Bloodworm Hive

Chapter 5 - Promise

Promise was flying around the hives next morning, daydreaming of a few flowers she was fond of. A fight seemed to be taking place below her. A few angry - looking dragonets (most likely silkwings based on their color palette) with aggressive faces plastered on themselves were chasing a whimpering young yellow dragon. It turned right and left, and it was a blur from here. 

Promise wanted to get closer, but she couldn't without dragging attention towards herself, which might have gotten others to get suspicious. She tried her best to see the dragonet clearly. All she could see is that it was a blindingly bright yellow and had a scared look on its face .

She decided to land from afar, watching as the guards grabbed the bright yellow dragonet as it squirmed, clawing at the two who held it firm. It had faint black speckles and freckles, and seeing more, it pushed against their claws as they chuckled. "Now, now. What should we do with this one?" as it shoved against them.

"Oh no, you don't." a brown and mahogany silkwing said, readying his claws. The dragonet only seemed to be 2. It squeezed its eyes shut, but Promise interrupted the scene. "What are you doing!?" she hissed, flying down from her hiding spot with her wings spread to protect the little dragonet as she snatched them from the silkwings' claws. One yelped while the other shouted angrily as she turned to face their supposed leader calmly. He was an odd dark yellow silkwing that had dim green eyes and dark golden horns. "You really think you're so tough, hivewing?" he scoffed. His voice sounded deep, and he was tall, with a twisted tail and broken snout. Promise hid her true feelings and said "Do you think you are?" as he growled. Ok, now she really needed to get out of here. The other SilkWings were flexing their claws as he said "A-ttack!" Promise cut him off in the middle by smacking his already twisted snout, which he didn't seem happy about.

In an instant, Promise found multiple hivewings swarming towards her as she quickly dodged one's razor sharp talons and dropped the dragonet saying "What are you waiting for? Run!" as the little one rushed off. The other SilkWings circled her like sharks. Most were metamorphosized and had some sort of injury. Some seemed startled while others were looking ready for the challenge. And all of them had the same marking, the same pale orange moth marking their necks, some had one on their forehead along with it. That included their 'leader' and most of the SilkWings near their leader. "We live for justice!" they chanted as their leader twisted his head towards Promise threateningly as she backed up a bit before saying "SilkWings. Knew they weren't as kind as everyone stereotyped." "We are kind to those who deserve it!" snapped their leader as he continued "We are the Wings of the Lonomia, and we live for justice!" The 'we live for justice' chant echoed due to the others trying to make cringey side effects. 

Promise snapped at one before saying "Shoo. There isn't enough to fill your nosey noses here." as the SilkWing leapt for her as she dodged, trying to run off before more leapt at her, swarming her as she squirmed out of an orange and purple SilkWing's grasp and leapt back before another could lunge at her. Her heart pounded as she thought I need to run. I can get the guards if I manage to get close enough to my mother's house. They can deal with the SilkWings. so Promise took slow steps back before leaping off her feet, zipping away in an instant, watching SilkWings fly after her. Oh wait- why wasn't she flying? She'd get more attention that way! Well, that might be a good or bad thing. Promise twisted around some curves as HiveWings all over shut their windows. Had they seen this before? Ack! Not time to focus on questions, time to focus on running! She zipped around, dashing past a few unluckly HiveWings who ran off as soon as they saw the swarm. The SilkWings behind her were getting farther into the distance, shouting angrily about how 'righteous' their causes were. One said "COME BACK HIVEWING! PAY THE CONSEQUENCES FOR YOUR MISTAKES!" as Promise yelled back "WHAT MISTAKE? SAVING A DRAGONET FROM A MOB?!" as the dragon gaining responded "NO! FOR ENSLAVING INNOCENT SILKWINGS!" as Promise shot back "DO YOU HAVE MY FILES? YOU DON'T KNOW IF I ENSLAVE SILKWINGS SO STOP ASSUMING THINGS!" as the other dragon didn't respond as the group chanted "We live for justice!", their voices were getting louder . . meaning they were getting closer.

