The Forgotten Zodiac

"Mommy?" Boko looked fearful as he looked between Zephyr and Vaira. "Daddy? What is wrong?" He whimpered, sliding away from Zephyr and leaving Nate to support the now-human. His stubby ears drooped, his eyes wide as they flicked to and fro from parent to parent as he wondered what on earth was going on. He touched his clawed hand to his muzzle, feeling the claw marks there.

Slowly, Vaira extended her neck out and brought it a few inches away from Zephyr, staring at him. He kept his gaze away from her, not moving. Very slowly, she touched the tip of her muzzle to his cheek, breathing in his scent. "Zephyr..." she murmured, tears budding her eyes. "Oh...Zephyr..."

He wrapped his arms around her muzzle, pressing his nose and chin against her magenta scales. Tears dripped down his cheeks again as the two dragons wept silently, but together.

When they looked up, however, Boko was gone.

The little Drakeling had run out of the guest house and down the street, out of the gates of Amnarius. It took him several minutes to break past the seal on the gate, but his magic resistant body broke past it in a matter of minutes. He flew into the place between worlds, only to crash into Titus mere moments later. He squealed in fear, launching himself off the bridge and flying away towards the gate to the natural world. He was there before Galai could do a thing; Titus was just confused and a little annoyed.

Boko flew on and on, finally landing at the base of the mountain that hid the gate to Amnarius. He huffed and scuffled in circles, staring at the forest and plains ahead of him. Where on earth was he supposed to go? He clawed at the grass, finally giving up and just curling up where he was, gnawing on his claw nervously.

He was there for quite some time before anything happened. When something did happen, however, it wasn't what he expected. He might've expected his mother to come after him, to comfort him with her warm licks and tuck him into her pouch.

What he got was a heavy chain next thrown over him, followed by laughing and noises.

"What is it?" one of the poachers said, frowning and poking Boko with the end of his spear. They were animal hunters, searching for rare things to sell to circuses, freak-shows and butcher shops (where the skins were turned into coats and the like).

"Looks like some weird kind of dragon," another poacher said, tapping Boko's snout with his sword. "Not sure what exactly it is, but I imagine it'll sell well enough. Better than the 'white deer' Birguss was going on about, eh? Still don't know how that drunkard managed to write 'murderer' on his forehead, the idiot." They shared a laugh, then started tying Boko up with strong ropes and chains.

Boko let out a hiss and tried to roar, but it came out as nothing but a squeal. He struggled and squirmed, but only managed to put long claw marks in the ground as he was dragged off. "Let go! Stop, stop!" He wailed, but it only sounded as whining and crying to the humans who hadn't tasted dragon blood. His claw caught one of their boots in his struggles, and he watched as blood welled up through the holes in said boot.

The man yelled and kicked at the little drakeling, hitting him in the snout. "Shut up, you little freak!" he shouted, bending down and tying the drakeling's hands together. "This'll teach this thing to behave. It needs to learn in order to be of better use to its new master once we sell it." The other men laughed, then they mounted their horses and tied Boko's ropes to their saddle horns, dragging him along behind them.

Boko screamed, but then they were gone. So completely gone.

"Boko!" Nate called, walking down the roads of Amnairus. He had noticed that Boko was missing, and decided to find him on his own. "Boko, where are you?" He came to the seal around the gate, knowing full well that he had no chance of opening it on his own. No matter. He turned and walked back the way he came, guessing he had missed the little Drakeling. He lifted his wine bottle to take a sip, pausing when he realized that Toro was watching him from the roof of the jail house.

"Eh...don't drink, kid. It's not good for you." He said with a wave of his hand, taking a swig and walking on.

Vaira was still back with Zephyr, having not left his side since finding out what had become of him. She was a rare dragoness that was willing to stay with her mate despite what had happened to him. She was currently curled up around him, talking with him over what they had to do.

Tasia suddenly flew down out of the air, landing right behind Nate and putting her arms around his neck and her wings around his shoulders. "Nate," she said softly, nuzzling him.

"Tasia," Nate turned and wrapped his arms and wings around her. "You heard what Ophile said, didn't you? Poor Zephyr...and to make matters worse, I can't find Boko anywhere. The poor little guy was scared off when Vaira looked afraid of Zephyr. It was only for a moment, but it seemed to be enough to scare the little guy away. I'm not sure what to do..." He sighed heavily. "Zephyr and Vaira have enough to worry about right now, though I'm a little surprised they haven't noticed him missing yet." He pulled back, letting out a small sigh and looking at her. "What do you think about all this?"

She reached her hands up and stroked the sides of his face, then kissed him gently and said "I think that if we keep quiet about Zephyr, he'll turn out fine. For now, we need to find Cynyr so we can take the artifact, like Ophile told us. Werr should talk to his father about Leo. I remember Leo, Cynyr's father, talking about 'watching' him and Werr for a long time. If Sylas can take us to Leo, then Leo can probably take us to Cynyr, which leads to the artifact and Zephyr returning to normal. As for Boko, I suppose Vaira can find him by his scent. Mother dragons are innately tuned to their babies, after all." She fidgited around next to him, leaning against him as she rested a hand on his chest.

