Eternal Fire

Chapter 10

Ember, unsurprisingly, lost her fight against Midnight. She didn't lose, she was thrashed, beaten until she was sure that she would be bruised for the next two months or so, but neither Midnight nor Shade would know, because her scales would cover the bruises. She walked, stiffly, back to the tunnel into the mountain, Midnight and Shade in front of her. The bottom of her tail just didn't scrape against the floor, her head hung a little lower than usual, her energy drained to nearly nothing, and an afternoon left before she could sleep, however, her dreams left her tired, angry, afraid, sad and vulnerable, only to go and do another day of training. 

They entered the room where Ember was taught the academic side of things, Midnight in the front, Ember bringing up the rear. Ember plonked herself down on the ground behind the slab of stone, the ground shaking a little. Midnight watched her sit down, his head slightly cocked. Midnight straightened his head again, as though he had remembered something. Ember watched him whisper something to Shade. Shade walked out of the room. "We will wait for Shade to return before we begin." Midnight said. Ember nodded her head slightly. They waited in silence until Shade returned, carrying a bowl with a handle in her mouth. Midnight motioned for it to be placed in front of Ember, whose head was lying on the table. "Thank you Shade. Ember, drink." Ember looked at the liquid in the bowl, it was dark red and thin.

"What is it?" Ember murmured. 

"It will help you." Midnight said. "Now drink. Trust me."

Ember looked at the bowl and decided to drink it by herself was less embarrassing than to be forced to drink, it would be better to just drink it. She started drinking, it tasted a bit of ash, and was nearly too hot to drink, but she drank it anyway. Once she had finished, she felt like she had more energy than before, which made her happy. "Thank you." She said.

"Ok the lesson. We have done how the world was made, so now we are going to learn the geography of the land."  Midnight said, Ember nodded. "So, we are going to draw a map of this continent, I will draw on the board and you can copy it down." Midnight turned to the big white piece of rock, it wasn't there last time, its surface was shiny and smooth, at least that was how it looked anyway. Midnight placed his claw in a stone bowl full of black ink and closed his eyes. A few seconds later he opened them and began to draw. Ember waited a minute before copying it down on a thin slab. 

They finished drawing, with a couple of stops for Midnight to check Ember's map and his own, for the rest of the afternoon. By the time Midnight had finished the map he was drawing, the sun had set, they knew as Shade had gone out to hunt towards the end. The map had lines running across it, showing where the different territories ended and started. The area in the middle was the largest, Earth territory, but in the middle there was a very small area that Midnight had labeled as 'Rainbow' and he had drawn a dot in the center, which he had labeled 'Tree of Life' to the north there was the ice territory, the beaches, as Midnight had labeled was known as water dragon territory. In the southern part of the continent there was the fire dragon territory, and it ran along the east cost of the continent. Ember copied the map to the best of her ability. 

"You can probably think about which dragons live where, tomorrow we will add land marks and mountain ranges. Now though, we will do the amazing thing called eating!" Ember smiled; her activities had made her hungrier quicker. Shade pulled the big deer in, its antlers ginormous. "Shade will eat first, then you, then me." Midnight said. Shade shook her head, Midnight just looked at her until Shade started eating. Shade ate quickly and when she had finished, two and a half legs had been eaten. Midnight turned towards Ember. "Eat your fill." He said and sat down.

   Ember approached the stag, wondering where to start. She ended up going for the rest of the leg that Shade had started. She then moved onto the neck. She ate until she was full, and the deer had one leg left to eat and the body, she had eaten half a leg and some of the neck. She sat and watched Midnight eat, he ate efficiently but carefully, with the manners that Ember didn't really have. He ate the remaining leg and the rest of the neck. He licked the end of his nose which his tongue, some blood had gotten on it.