Lotus

Chapter 13

By the time I had finally collected my thoughts again, Gemini and I entered the Prey Center together, and we looked around for the rest of our winglet. We didn't see any of them in the throng of dragons in there. Gemini then pointed up at the sky through the open ceiling. "I think they're with the hunting party Sulfur was taking out today. They mentioned something about doing that." I squinted, and sure enough, I could see Sienna and several others flying away from the school, following the larger SandWing.

"Oh," I said, not entirely sure how to respond to that.

"I think we could catch up to them, if we started right now."

I scrunched my snout a little at that. As with most RainWings, I wasn't a big fan of killing and eating other animals. "No, I think I'll stay here. You can go join them, if you want, though."

Gemini opened his mouth to respond, but his eyes flicked to something on the other side of the cave. I followed his glance and saw Cassiopeia, who I was pretty sure was in the Copper winglet, talking to Halcyon, from the Obsidian winglet.

"What is my sister up to?" Gemini said.

"Sister?" I echoed. Why did it seem like everyone in my winglet had siblings that I didn't know about that went to this school?  First Kosan, then Sienna (whose brother I had been introduced to a couple days ago), and now Gemini. It was getting hard to keep track of them all.

"Yeah," Gemini said as he looked back at me, a vague look of surprise on his face. "You haven't met yet, have you? I need to introduce her to you."

We moved over to where the two were talking. We were still a good distance away when three other IceWings came up to them, forming a small circle around them as they had to me before. As we got closer, we heard their conversation.

"Found yourself a new little...friend...have you?" It was Beryl who spoke. He was the smallest of the other IceWings, but he had the biggest personality out of the four of them. No one really seemed to be able to quite stand up to him, at least for very long.

Halcyon glared back at him, but it wavered a bit. "What does it matter to you?"

"She's a SkyWing, obviously! Can't you tell?" Solstice said blatantly. She then looked at the two other IceWings with her, a big grin on her face, as if she was asking if she said the right thing. They looked at her with a little disbelief that she had just said that.

"Tone it down a bit, Solstice," Beryl said. Solstice's smile disappeared quickly and she looked away. Beryl shook his head, then continued. "Yes, as she said, that's a SkyWing you're talking to there. You should know better than to associate with dragons other than IceWings."

Cassiopeia looked rather hurt at this, and she slouched down a little, as if she could somehow sink into the ground beneath her and disappear.

A furious look came across Halcyon's face. "You don't have any right to treat Cassiopeia, or any other dragon that way, just because they're a different kind of dragon."

Beryl looked oddly calm as he moved closer to Halcyon. "Oh, yeah? And what are you going to do about it?" Beryl looked almost twice the size of Halcyon, his glare making Halcyon slouch just as much as Cassiopeia was. "Because I don't think--"

"What are you doing?" Gemini finally spoke up, moving closer to Beryl.

"Why do you care, SkyWing?"

"Because that's my sister you're talking to there, and I don't like the way you're treating her."

"Yeah, well, you should tell her to get it into her head to stop hanging around us IceWings." Beryl looked over at her. "She's obviously having a bad effect on Halcyon."

Something inside Gemini snapped, and he darted forward swiping Beryl in the snout. Beryl hissed, jolting backwards. He quickly brought his talons up to his snout, and when he brought them down again, there was a little bit of deep blue liquid on them. 

"Why, you..." Beryl began moving forward to get Gemini back, but he was held back by Solstice and Glacial. He looked furiously towards them. "Let me go!"

"Now's not the time to fight." Glacial said. She moved her mouth closer to her ear and whispered. "Remember what Queen Alabaster told us? They'll have their turn eventually."

I had no idea what she meant, but Beryl seemed to calm down at this, and resumed his collected manner from before. "Right. Well, I wouldn't do that again if I were you, SkyWing. Especially for your...sister's sake."

He made eye contact with Gemini, and held it as he moved aside to let Cassiopeia through. She bolted past, hurrying out of the Prey Center. After a moment, Gemini reluctantly broke eye contact with Beryl, and started out after Cassiopeia. He paused and looked back at me, his eyes asking if I would be alright by myself. I nodded, and he continued out.

I turned back towards the IceWings, who were all looking at me, except for Halcyon. He had disappeared while I wasn't looking.

"Staying behind to clean up the SkyWing's mess, are we?" Glacial said, smirking.

I opened my mouth to retort, but Beryl interrupted. "Don't even bother. What could a dumb hybrid like you do, anyway?"

The three of them laughed loudly, and took off into the air, all before I had fully processed what he had said. My emotions were swirling around inside of me, never stopping very long on one or the other. Anger, hurt, sadness, fear, and pretty much everything in between. However, as I looked around the Prey Center, noticing the suspicious and rude glances being thrown my way, sadness was what triumphed over the other emotions.

Sadness because of what had just happened. Because of what dragons thought of hybrids. Because of how hybrids were treated, and because they were considered useless and not able to do anything.

Sadness most of all, though, because that thought might actually be right.