Day of the Dragon King

This book in the Magic Tree House series follows eight-year-old Jack and his seven-year-old sister, Annie, on a mission to ancient China to rescue a story from destruction. In earlier adventures, the siblings discovered a magic tree house in the Frog Creek woods near their hometown. The tree house belongs to Morgan le Fay, a magical librarian from the time of King Arthur who travels through time and space collecting books. Jack and Annie earned the rank of Master Librarian, and Morgan has tasked them with saving stories from ancient libraries. This is their second such mission.

Jack and Annie head to the tree house, telling their mother they are going to China. She assumes they are pretending and wishes them luck. In the tree house, Morgan explains that they must travel to a time before the Chinese invented paper, when books were written on bamboo strips. She shows them a bamboo strip inscribed with Chinese characters, the title of the ancient legend they need to find. Morgan gives them a research book called The Time of the First Emperor and warns that in their darkest hour, only the old legend can save them. Jack points at the book's cover and wishes to go there, and the tree house spins and transports them.

When they arrive, their clothes have magically changed to baggy pants, loose shirts, straw shoes, and round hats. Jack's backpack has become a cloth sack. From the tree house window, they see a sunny field with grazing cows, a farmhouse, and a walled city in the distance. Jack reads in the research book that China's first emperor chose the dragon as his symbol and was called the Dragon King. A young cowherd approaches and asks them to deliver a message to the silk weaver at the farmhouse: She should meet him in the field at twilight. Annie agrees. When Jack asks the cowherd about the Imperial Library, the man's face fills with horror. He warns them to beware of the Dragon King and runs back to his cows.

Annie insists they deliver the message before heading to the city. At the farmhouse, they find a young woman weaving cloth on a porch loom. Annie passes along the cowherd's message, and the silk weaver, visibly happy, gives Annie a ball of yellow silk thread as thanks. When Jack asks how silk is made, the weaver explains it comes from silkworm cocoons but urgently tells him not to write the information down. The secret of silk-making is punishable by death under the Dragon King. She then warns that they have been spotted and need to leave. Jack and Annie flee.

They run behind the farmhouse and dive into an oxcart filled with bags of grain. The cart lurches forward, driven toward the walled city. Along the road, the cart halts as a long line of men carrying tools crosses their path, guarded by soldiers. Jack reads that the Dragon King forced his subjects to build a wall protecting China from invaders, a wall that later emperors extended to 3,700 miles: the Great Wall of China. The cart driver then discovers the children and grabs them angrily. However, when he sees Jack's open book, he is astonished and reaches out to touch it.

Jack explains that the book is made of paper rather than bamboo. Tears fill the man's eyes, and he reveals that although he is dressed as a farmer, he is actually a scholar, one of China's most honored citizens, now in hiding. The Dragon King fears the power of books and learning and plans to burn all the books in the Imperial Library. Jack tells the scholar about their mission, and he and Annie show their secret library cards marked with the letters ML, which stands for Master Librarian. The cards shimmer in the sunlight, and the scholar recognizes the children's rank, bows in respect, and agrees to help them reach the library, warning it will be dangerous. As they ride together, the scholar is amazed to hear that Jack and Annie's country has thousands of libraries, millions of books, and universal schooling. He says it sounds like paradise.

The oxcart crosses a moat and passes guards at giant wooden gates. The scholar explains that every day at sunset, a gong sounds, the gates close, the bridge comes up, and the city is sealed for the night. They ride through the city, observing mud houses with straw roofs, then larger painted houses with curved roofs designed to ward off bad spirits, which according to local belief can only travel in straight lines. At the Dragon King's palace, the scholar announces a grain delivery, and the guard waves them through. Inside, the scholar points out the Imperial Burial Grounds, huge mounds of earth where the Dragon King's ancestors are buried.

The scholar then spots a dark cloud of smoke rising from the courtyard. They rush forward and find soldiers throwing bundles of bamboo books onto a bonfire. The Dragon King himself steps outside in his rich, flowing robe and tall hat to watch. Annie screams for them to stop, but her voice is lost in the fire's roar. The scholar spots a bamboo book that has fallen from a stack and identifies it as the legend they need. Annie dashes over, snatches it, and Jack stuffs it into his sack. The Dragon King sees them and orders his soldiers to seize them. The scholar tells Jack and Annie to flee through the burial grounds, because the soldiers fear the spirits of the ancestors buried there. Jack and Annie thank the scholar and run.

Arrows fly as they sprint through the burial grounds. They spot a doorway in one of the mounds and duck inside, finding a long lamp-lit hall with steps leading down. Despite Jack's unease about descending into a tomb, they go down. At the bottom, they discover a vast underground chamber filled with thousands of life-size clay soldiers. Jack reads that the Dragon King had 7,000 clay figures made for his tomb, hoping they would protect him after death. They wander the rows, noting that no two faces are identical.

After exploring, Jack and Annie realize they are lost. Every direction looks the same, the air grows thick, and the lamplight dims. Annie reminds Jack of Morgan's warning: The research book guides them, but in their darkest hour, only the ancient legend can save them. Jack holds up the bamboo book and asks for help, but nothing happens. Then Annie notices the ball of yellow silk thread has rolled out of Jack's sack and is moving on its own, leaving a trail behind it. Insisting it is magic, Annie follows the thread through the rows. When the thread runs out, they find themselves just a few feet from a stairway. They climb the stairs, walk down a long passage, and open a door that leads outside the palace gate into the fading daylight.

A gong sounds from the city wall tower, signaling the gates are about to close. Jack and Annie sprint through the city, losing their straw shoes but running barefoot. They tear through the giant gates just as they begin to shut, charge across the bridge, and keep running past the farmhouse and through the field to their tree. Before leaving, Annie looks out the tree house window and sees the silk weaver and the cowherd embracing at the edge of the field. She calls goodbye, and the couple waves back. Jack wishes to go home, and as the tree house begins to spin, he looks out one last time and sees the two figures glowing like stars.

They return to Frog Creek in their own clothes. Morgan is waiting. Jack hands her the bamboo book and the research book. Morgan tells them the legend is called The Silk Weaver and the Cowherd, a legend about two heavenly beings who came to earth and fell in love. Annie exclaims that she and Jack actually met them and helped bring them together. Morgan adds that according to a later legend, when the couple returned to the sky, the king and queen of the skies separated them with a heavenly river called the Milky Way. They reunite only once a year, when birds form a bridge across it. Morgan tells Jack and Annie to return in two weeks for their next mission: finding a book in Ireland over a thousand years ago, during a dangerous time of Viking raids. Jack and Annie head home, where their mother asks if they had fun in China. They tell her about getting lost in a tomb and being saved by an ancient book. She smiles and remarks on the wonder of books.