Unshattered

Chapter Twelve

"Holy moons," Moondrift said, when she and Moonwatcher were told about the venom scratch.

"So it's official?" Moonwatcher asked. "A SandWing did this?"

"Yes," the SkyWing answered, feeling a twinge of familiarity in him.

"Now the question is, which SandWing?" Moondrift pointed out. She turned to Moon. "Moonwatcher, you talk about this Qibli quite a lot."

Moon blushed.

"Judging from the name 'Qibli', I assume he is a SandWing?"

Moon frowned and spread her wings out, revealing sparkling white dots in the shape of stars.

"He is, but he would never do this!" Her face was flooded with emotions. "I know him,"

"Well I don't," Moondrift said, and bolted out of the door.

"Stop!" Moonwatcher cried.

Soaren wasn't sure what to do in this situation.

Should he help Moon? Should he stop Moondrift from getting Qibli? Or is he just going to stand there?

"It's fine," Moon said, making Soaren jump.

"Right, you can read minds too," he grumbled. "So what have you seen in my mind?"

"Well," Moon said, squinting her eyes in another direction, as if thinking of a way to say it.

"Wait," Deathbringer wondered. "Wasn't Moondrift here just to find the dream visitor? What happened to that?"

Soaren had forgotten about that. He'd read in scrolls about dream visitors, how when one dragon holds it, they can enter into anyone's dreams.

"Well now we have two mysteries to solve." Moon sighed. "Yay."

In just five seconds later, Moondrift came storming in the cave with another SandWing.

He had dusty yellow scales that gleamed like the sun at night. Small black freckles were splattered onto his snout like paint on sandpaper. A small amber earring in the shape of a raindrop hung from one of his ears as the SandWing wore a confused expression.

"Um, what's going on? Moon?" He said.

His venomous tail barb curled out dangerously as if ready to strike.

"Oh Qibli," Moon said.

The SandWing curled his tail back in safely and smiled warmly at Moonwatcher.

The NightWing ran up to him and hugged him.

Moondrift rolled her eyes at them.

"Anyway," she said, "I couldn't read this dragon's mind like some others I went by. So SandWing," she hissed and flicked her tail at him. "What do you know about the IceWing's murder?"

Moon let go of him.

"IceWing murder? I don't know anything about that. But why would you go for me as one of the suspects?" Qibli asked, tilting his head at the corpse lying behind Moondrift.

The hybrid turned the body over and pointed to the scar across the blood.

"Ooh, yikes," Qibli winced. "Well, if you thought it was me, it's not."

He turned to walk out of the cave when Moondrift stopped him. "How do you think this happened?" She asked, staring at the body.

Qibli turned around again. He walked towards it and examined it.

"Well there is a SandWing scratch, that's for sure. Hmmm," His eyes were stuck on the wound. "It looks as if his heart had been pierced. And look, there are other small stabs next to it"

"He's right," Moon said, with one claw pointed at each stab.

"Whoever killed him must have really hated him that much." Qibli observed.

"But doesn't it look too obvious?" Moondrift said, lifting the dead IceWing's chin up. "I mean, to commit a murder you must be stealthy, not leave any traces and be very inconspicuous about it."

She kicked the ground as she glared at it.

Qibli frowned suspiciously at her. "And how would you know that?"

Moondrift pursed her lips. "Because," she said, "I used to kill thousands myself."

I have recently discovered that I skipped a chapter when publishing. This just so happens to be the chapter the author named Chapter Twelve along with another chapter she called chapter twelve.

-BookDragon

-605 Words