Our Planet has Crashed [COMPLETE]

forty four - KOTLC

Marella POV:

It was dark out, the three (for some reason) moons shining bright outside.

No, wait. There were four moons now. Earth's moon was visible, faintly, in the sky. How odd.

Marella and Maruca were getting ready for bed, but a familiar clap of thunder caused them to jump up and run outside.

And they were right. Two dragon shapes, silhouetted by the moons, flew closer to Jerboa's hut, where she and Maruca waited.

"Marella! Maruca!" a voice, presumably Sophie's, cried as the dragons approached.

"Back so soon?" Marella asked. "We thought you'd be a day or two at least,"

"Sundew and her magic powers helped us," Mandrake supplied.

"You have them too," Sundew said.

"Magic powers?" Maruca asked.

"Leafspeak," Sundew corrected.

"What?" Maruca asked, evidently still confused.

"Never mind," Sundew said, shaking Fitz off her back. He tumbled off her with a startled yelp. "I'm going to check on the—my dragons." She left without another word.

"So, what happened?" Marella asked.

"Nothing much. We got a boring lecture about the Poison Jungle and found the plant. The nightshade. But then we had to find another vine because apparently it was too dangerous to bring back a sample from the breath of evil vine," Biana said. "It was very humid. My hair was ruined!"

Typical Biana. Caring about hair, of all things, while finding some poisonous plant or whatever.

"Well, we did nothing all day," Marella said, feigning a yawn. "But Vespera got bored and told us some more things."

"She did?" Sophie and Biana asked simultaneously, just as Fitz groaned from behind them and said, "Will someone help me up? I think I broke my back."

Biana barely glanced at him before saying, "No, big brother. I doubt falling off a dragon's back breaks your back,"

"Well, you've never fallen off a dragon, so you don't know how it feels!" Fitz complained as he heaved himself up.

"So, back to the more important topics," Biana said, glaring at her brother. "What did Vespera tell you?"

"Not much. But she told us this . . . story." Maruca said, exchanging a pointed look with Marella. "That I think you might want to hear," Marella finished.

"And you can't tell us yourselves?" Sophie asked, clearly not pleased with the idea of talking to Vespera.

"Well . . . I think it's better if you talk to her. You might have . . . some questions." Marella said.

"Understatement," Maruca muttered under her breath.

"Why don't we go inside, then?" Biana suggested, and the four girls used their combined weight to push the door to Jerboa's hut open.

In the darkest corner of the other side of the hut (which actually took them a few minutes to walk across to), sat Vespera's box. The group made their way to it, and Sophie raised her hand to knock (hey, it is a courtesy) but Vespera grabbed it and said, "Ah, the Moonlark. My new favourite person," It dripped with sarcasm.

Sophie yanked her hand back. "Tell us," she commanded.

"Tell you what?" Vespera asked innocently.

"What you told Marella and Maruca," Biana said firmly. "The story."

"Ah, the story. I don't want to," she said, retreating to the back of her box.