Waves of Ice: a Wings of Fire fanfiction (COMPLETED)

31.

Shadowhunter

The sky is on fire.

And I can't breathe.

Eclipse is frozen in place beside me. I lunge for my little sister, violently shaking her shoulders.

"Eclipse. We have to get out of here."

"But--I don't know where Way is--" Her voice cracks, tears welling in her eyes. "Hunter, we can't just leave him--"

Hunter. It's been ages, since my little sister called me that.

I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss it. Just a little bit.

Prince looks her straight in the eye. "Eclipse. We have to get out of here. Way--we can--we can find him later, okay?"

"No," she chokes,barely suppressing a sob. "He's my brother--"

"Eclipse," I say, gritting my teeth as I start to to back away slowly. "If we don't get out of here now, we will die. Do you want to die?"

My little sister freezes, small grey wings trembling like leaves.

"No."

"Then let's go."

The guards surrounding the plaza have long since fled. We take off, precariously dodging the onslaught, pushing through the hundreds of dragons all trying to get away.

Eclipse yelps in as a small flaming projectile slams into her wings.

Dragonflame cactus, I realize. A SkyWing export--and a highly regulated one, too. (I would know, I did a whole report on them  as a subtle way of threatening my social studies professor, and casually letting him know that if I wanted to I could probably slice his throat open. But I actually kinda like him, so I wouldn't actually do it.)

So how would a NightWing get their talons on one? Quite a lot more than "one" by the looks of it, actually.

Eclipse falters, dropping a few feet, flapping her uninjured wing in a frantic effort to stay afloat. "Hunter!" She screams, snapping me back to reality.

"You'll be fine," I say sternly, forcing myself not to look back at my little sister. "Just... stay behind me."

***

"Three moons. I was so worried. You're okay--oh, Eclipse, your wing--"

I sigh. Of course Mom knows about it already.

And of course she didn't warn us beforehand. Even though she literally could have stopped ALL OF THIS FROM HAPPENING if she just TRIED A LITTLE BIT HARDER.

If Eclipse weren't already upset enough, I'd probably slap my mother.

Grandma races  up to me. Looks me up and down worriedly. "Shadowhunter."  She pulls me into her, with her good wing, cradling me tight to her chest.

"You're going to be okay," she soothes. She smells like rosemary and homemade pies.

"Whatever," I mutter. "I'm fine."