to pretend to be that big bad dragon the whole time!”

  “Gethwing has a special mission?” said Sparr. “What special mission?”

  Jabbo made a grunting sound. “Oh, yes. About that. The reason the beasts have taken over Doobesh, the reason Gethwing is supposed to be here, is because Doobesh is the only place — wait, Jabbo will show you. Snakes, to the palace! Gethwing needs to rest!”

  While the beasts still bowed and cheered, the snakes circled the square and stopped in front of the large palace.

  “Now, beasts,” said Jabbo, “how about one more big bow?”

  “GETH-WINGGGG!” the beasts wailed. When every beast’s head was bent low, Jabbo urged the children swiftly from the cart into the palace.

  Once safely inside, the pie maker hustled the children quickly to a terrace overlooking the plains east of Doobesh. The plains spread out toward smoke-covered lands in the distance. Eric knew they were Emperor Ko’s Dark Lands.

  “Remember the voice that said to find the gate?” said the pie maker. “Guess what? The voice is quiet now. Because Jabbo found the gate.” He pointed toward the distant sands. “There it is.”

  Keeah looked out over the plains, scanning the entire scene from right to left and back again. “I don’t see a gate. What are we looking at?”

  “What? Oh, Jabbo forgot,” said the little dragon. “Because he is a dragon, Jabbo can see what the beasts can see. And what normal people can’t see —”

  Sparr breathed out a long sigh. “I can see it.”

  “You can?” said Eric.

  Sparr waved his hand in front of their faces. Suddenly, far across the plains, on the border of the Dark Lands, they saw a giant wooden gate rising up behind a cluster of trees.

  “Holy cow, the gate!” asked Julie. “Where does it lead?”

  “To Bleakwold,” said Sparr suddenly. His face turned pale even as he said the word. “It’s deep in the Dark Lands.”

  Max grumbled. “Bleakwold? I don’t like the sound of that. As a matter of fact, I don’t like the sound of any of this.”

  “You don’t like it?” snorted Jabbo. “As Gethwing the Totally Fearsome, Jabbo is actually supposed to lead the beasts to the gate! Then they’ll all cross Bleakwold to journey to a thing called the magic forge.”

  Eric kept looking at Sparr. “The magic forge? A forge for what?”

  “Ko’s magic battle armor,” said Sparr. “Not just his armor, either, but all the beast armor is forged there, using magical objects and devices. Wearing it, the beasts become invincible. And they’ll wear it to attack Jaffa City.”

  “Attack Jaffa City? Attack Jaffa City!” cried Max. “Ko is … is … evil!”

  Keeah breathed deeply. “We’ve gotten this far by following clues. But I think we can figure out the next step all by ourselves. We have to destroy that forge.”

  “From what the beasts say, it will be hazardous,” said Jabbo. “Tricky, too. Plus also quite dangerous.”

  Max grunted. “Yes, well, tell us something we don’t know —”

  “How about extremely deadly?” said Sparr. He was rubbing his forehead as if he were remembering something. “To protect his forge, Ko filled Bleakwold with obstacles deadly to everyone but beasts. I remember that well enough.”

  The kids stood looking out at the Dark Lands until Sparr’s visibility charm ended and they could no longer see the gate.

  Jabbo sighed. “The beasts won’t go to the forge until Jabbo gives the order. Maybe you can get there before they do. Jabbo can try to stall the beasts as long as possible. Well, he can try to try —”

  “Thank you, Jabbo,” said Keeah. “I know you’re afraid.”

  The pie maker made a tiny noise. “Afraid? Do you hear that chattering sound? That is Jabbo’s teeth! But what’s right is right. And beasts all over Droon is not right.”

  “Good,” said Sparr. “For us, the safest way — the only way — into Bleakwold is by challenging the beasts at their own game. We’ll become beasts….”

  Neal blinked. “Excuse me? Become beasts? I don’t like red eyes.”

