Little Small Horns

The Mud Kingdom

"Hippo! Get your sister away from the lagoon!" Acacia yelled as Stem, the smallest dragonet ran to splash in the water.
"On it mom!" Hippo called back, "Stem! Get back here!" He said running at her.
"But the mud is only dirt now! It hasn't rained in six days!!" She said, falling back dramatically.
"You'll survive." Acacia called to her, "If you want to go back to the Mud Kingdom we can."
"Why don't we just live there?" Stem muttered under her breath.
She scurried over to her mother, and realized that Dirt was waiting too. Dirt was the pet pig her mother had let her keep when she was only one year old. She had refused to eat the poor, sad creature.
Dirt scrambled towards her hiding a smug face. She could understand his expressions well, even for the pig who rarely move his feature around. Dirt was by her now, jumping on his back legs, waiting for her to pick him up.
She used to worry that mother or Hippo would eat poor Dirt while Stem was sleeping, but that never happened. Birch was, happily, vegetarian, so Stem never worried about what she'd do.
Stem tumbled over towards the Mud Kingdom, without a word to her mother. They followed. "Mother, where's father?"
Acacia stopped in thought. Then, after a moment, said "He was heading to get you guys enrolled in the new school."
Hippo and Birch chanted, but Stem just groaned. "A new school?" Stem complained, "Can't you and father just teach us?"
"No, Stem we talked about this." She groaned back, "We're very busy dragons, we can't teach three dragonets."
"Then teach only me," Stem jumped happily at the thought, "it'll be fun!" But mother only shook her head.
"Okay, okay, fine." Stem announced, "But can we visit first, so I don't get lost?"
Mother didn't speak. "Does that mean yes?" Stem thought anxiously. Still no answer. "Well, does it?"
"I suppose we could take a look around first" Stem wasn't glad that she'd have to go to school, but she was excited to meet the dragons that she would be living with for a while.
   "When can we go?" Stem asked, "Soon? Tomorrow? Later? Now?"
   "Geez, calm down, weren't you just complaining about the school like five seconds ago?" Birch asked, obviously annoyed.
   "For real, just stop, PLEASE!" Hippo nearly yelled.
   "All of you calm down!" Acacia said, making Stem jump. "You two go back to the cave," she said pointing at the two bigger dragonets. "I'm bringing Stem to look around the school. We'll be back before sundown." She promised
   Stem jumped up and down with joy, to the school now? She thought. She watched her siblings fly off toward the caves behind them, the school is in Jade Mountain, the school is caves. Maybe it would be easy to leave home for a while. Maybe.