Heart of Fire

Chapter 6:

Emberice had eventually fallen asleep, although it was hard to. The next day, she was woken up by something hitting her in the face, and she opened her eys to see a SkyWing guard stomp in, and yank the muzzle off. "Ow!" "You gonna eat?" the guard growled. "Yes." Emberice dug into the pig that the guard had brought, and once she was done, the guard stuck the muzzle back on her. The guard left, and came back several minutes later and yanked her out of the cell, dragging her to the arena entrance and unshackling her talons. He dragged her out, and unclamped her neck, but left her muzzle on as the annoucer flew into the arena.

"Fellow Dragons! Loyal SkyWings, Visiting MudWings, and Honered SandWing guests! We have a full slate of thrilling battles today, but first, let me welcome our ally, Queen Burn of the SandWings!" Burn and Scarlet sat on the queen's balcony, and Emberice clawed at the guard who was holding the chain on her muzzle. "Starting off today, we have Emberice of the IceWings! As for her opponent... we have a very... dramatic fellow that we'd like you to meet, IceWing." The guards were wrestling with a fighting, hulking mass of pale orange scales in the sky. They dropped the dragon into the arena sand with a thud, and Emberice's guard yanked off the muzzle.

"You all may remember an... affair, which involved a SkyWing and a SandWing several years back. They had one egg, from which came a disgrace to our tribes. Our Queen allowed the dragonet to live, but killed the parents, and kept the dragonet in the dungeons until he tried to escape when he was seven years old. He killed several of our guards, and tried to kill Her Majesty, but the guards stopped him and put him in the arena. Her Majesty ordered the guards to not feed him or give him any water as punishment. Dehydrated, starving, mentally unstable, and ready to fight at last. I give you Heatwave of the SkyWings and SandWings! Claws up, Teeth ready! FIGHT!"

The announcer flew out of the arena, and Heatwave shot towards Emberice and scraped his talons on her left shoulder, which made her mad. Emberice growled, and the cracks in her scales started to glow, and she sliced her talons across Heatwave's chest, shoulders, and sides, causing him to bellow in agony, thrashing around. The hybrid's eyes were black pools of rage and pain. He leaped at Emberice, who ripped her talons through his underbelly, then ran away from him, as Heatwave's screams echoed in the arena. The hybrid ran towards her with his talons outstretched, and she burned them , as the hybrid yanked them away, and started beating his talons in the sand, still screaming.

"Emberice and Heatwave, we don't have all day. Some of us have kingdoms to run." Scarlet said, sounding bored. Heatwave rushed toward her with a snarl, and Emberice let her firescales die down, then gripped his tail and stabbed it into the SandWing hybrid's stomach, dark red blood pouring out of the wound, with Heatwave howling even louder, and then as he stopped, the hybrid's eyes became clearer, like he was realizing something. "I'm sorry for h-hurting you, little IceWing. You have scales of fire, which no one can compete with. Use them well, little spark of fire. Use them well." then Heatwave went limp and fell into Emberice's chest, his black eyes staring, and his mouth open.

'...Little spark of fire... Dominus... Sheer... Spark of fire... hybrid.... firescales... Use them well... Scales of fire... Spark of fire...' Emberice snarled, and jumped toward the queen, her firescales blazing. "You... You arrogant barbaric son of a druken, gluttonous, flying seal!" she screamed. "I should kill you right now!" " Oh, really, little IceWing. I'm barbaric? What about your arrogant tribe?" "Shut up, SkyWing!" Emberice screamed, her firescales burning so hot she felt like she was going to explode. "I don't take orders from puny little dragonets like you." Emberice could feel the chains on her wings melting from the intense heat in her scales.

Then with a sizzling sound, the chains melted completely, molten metal dripping off of her wings, allowing her to free her wings, and she stepped towards the queen. "A firescales IceWing? You must be kidding." Burn hissed, stepping towards Emberice, who flicked her tail towards Burn with a hiss. Emberice leaped off the balcony with a growl, and swooped down, stomping on the neck clamp and the muzzle, which lay discared on the ground, melting them into piles of burning goop. She slashed her talons at the guard, who was standing nearby, and roared in anger. Her firescales died down, and she leaped into the air, picking up Heatwave's limp body and flying out of the arena, with the prisoners cheering her on as she did. None of the dragons in the stands tried to stop her as she flew away.