Secrets, a Wings of fire fanfiction {1}

Prologue

                            5 years ago

   Her dragonets were in danger.

   She couldn't let them be harmed. She couldn't go down the same route as her mother.

   Auklet's eyes shot open as her eyes adjusted to the dimly lit room. Her head was spinning from anxiety and exhaustion. 

   Another nightmare.

   Cliff had been worried about her as of lately, saying things like 'You don't seem like yourself today' and 'What's wrong?' He'd also consoled her when she woke up screaming from her night terrors about Orca's statue reforming, assassins destroying her eggs, or her mother smashing her eggs. 

   Cliff was overseeing the final additions to the newly rebuilt Summer Palace, which had been previously destroyed during the war. He would probably be exhausted by morning. Once the Summer Palace was fully rebuilt she would be able to move her dragonets to the nursery there.

   Auklet killed her mother in order to get the throne, and it was the worst thing she'd ever done. Her mother's last words still haunted her. The only reason she did it was because of the pressure from her sisters and even her mother to take over the SeaWing kingdom because Coral was growing old and sickly.

   Tsunami and Anemone never looked at her the same way after the act (despite their inducement) but Tsunami appeared to show a lot of empathy for her. Auklet remembered Tsunami at Coral's funeral, pulling her aside, and confessing that she was one to kill Gill, her father whom she'd never met. 

   Auklet had to admit that she had felt stunned that Tsunami had confessed this to her. It created somewhat of a fragile bond between them, but it still didn't erase the consequences of her act of regicide that still followed her. Tsunami had dreamed of becoming queen while she was a small dragonet but abandoned it for mysterious reasons. 

   Auklet didn't get to see her sisters that much because Tsunami was constantly busy running Jade Mountain and Anemone was living in the RainWing kingdom with her wife, Tamarin. Auklet herself had been dealing with the pressure of ruling an entire kingdom.

   She flinched from surprise as a loud knock pounded on the door and she tried to compose herself. It wasn't actually that uncommon for her to get knocks on her door in the night, mostly from her council, but this one had more of a sense of urgency and trepidation. 

 She slowly opened the door and saw the stressed look on the messenger's face.

 "My queen, there's a threat! We need your immediate attention in the nursery. Your dragonets are in danger, and-"

It took a few seconds for Auklet to register the words, but as soon as she did, she was already halfway down the corridor, swimming as fast as she could. Her chest was tight and she felt slightly dizzy with the chance that her worst fears might come true.

 There was a rhythmic pounding in her ears, and dread clawed at her chest. As neared the nursery, her mind was racing with thousands of scenarios, each one more terrifying than the last.

 What if she was too late? 

   There were only two guards, Stonefish and Chromis. They were two of her most trusted guards and personal friends of hers. Chromis was metallic green with a pale underbelly, and Stonefish was blueish-grey with a normally determined expression etched on his face. She was sure that if there were any two SeaWings she could trust, it would be them.

   She came too late.

   The two guards were on the ground, most likely knocked out and their weapons were stolen. She roared with confusion, anger, and fear. She swam forward to push open the nursery doors.

   Without a warning her vision went black and a powerful blow struck her from behind, and she collapsed to the ground... 

 ***

Her vision slowly came back and saw the red water surrounding her, which meant she was bleeding. She was unable to tell if she had been out for a second or hours, but the guards were still passed out and it seemed as though she was alone.

 She didn't have time to think, though, her mind was spinning and she rushed into the nursery where she left her eggs. She started frantically searching, and- 

 Her thoughts stopped as she saw the broken pieces of eggshells in her claws, and her dead unborn dragonent. She let out another roar, she wished she was on land so the whole world could hear her cries. 

 She gently set down the dragonet and continued to search for the rest of them. 

 Her heart raced as she caught her eye on something indigo tucked away in a lonely corner of the nursery. She gently moved the stones blocking and picked up an indigo egg. 

A fully intact indigo egg.

 Her eyes filled with confusion and joy, and she held it close to her chest as she searched for the last one. She moved the wood carving which Auklet swore she hid it behind, and then every other possible place she could have hidden it, as her dread increased with every passing second. She checked places which she knew she would never have hidden her dragonet in desperate optimism. 

 There wasn't a possibility it was stolen, was there? 

 She laid down on the ground, pulling her egg close to her, taking a moment to think. She cradled the egg as she closed her eyes. Her egg was a symbol of hope in the tragedy in the nursery, but it was tempered by the looming dread of not finding the last dragonet. 

 Was there a place she overlooked? Did someone destroy one of her dragonets and take the other one? That would be impossible, right? 

 The blood-soaked water was a reminder of how her guards remained unconscious, how her nursery was in disarray, and how the fate of her dragonets hung in balance. 

 She looked at her egg once more, and in a panic noticed a crack and tiny blue webbed talons sticking out. She saw the crack spreading. If she lost all her dragonets it would destroy her. She stared in confusion and shielded her face as the egg shattered. 

Auklet watched as the tiny dark blue dragonet with dark red glow-in-the-dark scales looked up at her and snorted out a jet of bubbles. It was her little Tidalwave. Auklet glowed up her scales in glee, and her fears and sorrows seemed to fade away for a moment. 

She would make sure to be the best mother she could.