The Quest for Onyx (Book 1)

Chapter 30

Briggan hesitates again. I can see how much he really doesn't want to do this.

"Briggan, what are you waiting for?!" Azula growls.

Briggan looks at me again and I see the regret flash across his face. He close his eyes and releases the eclipse spell.

I close my eyes. This is it. It's all over. All I can do is brace myself for the pain.

But it never came.

Slowly I open my eyes and I see Star standing in front of me. She wobbles on her feet and then collapses on the ground I front of me.

I sit there numb and in shock all I can do is  stare at her for a while in disbelief. My friend who I just met a little while ago just risked her life to save me. And look what it cost her.

I push through my pain and crawl over to her. She's laying flat on her back with her eyes closed. Oh please don't let her be dead.

"Star. Hey come on wake up." I say. But there is no response. "Oh no...y-you can't be dead..." I mumble sadly.

I hear Star cough and then she slowly opens her eyes.

My heart skipped a beat and I almost cried tears of joy when I saw that she was alive.

"You're ok!!" I exclaim.

For the moment I completely forgot about the pain I was in and gave her a big hug.

Star grimaces slightly "I used most of my psychic powers to block the spell. I'm super drained and won't be moving for a little bit, but other than that I'm fine."

I couldn't stop myself from crying, tears cascaded down my face. "Why did you do that for me?" I whisper with a choked sob.

Star smiles "Essix, you and Tiny are in the small category of true friends that I've ever had, and one thing about me is that I have a strong loyalty to friends." Her smile changes into a smirk "And I gotta admit it was totally worth me being on the bench for a little while to save your sorry butt. You owe me big time for this ya know."

I laugh and shake my head. "Definitely. Whatever you want I got you when It's is all over."

Star reaches down and rummages around in her little pouch on her belt. She then pulls out a yellow and orange leaf and reaches up and shoves it into my mouth.

I spit it out in my hand. "Star What the heck was that?" I ask irritably.

She weakly shrugs. "What you don't like me trying to heal you from poison?"

I roll my eyes and stuff the leaf back in my mouth. I chew it up and try not to spit it back out as the extremely bitter flavor destroys my taste buds. Amazingly not long after I ate the leaf I started feeling stronger.

"Wow that stuff works fast. How'd you know which plant would cure the poison?" I ask Star.

"I didn't. I just know from experience of what the most common poison for coating weapons is. So I plan accordingly for such an occasion." Star says in a know it all way.

"So you just gave me a random medicinal plant not knowing if it was going to save me or not?" I say angrily.

"Well...yes and no..." Star says slowly. "I'm more surprised you didn't ask me how I know about blade poi-"

"We'll get into why you know that later...right now I have some unfinished business to attend to." I say while interrupting her.

"That's the weirdest way I've ever heard thank you said before...but I'll take it considering the circumstances." Star says while crossing her arms.

I slowly get to my feet, pick up my sword, and face Azula again.

"Well aren't you a lucky one?" She snorts "Luck doesn't last forever Essix."

"That may be true, but it wasn't luck that saved me. It was my friends." I reply.

"Oh I'm sure friends can help you." Azula sneers in a disgusted way.

"I guarantee that they will." I say seriously.

I take the moment of surprise that I have and dart forward and tackle Azula. In her surprised state it was easy to knock her off balance, and she topples to the floor. She recovers surprisingly quickly and counters by slashing at my head with her poison dagger again. I duck and retaliate with a quick punch. It connects with Azula's shoulder and it makes her lose her grip on her dagger. It's sent skidding across the floor out of her reach.

Tiny suddenly shoots forward and grabs the dagger, running with all his might to get it away from Azula.

"Annoying little brat!" She hisses.

"Hey that's my little brother you're talking about. You better show some respect." I say protectively.

Azula narrows her eyes and launches herself at me with vengeance filled eyes.

I then became locked in hand to hand combat with Azula. I battle with everything that I have. All my training runs through my head. Every punch I throw she blocks it. Every punch I counter she follows up with another punch.

Since Azula was cloned from my DNA she already knows most of my fighting styles. It's like fighting my reflection. Literally.

That's when the idea hit me. And by that I mean I got hit with one of Azula's punches. Man does she have a heck of a right hook! Oh...Um anyways back to the point of all this...

I stumble backwards and shake my head to clear the ringing in my ears. I suddenly know how to catch her off guard.

Out of the corner of my eye I see Azula has started her finishing attack. By the looks of it it's going to be a full force punch that would probably kill anyone it impacted by crushing their skull. She's aiming to finish this quick.

I let her get within a few inches of me before I put my plan into action. I grab Azula's arm and twist around successfully flipping her onto the ground. I smile with triumph, I had just beaten her with a basic move.

As she hits the ground I hear a sound that sounds a lot like glass breaking. I notice that around Azula's wrist there used to be a green crystal embedded in the bracelet she's wearing. But now it has completely shattered.

Wow did I grab her wrist that hard? I gotta watch my strength.

Hmm now that's definitely odd though. Why did she have that crystal in her bracelet? It felt oddly familiar somehow...

Azula groans and moves around a little.

I draw my sword and hold it close to her throat "Don't move."

~~~~~~~~~

What up my peeps?

Yeah I wrote two back to back chapters for you guys, who's awesome, I think I am!!

Anyways I hope you guys enjoyed the chapters. As always thanks for reading and please vote and comment!!

------ScarletApollo99 😊