The Mystery of Jade Mountain | A WOF Fanfiction | Paused

Prologue

"Have you finished assigning winglets?"

Sunny glanced up as Starflight entered the room. Beside her, Tsunami nodded, then realised that Starflight couldn't see her and sighed.

"Yes," Sunny said for her. "We just need Fatespeaker, so you two can print it onto the welcome scrolls." She picked up the scroll she'd been writing the winglets and handed it to Starflight.

He took and sighed. "I wish I could read it."

"Don't worry Starflight," Fatespeaker said, bumping his side, as she entered the cave. "We'll make scrolls that blind dragons can read someday."

Starflight nodded but he still looked doubtful. Sunny wished she could cheer him up — or make him be able to see again, which would probably cheer him up better than she could alone. Her eyes darted away from Starflight as Clay squelched into the room, dirt and mud stuck underneath his scales.

"I've finished digging out the new area to the prey centre," he announced. "Now there's a special area for chickens only, so they won't get stomped on by the cows or goats anymore. Should we add an area for the RainWings too? Like with fruit trees...so they don't have to watch the other dragons eat meat, with the blood and all that..."

"That's a good idea," Sunny piped up. Clay nodded and was about to turn around to go back to the prey centre when Tsunami raced forward and stopped him.

"Do that tomorrow," she suggested. "You're exhausted. Go get some rest...Sunny and I are done here."

Sunny nodded and bounded over to them. Starflight and Fatespeaker sat down beside the pile of black scrolls and began printing the welcome scroll, though Fatespeaker had to pause and help Starflight every now and then. Maybe I should help them, Sunny thought for a moment. But then she felt her wings droop and her talons ache with exhaustion. No, they can handle it. You need to rest, Sunny, the students will be here in a few days and there's a lot to do. You need to keep your strength up.

She followed Clay and Tsunami down the passage to their sleeping cave.

"I wonder how Deathseer is going to handle this," Tsunami wondered aloud. "He was so cranky, even around his own tribe, and the RainWings in the NightWing village kind of made him more mad...I hope he won't be angry all the time."

"He wouldn't have agreed to come here if he would just be mad all the time," Clay pointed out. "But maybe someone else forced him too...maybe Glory wanted him out of her rainforest, in case he decided to murder some RainWings." He shivered.

"Why would anyone want to kill a bunch of harmless RainWings?" Sunny piped up, and Tsunami snorted. Sunny frowned. "All I'm saying is, what would that accomplish? It's not like the RainWings can give anything to the NightWings, after all."

"Their own queen?" Tsunami offered. "But you're right, more or less."

Sunny brightened. Tsunami said she was right! She was about to mention something when she realised she'd probably sound like a young dragonet when her mother praised her — which she was not, no matter how her friends treated her.

"He'll be fine," Sunny said instead. "Deathseer, I mean. And there's that other NightWing, Skygazer. I can't believe he's already six years old! Do you remember when he was just a little dragonet, running away from the NightWing village every day?"

Clay grinned. "Yeah, Glory told us all about it. I've met him, though, but I guess we've heard enough that it's like we've met him."

They entered their sleeping caves and lay down, with Tsunami's tail resting over Clay's her her head on his shoulder. Sunny curled up under his wing.