The Silver Scales

The Silver Scales Chapter 19

The Hunting Party.

"AVALANCHE!" Mindreader's voice suddenly snapped Avalanche back to the present, looking over at her clawmate, who was standing right next to Avalanche's stone slab of a bed; as Avalanche lay on her back, staring up at the ceiling, "What?" Avalanche asked with more than a slight twinge of annoyance in her voice. "I've been trying to get your attention for 5 minutes!!" Mindreader said, concerned that something was bothering Avalanche. "Is everything ok?"

"I'm fine, just thinking," Avalanche said sternly, not enjoying being ripped from her train of thought. "What do you need?" "I was going to ask if you wanted to come hunting with me, the prey center is running low, so Webs asked for volunteers to help refill it. Though if you're too busy wrapped up in your thoughts, I might as well go alone." Mindreader said, turning to leave the cave, that she was more upset at Avalnche's brash question rather than not hunting with a dragon, which she considered a friend. 'Guess she is like the others, still disliking icewings.' Mindreader thought, leaving the cave, she paused for half a second, as if waiting for Avalanche to come out and apologize, or at least still join the hunting party that was happening.

But Avalnche never came out, having returned to her thoughts. Mindreader sighed, rolling her eyes before continuing, flying out of the academy to start hunting. Mindreader's green eyes look around the area, scanning for any signs of animals to bring to the prey center. "Hey, Mindreader!" a familiar voice called, Wavegiver. She looked to her sides, but didn't see him. "Wavegiver? Where are you?" She called. "Look up." Mindreader looked up, nearly falling out of the sky as she spotted Wavegiver, flying upside down above Mindreader. Wavegiver laughed as he slowly circled in the air until he was flying beside her. "Apologies, I didn't mean to startle you."

"Well, at least you didn't tackle me out of the sky," Mindreader said with a slight laugh, forgetting about the irritating confrontation with Avalanche. "I would have thought you would be with Webs, trying to get some fish?" Mindreader asked him, looking at the seawing male. "Yeah, but I've seen plenty and been a part of plenty of fishing and hunting trips, I was actually..." Wavegiver paused, clearing his throat slightly. "I was hoping you could teach me a bit about how nightwings hunt? From what little knowledge there is, your tribe used to use a rather.... Shall we say disgusting methods when living on that volcano?"

Mindreader shuddered. "Don't remind me, I'm glad I was hatched after that era, but yeah, I can show you how I was taught to hunt, if you are sure you can keep up!" Mindreader suddenly put on a boost of speed, soaring up into the sky, hearing the laughter of Wavgiver from beneath her. Soon she leveled out, circling in the air and looking down at the ground. "Normally Nightwings hunt better in the dark, allowing our black scales to keep us unseen for as long as possible," Mindreader said once the Wave giver joined her. "But in the day, we often fly higher to look like eagles or falcons, of course, at first it was troublesome to try and spot them from so high. But you get used to it, and your eyes will adapt to it eventually with time."

Wavegiver gave a slow nod, listening carefully to her words as they flew around the Jade Mountain Academy. He was an adept hunter himself, familiar with most hunting methods, so the reason he gave wasn't why he decided to hunt with Mindreader. "And, what did you just dive down? Won't the prey see or hear you before you get to them?" He asked, hoping to keep the conversation going. He wasn't sure why, but he rather enjoyed spending time with Mindreader; she was nice, sweet, and easy to talk to.

"Sometimes, but if you move fast enough, they often don't have time to move before you reach them," Mindreader said, spotting a fox behind a small rock. "See that fox down there?" She asked, pointing a claw at it. "Uh.... no?" Wavegiver said, his eyesight more attuned to the dim water of the sea than hunting from so far away. "That's going to be your-" Wavegiver looked back to where Mindreader had just been flying, only to find she was already diving down to snag the unfortunate fox. The black-and-purple blur that was Mindreader diving down much farther than Wavegiver had expected 'Maybe there are some things to learn from Mindreader's hunting than I first thought.' Wavegiver thinks silently. His head tilted as he thought he spotted.... 'Oh no...' Mindreader was too far away to hear his thoughts, so Wavegiver immediately fell into a dive, hoping to catch up with Mindreader.

