Wings of Fire Legends • The Blue Comet

Chapter Twenty

Every morning started the same. Before either of the dragonets were awake, long before even the sun rose, she would fly up to the top of their home and watch for any sign of her husband. Puffin and Chinstrap would appear just before sunrise to watch with her. She would scold them for getting up before usual but could not force herself to take them down to begin the day. The three of them would cling to the ice spike into the morning, dreading the sight of blue light on the horizon. The Comet would be stopped by the newly enchanted Ice Cliff, but Ptarmigan knew that if it came to the Ice Kingdom a second time it would be because Prion had failed.

     Her worst fear was that he would never come home. That he would never know Puffin and Chinstrap had finally passed their Third Tasks...

- ❈ -

The guards had not come to kill him.

     They had sent her husband on a suicide mission and the reality was that he would probably never return.

     Prion's gaze was ripped from hers as he was herded away by the fleet of guards. Ptarmigan wanted nothing more than to follow him, but she was aware of the village's eyes on her.

     I must not follow. I must not move. I must not break.

     "I'm sorry!" she could hear Prion shout just as he disappeared among the guards' wings. Ptarmigan had to close her eyes. If she tried to look for one last sight of him, she would break.

     A flurry of wings sounded to her left. Ptarmigan opened her eyes and, to her horror, saw Puffin halfway into the sky.

     Before her daughter could get any farther, Ptarmigan grabbed her by her tail. Puffin collapsed onto the ice, hissing at her mother.

     "Let me go! I have to go after him!"

     "You will not squander the mercy the Task Official showed you!" Ptarmigan snarled into Puffin's face, well aware that Frazil was watching her.

     Her daughter was shaking under her talons, looking caught between crying and rage. Nearby, Chinstrap was staring at them with concern. Ptarmigan could sense he agreed with his sister.

     She flicked her tail to bring him close. The dragonet shuffled forward and her heart broke to see him suffer so much.

     Pay the Comet back, Prion, she said to herself, willing her thought to be heard by her husband. Make it pay for what it did to our dragonets.

- ❈ -

Ptarmigan climbed up for one more night of watching the horizon. She stared into the moonlit night, south in the direction of the desert, wondering what she would do if she saw The Blue Comet on the horizon.

     Grab my dragonets and leave, she knew, but she wondered if she would have the strength to. Because the sight of the Comet would be confirmation that her husband was dead.

     There was nothing Ptarmigan could do. She did not want to dwell on her fear – worrying was a nuisance that got in the way of productivity, her mother would say. It was unbecoming of a noble dragoness.

     Well, I'm not noble anymore, Ptarmigan thought. She felt anything but noble as she sat on the tip of her home in Narrow-Straight-Beside-the-Sea.

     The sound of wingbeats grew louder. Ptarmigan looked down, squashing her disappointment as Chinstrap came into view. His burns had healed nicely over the past four days but that did not mean he was well enough to be flying around when the moons were up.