  Sparr half smiled. “I seem to remember a spell that will change us into beasts for a little while.”

  “You seem to remember a spell?” said Keeah. “How well do you seem to remember it?”

  “Pretty well,” he said.

  “This doesn’t sound so good to me,” said Julie. “There must be another way. Anyone have another idea? Anyone? Anything? Please?”

  The beasts roared outside the palace, and the kids stared silently at one another.

  “I guess it’s settled,” said Sparr. “I need to put you — put us — into a deep sleep. The spell will take until morning to work. Trust me.”

  “Jabbo can hide you until morning, and come back for you just before dawn,” said the dragon. Then he led them quickly into a long yellow room filled with puffy beds. “Oh, Jabbo does hope this works!”

  “You hope it works?” muttered Eric, climbing into a bed between Neal and Max.

  As Sparr closed his eyes and began to mumble strange words, Eric thought of a time in the sorcerer’s volcano palace so long ago. He and Keeah had been holding their breath, hiding from a terrifying monster, when it transformed right before their eyes, from a hideous beast into the grown-up Sparr. Only a pair of fins was left as a reminder.

  “Just close your eyes,” said Sparr.

  Eric already felt sleepy. “Oh … man …”

  The last thing he saw was Julie’s nose.

  It was beginning to grow.

  Too tired to watch, Eric closed his eyes.

  First one, then another. Then another … and another.

  The sound of beasts roaring and shrieking woke Eric. Opening his eyes, he looked at himself in the early morning light. He was taller and wider than usual. He was also covered with fur the color and length of mown grass.

  When he climbed out of bed, he found he kept slumping over onto all fours. And when he blinked, he remembered closing his eyes the night before. All four of them.

  Two eyes were in the front of his head, two peered out the back.

  He co
uld tell from the glow around him that they burned with a bright red light.

  “Hey, Julie, Neal,” he said, even though they were on different sides of the room.

  Julie was her normal height, but quite round. From the tip of her long, flat snout to the ends of her thick, three-toed feet, she was covered with patchy blue fur. Claws stuck out from the ends of her short arms.

  Neal was much smaller than the others and looked as if he were wearing a suit of armor made up of tiny scales. “I’M A FISH!” he shouted loudly. “HEY, I’M A FISH AND I SHOUT! PLUS, I HAVE THREE FEET! AND THEY STINK —”

  “Neal, shh!” hissed Sparr. Towering over the fishy Neal, he looked like an upright wolf, but with ears the size of dinner plates. “Quiet, please,” he whispered. “You’re a beast called a Loudertail —”

  “TAIL? I HAVE A TAIL!” Neal shouted, trying to look behind himself.

  Julie laughed when she saw Neal. “Glup-glup-glup!” She stopped. “Glup?”

  “Uh, yeah, sorry, Julie,” whispered Sparr. “You’re a beast called a Glup. I think that’s all you can say.”

  Achoo! Julie sneezed suddenly, and a blast of icy air shot into the room.

  “Well, and sneeze ice, too,” said Sparr.

  Next to Julie, Keeah was all wings and feathers, but curling up from her forehead she had a pair of long, twisted antlers. “These will be trouble, I just know it,” she said.

  Finally, Max loped over to them. He was shaped something like a cat, covered with sleek orange fur, but with bony spikes running down his back. “Only four paws?” he asked. “How will I manage?”

  As different as his friends now were, Eric saw that the same smoldering red light burned in all of their eyes. They were all beasts, with the same eyes every beast had.

  “Just as long as you know how to end the spell, Sparr,” said Eric. “Wait, you do know how to end it, don’t you?”

  Before Sparr could answer, Jabbo hurried in, flapping his wings rapidly. Then he stopped, his eyes wide. “Oh, dear! You are … well, never mind. The beasts are ready to go, so you must sneak out before them. A secret passage the pirates built will take you outside the walls. And please hurry. Jabbo fears how long he can delay the beasts!”