"But if we're going to catch up to Leo in time, we have to have some means of transportation. Which would be Vaira, since Zephyr isn't rideable anymore. And then we have to worry about running into Naybrin's followers, not to mention the fact that Vaira won't be too willing to ride off in the opposite direction of her son, wherever little Boko went. Besides, he's not even hers. He's adopted. I don't think that the 'tuning' is quite the same." He said as they walked back to the guest house. "We have a rather serious predicament on our hands, to be honest."

"I'm sure she could find him by scent," Tasia said, taking his hand into her twisted little one. "But you're right. Our bigger focus is on finding Cynyr." She leaned against her mate's shoulder, then said "Vaira won't be happy when she finds out Boko isn't here..."

"What?!"

Tasia flinched and ducked behind Nate when she heard the aformentioned dragoness' angry voice.

Vaira had been walking along the hall, heading outside, with Zephyr held in one paw, clutched tightly to her chest. She wasn't about to let go of him and was obviously one of the most loyal-to-her-mate dragoness' they had seen. "Where is Boko?!" she snapped, snarling at them.

Tasia squeaked and stammered "W-we don't know, Vaira-lahnir." She went forward and explained to Vaira their plans and how they needed her help despite Boko. "No!" the dragoness thundered. "No way! I won't leave him! I refuse-"

Zephyr slowly stood up in her hand and managed to take hold of one of her long ears, pulling her head down to him. He whispered into her ear for a moment and she listened hard, occasionally pulling back to argue quietly. He seemed to win, however, though she looked furious with him afterwards. "I'll take you where you need to go," she spat lowly.

Zephyr stroked her muzzle and licked the bridge of her nose.

((She's going to fly right over where Boko is now and he's going to feel completely abandoned. : D))

"Thank you, Vaira. We understand how important your son is to you, but...the entire world depends on our ability to recover our friends and defeat Malice." Nate shook his head with a heavy sigh. "After we find Cynyr and get back here, I'm sure you can go to find Boko." He started walking again, moving towards the guest house. He needed to speak with Werr, let him know that they were all prepared to leave at once.

((That's why Zephyr gets to go save him~!))

Vaira growled after him, but Zephyr spoke again and reassured her. She gave him a soft lick, then shrunk down to a much smaller size in order to give him the dragon equivalent of a kiss, which was basically them touching their tongues together. It was a little odd seeing a human and a dragon put their mouths together like that, but anyone who would've seen and known Zephyr would've understood.

Seria was in Werr's room, giving him a light check-over and just generally being a minor comfort. She brushed his hair back with her delicate claws, murmuring softly to him as she cupped his chin in her hand.

Werr was mostly silent, only speaking once or twice since Naminai finished. He kept rubbing the tops of his fingers through the bandages, wincing when he touched a sore spot. "We need to leave soon," Werr muttered, still too ashamed of himself to make eye contact with Seria.

"My thoughts exactly. Boko is gone, but...Vaira has agreed to take us anyway." Nate said, stepping into the room. "I'm fairly certain everyone is ready to go. I wouldn't be surprised if Obelisk wanted to come, as well; I get the feeling that he just wants to get out of here as much as possible."

Seria was sitting on the edge of Werr's bed, one hand resting on his leg. She listened to Nate speak, then glanced up when she heard a voice say "We'll come too."

Luen was standing there in deer form with Diana on his back. He had fashioned a sort of saddle for her out of strips of leather, a pillow, and a blanket. It was actually very well made, despite the materials used. The pillow and blanket served as padding and wrapping, in order to protect Diana from the kirin's bony back and to protect Luen's belly from the leather straps holding the saddle on. There was a soft strip of the blanket attached to the front of the saddle, where Diana could hold on.

"We want to help," the kirin said, flicking his long white ears and tapping the ground with a slender leg and hoof.

"...Luen, you know how dangerous this is going to be, yes?" Nate frowned at them. Diana looked down and away shyly, pouting a bit. "You could potentially be killed. The safest place for you to be is right here. I know that you have your powers back, but...you should use them to keep Diana safe, not take her into a battlefield and get her and yourself killed."

Luen looked down and away, then muttered something.

"What?" Seria said, tilting her head slightly. "What did you say?"

"I said 'Forin would fight'," he said, glaring at her. "He knew how important this was to us. To all of us. But fine, whatever. We'll sit here and do nothing to help our remaining friends." He turned and walked out of the room, his ears flicked back against his head.

Seria could sense how badly he was hurting.

"I miss Forin too..." Nate sighed heavily, mostly missing Luen's happiness. It seemed that with the Tartaran gone, Luen just...wasn't happy. Nate looked back at Werr. "I suggest you stay behind, too--"

"No." Werr said bluntly. "I need to apologize to Cynyr. I need to make things right again."

"...Alright. Fine. But you know that if the dragons find us--"

"I'll be human toast. I know." Werr tutted.

"Very well then. I'll let the others know that we're leaving."

Seria sighed, then gently stroked her hand down Werr's arm and said "I'll go pack my things. Don't worry anymore, okay? Everything will be fine." She bent forward and touched her lips gently to his forehead, then slid off and went to gather up her things. Once everyone was ready and had said their goodbyes to the ones being left behind, Luna contacted Galai and asked her to open the gates in order to let them go through. Once they were open, everyone went out, only able to watch as Galai closed the gates once again.

The Divine and Sylas were back by this time, both just lounging on the bridge and chatting enjoyably.