Freezing Wings

Chapter 7

[The next two chapters are dark so if you don't like that you have been warned. It goes back to normal in chapter 9 though]

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I felt a grogginess cover my figure as I woke up, a rumble jarring me awake. 

My mind was roused from the fog of drugs and I sat up, rubbing my face. I was greeted with a cramped cage around me, the murmur of dragons echoing down from the other end of the hall. 

I looked around, taking in the empty cages, the unhatched eggs, the fluorescent lights, the concrete floor. The first thing I registered was how cold it was. It had been cold for as long as I'd been there, but it seemed to bite even more than normal as I sat there, staring into empty space.

I was back in my tiny cage, deep underground, covered in white light that hurt my eyes, and standing on glass that made my claws tingle when they scrapped my floor

As I mulled over the happenings of the past day I couldn't help but feel disappointed in myself. I had been inches away from freedom, and I had failed. 

I looked down at my claws. They had left a mark on the door. I knew it. I had seen it right before I had passed out.

The memory of the blue sky, and of the blinding sunlight taunted me, and I didn't realize when I had started to cry.

Everything I ever needed to escape had been handed to me, through pure chance. Now, years later, I can see that it wasn't my fault, but at that moment all I could think of was my failure. It stuck to my mind, and my train of thought kept circling around back to it, as a pair of tears dripped onto the back of my hand.

The floor was a mirror, and I could see my reflection. The dragon looking back at me looked ...sad. Her scales were dull and seemed to go from ink black to steel gray in a matter of seconds. Her horns weren't as sharp as before, and her claws seemed blunted. Her yellow eyes had reddened and were filled with tears, her face twisted into an ugly expression. 

I grimaced, sniffling as my vision blurred. As I contemplated over and over again, I couldn't help but get angry. My hands clenched and claws lengthened, biting into my palm and drawing blood from the small scales. I barely noticed.

My jaw clenched, my hands trembling. I was so close, so close to my freedom. A moment later there was the sound of glass shattering as I broke the floor of my cage, revealing the metal base underneath it.

The sound of cracking glass split the almost silent hall, and all that I could hear was the beating of my own heart as small shards of glass bit into the palm of my hand. I shook them off as I curled up in the corner as far as I could, my wing hiding me from prying eyes and cutting off my line of sight so that I could not see my own face. 

There was a bitter taste in my mouth as I closed my eyes and cut myself off from the rest of the world, hiding. 

*

I cried while writing this chapter and I hope it was worth it, though it was a bit of a tear-jerker for me. 

-the author