Wings of Fire Legends • The Blue Comet

Chapter Nine

Every beat of his wings made them feel like they were about to fall off. Prion was not out of shape – on the contrary, his lifestyle made him fitter than some of the guards in the Second Circle – but IceWings were not built to fly for hours on end. That was a SkyWing's forte. He might have had a better chance if he was not flying at his top speed, and especially if he was not flying through the desert. During the day.

     After the guards had dragged him away from Narrow-Straight, the general had pointed south. "We will follow you until the border of the Sand Kingdom is in sight," she had said. "By nightfall, all the guards in the Kingdom will know your name and face. If you even think about sneaking back here, we'll know, and I'll come to finish what you started when you failed to notify the Crown of The Blue Comet's approach."

     At that, their spears had pushed forward and he was driven out of his home.

     Prion had flown through the rest of the day and all of the night, watching a dim blue glow on the horizon ahead of him. He knew could never catch it. It felt like the universe was mocking him as the light dimmed.

     Night slowly began to turn into day. The shifting dunes that had been beneath him all night finally changed to rocky hills. Ahead of him, Prion could see the pointy mountain range that protected the Night Kingdom from the SandWings. The Blue Comet's glow had disappeared behind it, and Prion fully expected to lose sight of it by the time he cleared the range too.

     Then The Blue Comet will escape. It will disappear and I'll never find it. I'll never be able to return home.

     His chest constricted at the thought of never seeing his family again, but as he crested the high spires, his chest expanded in time with his gasp.

     The Night Kingdom, described in scrolls as peaceful and studious, had dissolved into chaos. Stretches of forests were burning, pouring streams of dark blue smoke into the air. As he flew closer to the heart of the Kingdom, he found that parts of the palace were blackened. The ravines, where NightWings were said to live, were lit not with the pleasant orange glow of study fires, but with blue flames. Screams drifted up with the smoke, Prion's wings catching them as he flew so that he could not ignore them.

     Is it still here? was his first thought after the horror of the scene sunk in. Prion began to hover, his eyes flicking across the landscape. Maybe he could catch The Blue Comet while it was burning the city, then kill it and go home.

     I'll start in the main ravine where the fires are the biggest.

     Prion tilted his wings back and swooped into the heat, already regretting his decision to have a look up close. The heat from the fire that washed over his scales felt ten times hotter than the desert sun. Hotter than that, even, and he was not in the thick of it! The very air was tossed with the flames – burning – bouncing Prion around with updrafts and forcing him to stoop further.

     Gliding above the ravine, he could see that most of the flames were coming out of caves or from trees and other vegetation that had once decorated the city. The blue fire made quick work of whatever it touched.

     This is... Prion felt a chill, though perhaps it was from flying through a cold spot. The air in this column was marginally cooler than that around it and he was sucked to the ravine floor. As he landed and came close to a burning cave, he still felt a shiver gripping him. Then, as if guided by a sixth sense, Prion looked up in time to see The Blue Comet streak across the sky to the east.

     It left. It came here, burned the city, and then left. For no reason at all. This is monstrous.

     But whoever this dragon is, Prion decided, could not have come from Pyrrhia. No creature here has fire hot enough, and I don't know any tribes that can breathe blue fire.