Wings of Fire: Missed | The Turning Tides #1

Epilogue

Pale looked to the grey sky above, watching as snowflakes begun to fall.

One fell on the tip of his nose and he gazed at it for a moment, admiring the slight edges and differences that separated it from the other snowflakes.

One of a kind, as he always heard. Every snowflake was different.

Then he shook it away, resuming his work.

The adult ranking wall stared back at him and the list of names only called him closer, hoping for it to be their name that he moved. But no, he wasn't moving any names, only scratching on names. One in particular.

Frost.

Still he couldn't believe that Frost was apart of the Talons of Power. It explained his absence at least, from his disappearance and then reappearance on the opposite sides of the battlefield.

"I owe North everything! He saved my life!" Frost said.

"How can you? We were like brothers, Frost!" Pale said to him.

"I'm sorry, Pale, but I have my orders."

Frost had to surrender after Pale had him pinned on the sand - as painful as it was to do even that.

Frost had to be brought back to face justice and for a punishment to be declared upon him by Queen Mist.

Pale never saw Frost again but that was the least of his problems now.

He eyed Frost's name as last in the rankings wall and then turned away, strolling towards the courtyard.

It wasn't just his imagination that the kingdom was quieter than usual. At first, it was glaringly obvious that the icewings paid their respects to the fallen queen, Blizzard, but that a month ago and the kingdom had only grown quieter.

Pale had no idea why but all he could do was keep going.

The courtyard was almost empty when Pale stepped into it. He glanced at all the sides, hoping that an icewing was merely reading a scroll or chatting to another but the only icewing was Queen Mist with a floating moonglobe above her shoulder.

Queen Mist focused her attention on the statue of an icewing that she had carved and finished only a week ago. The statue was tribute to Blizzard, Pale was sure about that. He always knew Mist had a soft interior in contrast to the tough and rough exterior she presented.

Pale used to have a crush on her when they were dragonets but marriages and relationships were always set by the parents or the higher ranking icewings, so he focused on his ranking instead.

He wanted to make his way to the palace library to read and recite scrolls but Queen Mist looked too lonely and too sombre that it was something he couldn't ignore.

If he was lonely, then of course he'd want another dragon to be there for him.

Pale approached her. "Your majesty," he said. Mist offered a quiet glance but then continued to look at the statue. "Quite a grey day, is it not?"

Queen Mist looked up the sky. "Yes, it is." She said and nothing more.

"Is something the matter?" He asked.

She sighed, rubbing her forehead. "She never got to see the statue."

"It is a magnificent statue. I'm sure she would've loved it. In fact, I'm sure her spirit is still here, smiling at you and the statue."

"If only that was true."

"I think it's very true. Everyday our ancestors look upon us and smile at our marvel." he waved to the sky, briefly imagining spirals of icewing heads. "They smile at all of us."