Promise dodged a few yelling HiveWings shoving past each-other, and saw a few cops run off too. Were you kidding? The cops were too cowardly to deal with this mob? Wow, they must be real infamous  Promise thought wearily, still running. A few dragons behind her were trying to distract her by throwing fruit at her feet, but she kept her gaze averted from the food and was finally getting close to Honeycomb Block. This was called Flannel Lane, and it was notorious for crimes and rebellious SilkWings. How fun. A grumpy SilkWing mob chasing after her. She nearly ran into a box of something, but jumped over it. She felt like she was in that Subway Surfers game. How she knew what it was? She heard rumors that Clearsight had oddly predicted that it was a game of the future on something called a . . a what? An electrozip? An electrorip? Oh! An electronic. But it wasn't going to be available to dragons, unfortunately.

She yelped as a few dragons rammed into buildings nearby, seeming angry that she was escaping. They were yelling angrily over it, fussing like it was a big deal. What did she ever do to them? Well, she'd have to ask them that later because now wasn't the time. And plus, she probably couldn't ask them without being - uhhh - what would they do? She didn't care - she just needed to get away from those startling faces.

Once she got past the border, SilkWings all around her lurked away, while some lingered, hiding in their surroundings, probably hoping she would come back. Which she was not going to do. She saw their sneering faces and their markings. Was that a sign of who to watch out for? Hmmm. Oddly enough, silkwings in general never caused trouble. Why would they start a gang? For 'justice'? This 'justice' didn't seem very just, though.

Promise decided against running to her mother's house and slamming the door shut. It would be better to fly around a bit, just in case some of the SilkWings were following her. If she went home, they could target mother, too. In fact, I did see them muttering about something while I was running - but what? They had let her go . . and that was what worried her. Was it because Honeycomb Block was better guarded . . ? Or was it because they were planning something bigger ?

I was zooming around the hives, ignoring the weird looks other HiveWings gave me. Note to self - never go to Flannel Lane ever again, and especially not to confront a bunch of angry - looking silkwings with weird orange moth markings and called themselves 'The Wings of the Lonomia' and wouldn't shut up about 'justice'. Weird dragons. The oddest thing was all of them had already grown their wings and had their silk. Why didn't they use that to tie her up? Maybe she was farther from them than she thought. Or - but just as she started that sentence, silk flew, missing her by a strand. By Clearsight's foresight, why did this have to happen? she thought grumpily, dodging strands of silk. The authorities here were better than Flannel Lane, surely. "Hey!" Promise said, as the strands of silk stopped as she turned to a random adult HiveWing "Some silkwings were attacking me." as he snorted "SilkWings? Everyone knows they don't attack dragons, is this a joke?" as Promise said "No! They were shooting their silk at me!" as the HiveWing sighed "Where are they now?" as Promise pointed behind her where she had located them "THE LONOMIA-" the HiveWing seemed to shout, fainting. Promise ran off again - maybe her house was the best option.

Her heart pounded as she ran across, dodging strands of silk on her way. When would they ever leave her alone? Why were they not reported to Queen Wasp? Promise guessed they ate baby HiveWings for dinner or something like that. And that wasn't very fair, if you asked her. Not very fair at all. What did the HiveWings do to them? Be honest? Not sugarcoat the world like the SilkWings wanted them to? Rude. But perhaps she could focus more on her sense of navigation at the point of time. Yikes - now she really wanted to be a SilkWing, for the first time in her life. Partially because she was being chased by SilkWings, and wouldn't be if she were a SilkWing - or did the Wings of Lonomia target everyone, including their own tribe? Alright, back to the subject. And partially because she wanted to check how much time the SilkWings had been chasing her. HiveWings had a good sense of time, but SilkWings had a near-perfect one. She finally spotted her house and rushed over, a swarm - well - a mini swarm of SilkWings behind her with their arsenal of silk following. She slammed the door as Firefly, her mother thundered "Where have you been?!" as Promise said "Oh, sorry, couldn't come home earlier, had a MOB OF SILKWINGS chasing me." as Firefly facepalmed and said "Go up to your room." with a grumble as Promise set up for her room. The flowers didn't comfort her much anymore. She adjusted her flower crown and watched from the windows. The SilkWings seemed to have left them alone, but she didn't want to jinx it.

She shuddered, knowing today was not going to be a very good day. At all.