Wings of Evolution (WoF AU)

Chapter 28

Echo of death

They flew south, only stopping when they left their blankets with Blaze, who was all to happy to now be the queen of the blanket fortress dragons. The more Echo saw her, the more he began to understand that if Blaze ever became the real queen of the sandwings, then she wouldn't live very long.

They turned east after Blaze's place, finally stopping for the night at the town known as 'possibility,' as Glory surmised, it would probably be the only place besides the scorpion den where dragons wouldn't question the presence of an impossibly sparkly dragon and an absurdly tiny cave dweller.

Foeslayer had partially broken out of her depression, and she seemed happy about the city, but Uhar was too busy gawking himself to take heed of the Nightwing. Everything was just so big. His previous experiences had prepared him for all the large dragons and the buildings built for them, but the smells and sights could still not be distinguished.

Possibility was the strangest most wonderful experience that Uhar had ever had. As they passed street vendors selling items that Uhar sincerely hoped weren't edible, and buildings so beautiful that he longed to run his talons over one to see if the texture was really that strange.

He saw precious stones, though there seemed to be less of those than back home, and dragons performing in the streets. He saw everything and more from his old wonderings about the surface world. There was just so much happening.

Eventually, after an evening of going insane, Cactus dragged him back to the inn that they'd gotten a stay at, lecturing him about how much of the strange rainwing fruit he'd tried. Which by his count was not nearly enough, but Cactus could be right just this once.

The inn was pretty cool, though not very diverse, prepared with blanket covered padding but not much else for dragons who didn't like the strange squishy-ness of it. Frost just gave up after stepping onto the bed and just slept on the ground. Uhar was more polite and just slept on top of the blankets. And really, it wasn't that bad, it melded to his shape very well and there was less worry about sleeping wrong and hurting tomorrow.

He still took a while to fall asleap, and would have given half those strange rainwing fruits for nice smooth rocky ground.

---

Uhar woke before dawn to movement, looking up and around until he spotted Glory opening the door, looking everyone over, apparently something had spooked her, because she looked at Uhar sharply as he got up.

She made a shooing motion and closed the door behind her. Huh.

Obviously, Uhar wasn't going to just go back to sleep, he wasn't even very tired. Glory on the other hand he'd seen yawning several times over the last week. She wasn't getting enough sleep, she shouldn't be out and about.

He stubbornly stood up and walked across the room with quiet claw steps, passing his sleeping companions and opening the door with a slight creak.

He exited the building, searching for the rainwing and belatedly remembering that she could turn invisible. That was unfortunate for him since he couldn't see invisible things. He also had no proof that she was even nearby, and his echolocation was too finicky outside of the caves. Too many other noises.

He sighed and almost went back inside, except he spotted a flash of blackness. Black scales, just down the street.

Uhar narrowed his eyes and followed that, deciding that there was no point in staying where he was. He remembered the sensation of ice sliding from his throat and felt powerful. Sure, Uhar hadn't been able to summon the ice again since, but after that first time, he'd felt a constant strange preassure in the back of his throat, as if something was just waiting to come out.

Because of that, Uhar felt more or less confident as he crept about the empty predawn streets, hurrying toward where he'd seen those scales. Black scales, NightWing. Unless there was another tribe he didn't know about with black scales, but Uhar doubted it.

He was acutely aware of his own light gray-blue scales that glowed dimly in the darkness, looking almost white. Part of him regretted not bringing one of those blankets to be more stealthy, but he was here now and there was nothing he could do about it.

He entered the alley closest to where he'd seen the scales, not seeing anyone in hiding. He swiveled his ears though with a frown as the obvious shuffling of feet reached him, though most dragons with their tiny ears might not notice. Uhar could also catch the faintest sound of dragon breath.

Uhar squinted into the darkness, "Glory?" he whispered loudly, glanging about as he tried to figure out where the hiding dragon would be. There was no response, though the faint shuffling stopped. Uhar frowned, swivveling his ears purposefully, "I know someone's in here, I can hear you breathing. I see literally no reason to be hiding in a random alley from a tiny dragon who's only looking for Glory."

He shook his head and stepped forward, closing his eyes as he tried to pick up how his words echoed across the alley. He'd been hesitant to try earlier, but this dragon certainly wanted to stay hidden, and they already knew he could hear them. Especially if they moved.

He twitched his ears and turned to the side as he finally picked up where the dragon actually was, his eyes, suited to the darkness, finally saw the black scales as the silent dragon launched himself at Uhar, talons bared for an attack.

Uhar blinked and stepped to the side clumsily, causing the attacker to hit oddly. They both fell to the ground as Uhar yelped, just before a talon covered his mouth. He struggled, but this dragon was much bigger and stronger than him. I'm going to die alone in an alleyway. Wow, I'm dumb.

The black dragon got the upper hand, finally able to pin Uhar effectively. He's pinning me though, so maybe I'll live after all?

Uhar stopped struggling and the nightwing hissed at him quietly, "tell anyone I was here tonight and I will personally roast your strange tail scale by scale."

He released Uhar and started to leave, "you could have just told me you weren't Glory." Uhar rolled his eyes, trying not to act as shaken up as he felt. "I hope to never meet you in a dark alley again."

"Agreed," the NightWing mumbled, and he was gone.

A few minutes passed and Uhar frowned at the shadows, twitching his ears as new sounds reached him, he turned toward the light, seeing nothing, "so how long were you going to wait before bursting in heroically and banishing the random backalley nightwing?"

Glory materialized with a sigh, wearing a dark grey that almost matched her surroundings, "I didn't find you until after he attacked. What are you doing out here?"

"Failing at following you," Uhar answered easily.

Glory looked at the alley with a frown, "yeah well maybe don't do that."

Uhar nodded, "yep, won't happen again."

"When I first saw you, I assumed you had more self preservation skills than Tsunami."

"Thank you."

"It wasn't a compliment."