Mindreader's wings were tucked into her sides tightly, stopping as much drag as possible. This diving technique did not come without risks; if she mis-timed or mis-calculated the speed, time, and necessary need to pull up, she could end up with a rather-

CRACK! A searing pain ripped through her left wing as she clipped the edge of a cliff that was jutting out of a mountain she hadn't seen, breaking her wing instantly. Crying out in pain as her smooth dive turned into a pained spiral, unable to stop or even slow down her descent now. Her eyes filled with fear as the mountain cliff where she spotted the fox was rapidly approaching her with what would be a rather painful landing.

Wavegiver was trying to get down to her as quickly as possible. Mindreader had one of her wings spread to try and brace her fall, but it wasn't doing much. She had been moving too fast already. Wavegiver just had to hope that he could reach her before she crashed and was injured even worse than she was now.

It was extremely close, but Wavetiver just barely got to Mindreader before the point of no return, where pulling up wasn't an option. "I got you!" Wrapping his arms around her, his body surging with adrenaline, Wavegiver pulled up as hard as he could, flapping his wings to try and get them away from the face of the mountain. Wavegiver ended up smashing his tail into the hill, but was otherwise unharmed. "That was close." Wavegiver breathed, ignoring the throbbing pain from his tail. "You ok?" Winter called, flying over to the two dragons. Winter, after spending a considerable amount of time building his scavenger sanctuary with Lynx, had taken on a teaching position focused on scavengers, their behavior, and patterns. Not to allow dragons an easier time to hunt and kill them, but rather to soundly avoid them and let the two species live in peace. By a stroke of luck, Winter had even found Bandit again while building the sanctuary.

"I clipped my wing, I think it's broken," Mindreader grunted, unable to move her wing at all. "Take her to the healers' wing, and then make sure you get your tail checked out," Winter said, gesturing at the trail of blood dripping down Wavegiver's tail

Wavegiver nodded, rushing back towards Jade Mountain Academy. "You ok? Other than the wing, I mean?" Wavegiver said, tightening his arms around Mindreader to make sure not to drop her by mistake. "Yeah, I think so, Moons, this hurts...." Mindreader grunted, clutching the socket of her wing to try and alleviate the pain, only to hiss as the ginger touch caused another jolt to shoot through her. "Thank you... If you hadn't managed to get me..." Mindreader fell silent, not wanting to imagine what might have become of her if she had crashed at such a speed into the mountain.

"Don't mention it, I'm just glad you aren't more hurt," Wavegiver said, trying not to think of how it would have ended either. "Let's get you patched up, shall we? Then maybe you can teach me all about Nightwing's better vision." Wavegiver said teasingly, hoping to lighten the mood.

Mindreader chuckled slightly. "Yeah, yeah, you aren't gonna let that go, are you?" Mindreaker asked. "Nope." Wavegiver laughed, gently placing Mindreader on the entrance to Tsunami's classroom, the closest one to the healer's wing, before landing beside her, both dragons silently heading to the healer's wing, hoping to get patched up without any significant injuries they hadn't yet noticed.

A few hours later, the two sat in the library, looking over scrolls about the hunting methods the other tribes use and have used in the past. Mindreader's wing was wrapped in simple but strong leaves and placed in a sling to keep it set. Wavegiver's tail wrapped in the same bandages. With neither of them having received any other serious injuries. "Hey, look at this, according to some older scrolls, Grandeur had written that they used to use their venom for much more than protection. They would use them like dragons would use fire, spraying it in the path of an animal to corral them into an ambush." Wavegiver said, sliding the scroll over to Mindreader. "Interesting, though I suppose they only corral sloths now." Mindreader giggled.