Wings of Fire: Dragonbite

Prologue

Four years ago . . .

The small Sandwing looked out her window at the moons, two of them almost full, the third just a sliver in the deep indigo sky. The first stars had come out, and all she wanted to do was fly. She stretched out a narrow clawed hand, reaching for the stars as if she could scrape them off of the canvas of space. 

"Uncle, why can't I go flying with the battalion?" 

The older Sandwing barely looked up from his neat pile of scrolls, etching words onto the corner of a map and sighing. His voice was raspy and whistled when he spoke, air escaping through a half healed wound in his neck. "You're too young, Topaz." 

She turned away from the window and stretched, arching her back, "That's what you always say." A sly glint appeared in her eye. "When will I be ready?"

"When I say so." He lifted his eyes to meet hers, obsidian meeting jet for a brief staring contest. She looked away first, going back to the window to look at the cold stars and frigid moons. "Your father told me to keep you safe while he was . . . away. I'll not break a promise to my brother, even if he did choose the wrong side of the moons blasted war."

It had been a shock to everyone when her father, Slate, had chosen to fight for Blaze. A shock to everyone but Topaz, that is. He'd told her many times about how cruel Burn could be, and that Burn was the reason her mother died. She would have been shocked if he'd stayed. 

Her Uncle Boulder, a long-term general in Burn's army, had taken it the hardest, raging for days and taking out his anger on his soldiers, though never even yelling at Topaz. She was his favorite niece. He'd gotten better now, but made it his goal to be the best general Queen Burn had. Loyalty meant a lot to him. It meant more than blood. 

***

Something warm splattered across her scales, startling her awake. The torch had gone out, leaving the room lit only by starlight, the moons hidden by thin clouds. "Uncle?" There was a smell like metal and brimstone coating the air, her nose, her mouth. Something shifted in the darkness and she turned, half expecting to see Boulder. There was nothing there. Nothing at all. Except . . .

A dark shadow hunched at the desk, completely still. She stepped closer, scales shivering uncontrollably. "Uncle?" No words, no hissing breath. Topaz placed her hand on his shoulder, hoping beyond hope that he was alive. 

Instead, cold scales met her palm, sticky with what she knew was blood. A long thin knife with a hilt wrapped in snakeskin protruded from his back. She knew what this meant, and then, finally, she became scared.  Dragonbite had been here.

And he never left any witnesses.