Wings of Fire: The Secret of Silverstripe

~Ch.11: Friendship in the Sea~

The storm that Mistress Seasnake had predicted came. Emerald slept for two days, missing the storm entirely. Silverstripe seeked entertainment by cleaning their quarters, cleaning the Deep Palace, and helping other Deep Palace residents seal windows from strong water currents and fleeing fish.

Once the storm had passed, the pearl hunters returned to work. After gathering their quota, Silverstripe left Emerald to help Turquoise clean his settlement while the green dragonet slept some more back at the quarters.

On the evening of her next report, Silverstripe was growing excedingly nervous. She had thought about how she was going to slip away from Emerald without hurting the dragonet's feelings, and she had thought about how she was going to hide a detail of her mission to Morrowseer.

"What do ya wanna do?" Emerald asked as she and Silverstripe broke the surface of the water.

"Umm... I'm going to go see a friend," Silverstripe called out over the sea spray.

"Is it that same SeaWing that you saw yesterday?" Emerald asked.

"Er... Yeah," Silverstripe said awkwardly.

"Why do you keep seeing him?" Emerald asked skeptically as Silverstripe led them to a sandbar.

"Welllll..." Silverstripe trailed off as they sat on the underwater sand. Here, the water only reached up to her shoulders, so they could talk a little more easily.

"Do you have a crush on him? Are you two dating yet?" Emerald asked.

"GOTTA GO, BYE!" Silverstripe shouted as she dove off the sandbar into deeper water. She hastily darted through the current to Report Island (she had named it for the sake of identifying it in her mind), and flew up the skeletal dragon's rib cage and up its spine. As she landed on the dragon's skull, Silverstripe took out her slates, spreading them out in an arc in front of her.

Morrowseer didn't take too long to arrive this time. In fact, he arrived not a few minutes after Silverstripe did.

Great. Now he's arriving early to accuse me of being late, Silverstripe thought, rolling her eyes.

The massive NightWing looked at her with narrowed, yellow eyes. He appeared to be surprised, maybe slightly annoyed at Silverstripe's early presence.

"Report," Morrowseer said in his usual gruff voice.

"All is well," Silverstripe began calmly. "I am continuing to build trust with the SeaWings, and I have an apprentice of sorts. Her name is Emerald. She's about six years old. You'll see my information on her in this slate."

Morrowseer picked up the slate that Silverstripe was pointing to and skimmed through it.

"Not much has been going on politically in the Kingdom of the Sea lately," Silverstripe continued. "Queen Coral leaves to meet Princess Blister ever so often. Whenever she leaves, King Gill is always there to keep charge in the palaces. The army is continuing to build up greater numbers. They like Commander Tempest. She's a strong leader, and cares about her troops. No news on when the summit occurs. What's the news on your side?"

"The summit is being postponed due to IceWing advances in the Sand Kingdom," Morrowseer said indifferently. "Our intelligence suggests that based on the slate that you acquired, the IceWings are invading about where the SeaWings wanted to previously."

Silverstripe nodded.

Morrowseer gave her an expectant look, and Silverstripe added, "Overall report is good. Abyss still has a stable identity and remains in the background."

Morrowseer nodded approvingly. "You are dismissed, Silverstripe."

Silverstripe watched as the massive NightWing dove off the stone skull and disappeared into the horizon.