Always - Moonbli

11. Blades and Blushes

Moonwatcher

Peach took them all to an underground base beneath Hawk's Eye Mountain. 

Moon still didn't know what to make of their new friend. Thankfully he'd changed his scale color to a way more subtle pinkish-orange (and that had helped a lot because they could look at him without getting blinded) but there was still the problem of his excessive jewelry and fruit decoration.

Either he picked out his outfit himself, in pitch-black darkness, spinning around and half-asleep, or he just had really bad taste in gold. Several rings were fastened onto his ivory-tipped talons, and around his forearms were silver armbands. Thin gold lockets hung from his neck and in each ear glimmered three ruby, emerald and sapphire earrings.

Peach said that he joined the Talons of Peace because he was bored of life in the rainforest and besides, he had an obsession with sparkly things (he thought he was the only one. Clearly he hadn't heard of Chameleon). The RainWing had also done some odd jobs here and there, mostly in inter-tribal towns like Possibility and once in the Scorpion Den (he said he was mentally scarred by the inhabitants. It was probably vice-versa).

'I was looking for fruit when I saw your signal,' he explained, leading them down a dark, musty tunnel lit by the occasional torch. 'This is one of the most frequently used hideouts for the Talons of Peace. We used to stick around here whenever we were on missions involving SkyWings or the Dragonets of Destiny, because the Sky Kingdom and the Dragonets' old home is somewhere around here.

'We don't use this place anymore, but I took over when everyone left, so this is kind of my house. When the Talons come around here, they stay for a week at max and then leave, but I'm fine with it. I'm used to being lonely.'

They emerged into the base and Moon's jaw dropped.

She had no idea how this was his house.

It was large and quite spacious - the main room was slightly smaller than the Jade Mountain Academy Great Hall. That could fit four hundred dragons; this one averaged three hundred or more. It had a soft golden glow and the stone floor was completely covered by a thick, exquisite red carpet. Beautiful tapestries and paintings hung on the walls and so did torches in ornamental black sconces.

An intricate chandelier was suspended from the domed ceiling above them. At the far end of the hall was an upraised platform - a stage, maybe. Throughout the room were comfy, petite couches around willowy wooden tables with a scented candle on each.

'Woah,' whispered Qibli, his dark eyes the size of saucers. 'Meh. I've seen better,' sniffed Winter haughtily, but even his piercing blue gaze was fixed on some of the more rich tapestries and hangings. 'You live here?' asked Nightfrost skeptically. 

'Why, obviously not!' said Peach brightly, apparently missing the veiled insult in her sentence. 'This is the meeting hall. My house is over there.' He jerked his head in the direction of a simple birch door next to the stage. 

The RainWing led them over to it and pushed the door open.

Moon's jaws seemed to be in permanent open mode.

Yep, this was definitely his house.

It seemed to be too bright yet too dull at the same time, in stark contrast to the elegantly furnished meeting hall, but it felt homely and inhabited, unlike the cold, abandoned feeling outside. 

The stone walls were covered in artwork and designs he probably did himself, like graffiti. In the center of the room was a fluffy yellow rug. Glowing white and yellow balls of fire like the ones in the hallways of Jade Mountain Academy were floating in the four corners of the room and on the central oak table. Little doorways led off from the main room to the others.