Where Smoke Bleeds Gold

Chapter Eight - Beings

Quake jolted up, throwing up water and bile through her nose and mouth. I jumped back, not wanting to get splashed by the goop.
"Quake!" Typhoon yelled, splashing in the water as if she might just jump out.
"Are you okay?" Avalanche asked, holding her steady as Quake continued hacking.
"Leave me alone," Quake hissed, shrinking away from the touch of Avalanche's wing. Avalanche backed away, drawing her wings back. Quake leaned forward, holding her head as if she heard something no else did.
"Quake, yes?" Typhoon said, inching closer to her. I turned to her when no one else did. She held her webbed talons up, her claws flexing as if it meant something. I looked at Quake, talons on her head, blocking most of her face. What I could see looked twisted with anger. She suddenly whipped toward Typhoon, I flinched back thinking she was going to hit me. Instead she just breathed a deep shaky breath.
"Yes what?" She said, traces of anger in her voice. I wanted to back away and get space between me and her, but if I moved she would focus on me, like mom would.
Her big blue eyes focused on Quake's, twitching a little as she searched her face. She nodded her head and gave Quake a sanguine stare, eyes narrowing. Quake muttered something under her breath.
What was this secret code? Would I ever be able to translate it too or was I just stupid and this all made sense? I looked to Avalanche, but she was looking away.
"I just want to sleep," Quake said, lying on her back. She set her tail on her leg, hiding something I barely had time to see.
"I think we can do that," Starshine said, but he stood next to Quake with his small talon pressed gently against her neck. Was he trying to hurt her? I didn't know. I laid back down, all I had done last night was lay around and be useless while the others slept, but fatigue was already pulling me back to the warm sand. I laid with my face pressed against the warmth of it. The world blinked to black as I finally managed to slip away.

"Quake," Typhoon muttered. I flinched, scared to not feel Flicker beside me. Her heat was gone. Was she okay?
"Quake!" Typhoon said, tears in her voice. I sat up turning around getting dizzy from suddenly remembering where I was all over again.
"Typhoon!" I called. Her legs laid limply behind her like they were broken, her arms clawing at the sand trying to swim to Quake. She was whispering, why? I ran to her side when I suddenly realized what had happened.
She didn't have legs before.
"What?" I whispered, keeping my voice down with her. She looked at me silently. Her mouth slightly dropped.
"Bubbles hurt," She said, her eyes growing wet.
"What bubbles? What happened?" I asked, setting my talon on hers like how Flicker would do for me. Her talon flinched back the moment I touched it.
"Air hard," She said, cocking her head with a weary confused smile. I didn't know what she was saying. What she meant or what I should do.
"You can't breathe?" I asked, trying to make sense of what was happening.
"Quake hurt sad," She gasped. "Typhoon sad, to help," She said, her arm reaching toward Quake. I wanted to hold her. Like Flicker trying to calm me down, but she was so scared. Was I scaring her, too?
"Quake," I said, turning to the mangled CavernScales a wing's length away.
"What?" She barked, sitting up and kicking her right leg into the sand. She stared at Typhoon for a moment, unmoving. Suddenly she cussed, turning to Avalanche. "Wake up!" She yelled at her. Starshine jumped up first, so fast that he ended sitting back down from the world spinning.
"What?" Starshinee asked, turning to us.
"My leg hurts, get me something," Quake said, surprising me.
"What?" I asked, but my words were drowned out by Starshine gushing about what happened to her leg.
"I just scraped it," Quake said, pulling her tail away to show an oozing cut that went bone deep into her leg. I quickly looked away, unable to get the green blood out of my head.
"Oh," Starshine said. I refused to look back at them, so I ended up watching the ocean. It made me wonder what happened to Quake after so many paces underwater, but she didn't seem to ever want to talk about it.
"Avalanche, can you go get some Jasmine?" Starshine asked once she lifted her head.
"Send Flare," Quake growled. I looked back at them, confused.
"Wh-" I began.
"Do you want to go, Flare?" Starshine asked. I stared at them for a moment. Quake wasn't facing me, and I didn't know what was happening or how Starshine hadn't noticed Typhoon's legs. Accidentally glancing at Quake's leg, I again saw the red of her flesh under her skin and scales. I winced, looking away.
"Okay," I said, standing up. I made sure to keep Quake out of my peripheral vision so as not to throw up.
"It's a large tree with triangle shaped leaves, and don't touch the flowers around it, I mean it," Starshine said, trying to make it sound like a threat. He was too small to seem dangerous, but I made sure to remember that.
How long had it been since Starshine told me that? My talons felt sore and my wings dragged behind like something dead. Moon was going down already, and I didn't know where this tree was. I shook my head, trying to make sense of my talons. Talons that fumbled endlessly through the dark. Staring down at my talons while walking made them look long and shaky. All these trees looked the same, but none were quite what I was looking for. I needed to walk with the sun on my back to get back to the beach, but even with that, I felt lost.

