Raised of Fire (a WOF story)

Chapter 1: Dawn and Amaranth

"Why do you have to go Mother?" Amaranth said. Her wings dropped down, almost as if she was wilting.

"The Queen and I made a deal. I must fight in the war for her. The SkyWings need more dragons, or we could loose the war." her mother, Dawn, replied while gazing distantly towards the horizon.

The sunlight was glimmering as it stretched its rays over the silhouettes of the distant mountains. The morning sky was brightening; the start of a new day.

They stood outside of their cave. Amaranth felt her gaze drifting back towards the familiar environment.

The cave that the red dragonet's mother had made into their home was small and sparsely decorated. Amaranth loved it, however. She felt as if it was a palace on its own--as long as she could share it with her mother.

Clacking her claws against the gray stone outside their home, Dawn met her daughter's gaze. "I need you to stay with Glide. I need you to listen to her."

Amaranth nodded sadly. She looked up at Dawn. "When do we get to be together again?" Her voice was innocent. Naïve. She had no idea what the war was like; she only knew that her mother was going to participate.

"When you're four, I'll make sure to be back on your hatching day." her mother replied. To any older dragon, it was obvious that she was masking her sorrow with hopeful replies and empty promises.

Amaranth smiled, satisfied. The only problem was that she didn't like Glide. The lazy, pale orange smoke-breather would hardly lift a claw all day, and she commonly made the dragonet do chores. She prided herself on not having to fight, even though having a lame leg was not something to be proud of. Glide commonly acted as though she thought she was going to be queen. Amaranth constantly wanted to smack her over the head with her tail.

With a small droop to her wings, she walked with her mother back into the cave. Her tail flicked across the gray floor.

The main room branched off to two other rooms; hers and Dawn's. They were relatively small, but she didn't need that much space. Amaranth had decorated her room with attempted sculptures and paintings that would hardly rival teaching a cow to do art. She, however, was proud of them.

Her mother had taught her to paint. The dragonet recalled what Dawn said to her. It was apparently something that she had always loved, and she figured Amaranth would too.

Dawn had been right. Her daughter had loved painting and sculpting, though she clearly lacked talent because of her age. Amaranth loved her mother's art classes; she bonded with her so much.

Glide glanced up from a scroll she was reading on the couch. It was carved from granite with soft goat hide cushions. The dragoness who shared their home treated it like her throne.

Amaranth snorted at her and looked away. She was aware of the angry yellow eyes boring into her scales. Still unhappy about having to stay with Glide, she whisked away into her mother's room.

She looked back to see Dawn give Glide an apologetic glance, then whisper something to her. Glide nodded and looked at Amaranth. Her eyes held a smirk, as if she knew something the dragonet didn't know and was going to make it obvious but refuse to tell her.

Amaranth puffed a whisp of smoke and vanished into her mother's room. It was probably the most beautiful of the rooms in the house: she had decorated it with ornate paintings of dragons she knew (several of them sporting Amaranth or her husband as the subject) or of beautiful landscapes. They all neatly lined the walls. On a few stone shelves Dawn had placed some small sculptures of dragon eggs and other dragons. They were all carved from clay and stone.