Conquest : A Wings of Fire Fanfiction

12. Stories

'Hurry!' hissed Sandstorm viciously.

Narrowing her eyes against the raging wind, she ploughed on valiantly, ignoring the whining of her friends behind her.

More accurately, Ivory's whining.

'I don't understand why we have to be out here,' she moaned. 'I could be curled up in a comfortable cave right now. Or I could be back at Jade Mountain Academy. Or back at the palace, in my own room, on my own bed.'

'Then go!'

Surprisingly, it wasn't Sandstorm who'd snapped at the princess. In fact, it was Hyacinth, who was glaring at her. 'No one's asking you to stay!' 

Stunned, Ivory looked at him. Usually, Hyacinth was nice and friendly and easy-going, kind of the polar opposite of Ivory and Sandstorm. But apparently the high tension had frayed even his nerves.

'I -' she began, but was shunted aside by the MudWing dragonet, who promptly sped up and bypassed a confused Sandstorm. Normally it would be her acting like that. She wasn't sure she liked someone else stealing her role.

Ivory regained her senses.

And her memory, judging by her rejuvenated shouts.

'Do you know who my mother is?' she yelled at Hyacinth's back. 'The queen of the IceWings! The queen! Queen Snowfall! You don't know how much power she has, you impertinent little -'

'Can everybody please stop fighting?' interrupted Mysticdream, sufficiently cutting off Ivory's furious rant.

'Exactly!' supplied Sunbeam, who'd been either sighing or rolling his eyes during the entire time they'd been in the air.

The dragonets and Moon had been flying for several hours. They'd left the Aureate Hollow and had been following the Mutineers' trail ever since it coincided with their own, which was headed for Jade Mountain Academy.

Sandstorm kept looking nervously behind her for any sign if the Mutineers. Now they knew they had somebody following them, it seemed right in their characters to set up a trap and ambush the dragons tailing them to make sure they wouldn't be a threat later. 

'I keep thinking what Hibiscus might be up to now,' said Moon softly, looking sideways at Sandstorm. Sandstorm nodded wordlessly. 'She hasn't changed much,' added her mother, who'd apparently read Sandstorm's mind. 

Sandstorm made a mental note to put on her skyfire again. 

She'd removed it and given it to Maelstrom back in the cave so she could share a telepathic conversation with Moon, but she'd better take it back, because Moon's frequent forays into her darkest thoughts were quite annoying (and worrying. What if her mother learnt all of Sandstorm's deepest secrets?) 

She quickly shook her head, wiping all of those thoughts away and trying hard to make her mind blank. 

Then, something Moon said struck her particularly hard. 

'You knew Hibiscus?' she asked Moon, stunned. Moon opened her mouth to deny it, then realised what she'd said and smiled ruefully. 'Yes. Yes, I did. Or I thought so.' 

'Was it on your quest to stop...' Maelstrom struggled to remember the name, and then found it, 'Darkstalker?' 'Partially,' Moon told him, 'but our quest had a double purpose - we had to stop Darkstalker and Nightmare.' 

'Oh, yeah,' said Maelstrom, nodding, 'my cousin Starfish told me about that.' 'Isn't Starfish Turtle and Kinkajou's son?' asked Sunbeam, 'I know him. He's nice.' 'And kind of boring,' added Maelstrom, 'I mean, I like reading, but all he does is read stories.'