A Guide To The Dragon World

But Who Shall Wear The Crown? Part 1

A firsthand account of the Mud Wing succession crisis.

By Prince Sawgrass of the Mud Wings.

There were five of us, to begin with.

Three brothers, two sisters, which should have been enough.

Egret was out bigwings  and destined to be the next queen of the Mud Wings. Royal eggs are not treated like regular Mud Wing eggs. We were not just left to hatch in the marsh on our own. We did not have to fend for ourselves, just five siblings against the world.

Instead, we hatched in the warm underbelly of the Mud Wing palace, inside the mud walls of the Royal Hatchery. My first memory is Egret's claws peeling back the shell of my egg and tugging me into the chirping, whispering world. She was not that much bigger than I was, but her bigwings instincts were powerful.

The only light came from an orange sunset glowing through a hole that looked out over the lake, but it as still brighter than I'd ever known, and I blinked and blinked, wishing I could burrow back into the darkness and safety of my shell.

Three enormous dragons sat by the doorway, watching us. They did not move as Egret freed her siblings, one by one, and we kicked off the last glommy bits of egg-shell. They did whisper to one another, but we didn't  understand what they were saying. We certainly didn't know that the biggest one was out mother, Anhinga, the Mud Wing queen. That wouldn't have meant anything to us.

We only cared about Egret's talons, Egret's warm, brown eyes, Egret's strong snout nudging us all closer together. We huddled as she scooped out a nest in the mud where we could all curl up safely. We ate the worms she found for us and fell asleep, exhausted from the hatching.

A normal Mud Wing sib group would hatch near a village and soon find their way to the older dragons nearby. Most villages have a schtick where young dragonets can learn the Mud Wing language, although many pick up the words and ways of Mud Wing life by following an older group around. In the palace, however, education and training begin early, and the ritual of our choosing our names happen before the next full moon.

Copperhead, the smallest of us, sharp and quick. Possum, quiet and cuddly and unaccountably sad most of the time. Bayou, the other sister, the backup heir, Egret, the next queen.

And me, Sawgrass, the brother who worried,

I worried about whether there would be enough worms and roots and grubs for us all to eat. I worried about the tall dragons who poked their heads in to stare at us night and day - what did they want? Who were they? Why did they keep taking our bigwings away and bringing her back and taking her away again? I was worried about wrapping my mouth around the language of dragons and I worried about the weird yowling sounds of the birds on the lake and I worried about the sin going away and the strangeness if the dark and the noises of the insects and wether the sun would ever cine back and then, when it did, I worried about how long we would have before it abandoned us again,

So, as you can imagine, when I was taught about hoe succession worked in a royal family, I worried about that a lot.

And, as you can perhaps also imagine, my siblings did not take my worrying very seriously.

"But this can't be right" I said to my tutor for the hundredth time. "Egret has to defeat our own mother in battle to become queen? She has to... has to actually... with her own..."

"Yes," He said impatiently "Princess Egret will have to kill Queen Anhinga at some point, when it is her turn to be queen."

"Unless Anhinga wins" I said, and possum frowned at me across the classroom.

"Then we'll know Egret wasn't ready," Said our tutor "and Princess Bayou will become the heir instead."

I had nightmares about this for years, if you're wondering, And I think Bayou did, too, although she wouldn't admit it. She was not interested in being queen, to put it mildly. She liked having a bigwings; she would never want to be one.

"Why would Anhinga leave Egret and Bayou alive?" I asked our tutor on a different day. "If she knows one of them might - I mean, probably will kill her one day? Isn't she scared of them?" 

He looked at me as though I'd just sneezed bullfrog guts out my nose. "The queen is not scared of her own dragonets," He added with polite revulsion "She knows that heirs are necessary for a safe and well-ordered tribe. And" He added as an afterthought "She has no sisters or nieces to take over if something should happen to her. Her hatching contained only two brothers, both of whom died in skirmishes with Sky Wings before having any offspring of their own." He flicked his tail at Egret and Bayou, who were playing a building game with twigs. "Those two are all we've got."

So, as you see, that was part of the problem right there. A new thing for me to worry about. The safety the of the entire tribe was a lot to rest on the narrow shoulders of two little dragonets. 

Still, we should have been all right. Even though mother had no more eggs. Even though Bayou grew more nervous, not less, as she got older. But Egret was patient, thoughtful, wise. She waited a long time before challenging Anhinga for the throne, when the queen was old and easy to defeat.

Anhinga was not particularly affectionate to any of us - that would be weird in a Mud Wing family. Copperhead, Possum, Bayou, Egret and I took care of one another. We were not very sad to say good-bye to Anhinga; we were proud of out bigwings, and the new queen Egret.

I sought her out after the day she one. She was on a large rock by the lake with the royal artists, modelling her crown for a new royal portrait.

"Time to go find a match!" I said, trying to sound cheerful and casual and not at all frantic with nerves "Better have some dragonets soon, right-o?"

(Yes, I know. I sound quite ridiculous when I'm freaking out.)

Egret rolled her eyes at me. "I've been queen for ONE DAY," She said wit ha laugh "There's plenty of time for dragonets, you flappity tadpole."

"Yes" I said "But you know, still a good idea, might as well get started, very sensible, yes."