It was that smell again. So sweet and warm. If I could wrap myself in a blanket of this scent I would bundle me and Flicker together to hide in a world of this cozy smell. Sometimes it made me want to shout. Sometimes it made me want to cry. It had a way of pulling at my heart strings with it's comfortable perfume.
Mother was making tea again. Mother was inviting someone over again. Mother was-
"I'm going to the market," She said, leaving the cauldron of tea above a small contained fire in the kitchen.
"Is someone coming over?" Flicker asked, sliding down the stairs to stop her at the door. I watched them for a moment from down the hall in the shadows. Both of them were silent and staring at each other. Mother breathed in, eyes closed.
"Yes, do you think you'll be able to handle some company tonight?" She said with a gentle smile. She looked so pretty with a smile. I wished she had smiled more often, but I guess it's hard sometimes.
"Of course I can," Flicker smiled back at her. Her smile was my favorite. You saw glimpses of it when she talked about something she loved or when she was surprised with something nice. Mother dipped her head down, tapping Flicker's head with her chin. It was the most affectionate thing our mother would ever do. She wouldn't hug us and hold our talons, just a small tap.
I stepped back into the kitchen, jumping out of the shadows. A giant smile split my face, although I didn't feel very happy. My eyes went blurry as I held back tears. I shouldn't have watched that. It was their moment and...
Every scale ached as I held my face. When was the last time mother gave me that little tap? I couldn't even remember anymore, but I longed for her to be kind to me too.
"I'm going to market, Flare," She said. She didn't see me in the hall.
"Bye," I whispered so quietly I couldn't even hear myself say it. I waited a few moments to hear the door shut before I took a breath and snuck into the hallway.
"Mom seems happy," Flicker said, eyes fixed on me as I crept up the stairs. Why did she say it like that? Was she upset with me?
"Does she?" I asked, dragging my talons up the creaking old stairs.
"Come on, let's play in the room," She said, talking about our sleeping room.
"Don't we need to clean the house?" I said, standing at the top of the stairs with her.
"Doesn't matter, we have plenty of time before mom comes back," Flicker said. With a push of the green and tan curtain out of the way, she jumped over my pile of blankets of a bed.
"What are you gonna do?" I asked, stepping into the small room.
"I'm gonna show you something," She smiled deviously.
"What?" I asked, following her to the window beside her bed. She motioned me closer before putting her talon up to the screen.
"Watch this," She said, pulling the screen up. My breath caught in my throat. It was the hole in the screen I made to see Kindling.
"There's a dragon our age that came by the other night," She said. "He thought there was someone else in here, said he thought there was a ghost and thought the house was abandoned," She said, turning back to me keeping the window open. Without Kindling there, you had a clear view of the barren alley. I brushed past her, sticking my head out the window. I looked around, trying to breathe in the outside air. The outer wall of the city was just beyond the alley. It was so tall it almost blocked out Sun flying downward. If I could reach out just a bit further, I might be able to touch it.
"It'd be so easy to run away," I said, putting my talon on the frame of the window. Flicker had an uneasy silence around her. Perhaps that wasn't the right thing to say. The sounds of the alley echoed against the unstable wooden walls and the sandstone brick.
"Uh, yeah, Anyway," Flicker said, brushing away my comment. I pulled myself out a little further, my shoulders tearing against the thin fabric screen.
"He was really nice, and accidentally showed me the rip in this screen," She said, nudging my wing. I pushed further through the window, now determined to touch the wall.
"Accidentally?" I asked, getting a bad feeling in my stomach. This was beginning to sound like Kindling.
"Yeah, he pulled up the screen really late into the night. I heard him walking on the tiles. Don't know how you didn't hear him above our bed," I bit my questions back as she continued. Why was he there? What was he doing?
"Anyway, we should get to cleaning," Flicker said, tugging on my tail.
"Wait," I said, leaning forward a bit more, my talon just short of grazing the wall. I stood up on the window sill, pushing further.
"Flare," Flicker said, demanding my attention.
"One moment," I said, halfway out the window.
"Flare!" Flicker siad, raising her voice. Then I heard it.
"I'm home," Mother called from downstairs. I stood up suddenly, the fabric screen tearing open completely. Without the cloth to help me balance, I tipped forward ever so slightly. My talons rubbed against the splintering wood as I pushed myself back.
"Coming!" Flicker yelled, trying to buy time. She pulled back on my wings harshly, flinging me back into the frame. My horns stabbed into the shredded fabric, tangling me further into the mess.
"Now, please," Mother yelled again, telling us to get downstairs faster.
"Uh," Flicker mumbled, trying to think of something to buy us more time.
"Go," I whispered, pushing her forward with my tail.