Wings of Fire: The Glorious Tower (dead)

Part 1: Aloha

Note: This adventure takes place in between arc 1 and arc 2

The Rainforest Kingdom.

 Aloha loved it. Who couldn't? Queen Glory was kind and good and generous, every RainWing she ever met was kind, and though some of the NightWings were a bit grumpy, they weren't a bad lot at heart. The youngest of them weren't, anyways. 

Aloha had so many friends, caring family, and a carefree life. Well, it wasn't that carefree, seeing as she was a guard, and she had to be fierce and alert on her shift. But her shift only lasted from sunrise to midday, so it wasn't even that bad. The only downside was that she had to get up before dawn, and as a result sleep very early. But she didn't mind very much.

Aloha woke, as usual, two hours before dawn. She had a little hut of her own, between her parents' and older brother's one. Aloha stretched and yawned, and slipped out of bed. She looked out of the huge open window, and saw the dark rainforest. She loved the silence and peace of this time, this grey area between night and day. No birds chirped, because they were all busy snoozing in their nests. Aloha looked at the two moons slipping, slowly, away into the west. At the east it was still dark, but she could see a little orange light moving across the moist green leaves. 

She looked down at herself. She was a mess of colours, blue and white and red and black and so on and so forth. Aloha took a deep breath and composed herself,  turning a nice, rich yellow, with  an electric blue shooting throughout, in the shape of lighting bolts. She slowly made her way into the small kitchen. 

She grabbed a pear from the counter and munched on it, while making her way to the living room.

She took a large cloth from a chair, and having finished her pear, opened the door and flew into the dark sky.

Aloha loved flying. Flying, especially, high above the restricting canopy of the rainforest and into the wide, endless sky. She stopped when she guessed she was high enough, and looked around, trying to find her waterfall. 

The rainforest stretched for what seemed like forever, but if she tried to look hard enough, she could see the horizon, where the trees thinned out and the swamps started.

Aloha looked down below, and swooped into a dive, neatly flying through a spot between the thick canopy, and landed on the soft muddy ground. She could hear the soft splashing of a waterfall off to the east, and hurried off that way.

Aloha arrived at her little waterfall as she stepped into the clearing, and beamed with pride. She had found it years ago, when she was very little and very bored.

The waterfall itself was a pretty little thing. It flowed down from a small hill some way into the jungle, and the main pond where all the tiny rivulets of water flowed into, had a natural circle of pebbles around it. Aloha put her towel on a large rock and slipped into the pond. 

The pond was a bit of a miracle. It was too small to let fish and frogs live in it, but far too big to be a worthless dirty old puddle. During the night and evenings it got nice and warm, to let dragons have a little relief from the cold. And during the day, it was pleasantly cool to let dragons have relief from the humid temperature. It was perfect, Aloha decided as she waded around, feeling refreshed and clean.

Aloha finished her bath and got out, using her towel to dry herself. She flew back to her hut and put the towel on her balcony, letting it dry off in the soon-to-come sun. Not that soon to come, Aloha realised with a start. She looked at the sky, with an alarmed blueish grey making it's way through her scales. The sun had almost fully risen, which meant that she might be late, if she didn't hurry. 

She shot off into the rainforest and the direction of Queen Glory's Palace. She guarded the courtroom entrance with her friend and colleague, Andromeda. She arrived at the entrance of Queen Glory's Treehouse Palace. She skidded to a stop at the very entrance and bowed to the two dragons guarding the door. Aloha looked up and smiled. These two dragons she knew. Windshifter and Vine grinned at her and beckoned her up. Aloha quickly straightened herself, and composed her scales back to her original pattern of yellow and electric blue. They opened the door, and she hurried inside. 

Thankfully, Aloha was not too late. The palace hadn't fully woken up yet, so there weren't many dragons around. She hurried up the twisting stairs and finally, arrived at the throne room. Andromeda was already there, in perfect guard posture. She broke it slightly to glance at Aloha as she ran up the stairs, and then to wave at her and offer her a friendly smile.

"Hey! I was beginning to worry that you'd be here after Queen Glory came. Fortunately, she isn't here yet." Andromeda said through the side of her mouth. " She'll be around in a moment though." She added.  Aloha nodded in agreement, and quickly took the sleeping darts Andromeda offered her.