Wings of Fire: Peace (Completed)

Chapter 2- Palo

Palo was reading a scroll in his cave, Copper was scowling, and Mandarin was looking at a map of the academy. It was silent. The white-yellow dragon's tail twitched and he pulled it in closer. His SandWing claustrophobia was kicking in. Why did the cave feel so small all the sudden? His wings twitched. He longed to be out in the sand eating lizards. Or at least in the sun. He accidentally tore the scroll he was reading with his twitchiness. Ugh, this is so boring. Why am I even here?

"Will you stop that?" 

"Stop what?" Palo looked up. 

"That weird thing you're doing with your body! It's disturbing." The SandWing rolled his pitch-black eyes and tried to stop twitching.

GONG, GONG, GONG!  The yellow dragon jumped. "What is that?!" Copper chuckled, but not chuckled at the same time, it was kind of creepy. 

"Come on," the SkyWing hopped off his ledge and walked out the doorway. Mandarin the MudWing looked up and tossed his map to the side, Palo placed his scroll on his moss rock and followed Copper into the main room of the school. GONG, GONG! It got the SandWing every time. 

They followed Copper to a tunnel a few wingspans away from the Great Hall with a lot of noises inside. There were chickens, pigs, fruit bowls, dragons of all colors imaginable, a giant pile of fish inside, and two bowls of Pantalan candies.

There was a MudWing sitting on a big rock in a corner watching the chaos unfold.

There were a couple RainWings chatting by a table, there was an IceWing and a LeafWing eating closeby, there was a HiveWing and a SeaWing and a few other dragons by the wall that was built to keep prey in, but was useless for dragons, of course, a NightWing was eating by herself and didn't seem to be bothered by it, and a SilkWing sitting by herself eating a banana and had a peach next to her. He would go talk to the SilkWing, she looked nice.

Palo grabbed a charred lizard and a sugar drop on his way over, "Hi, I'm Palo, what's your name?" 

The SilkWing looked startled for a moment that someone would talk to her, "My name is Cecropia." 

"What winglet are you in?" 

"Sapphire." 

"Oh! Me too!" A smile flickered across Cecropia's face. The SandWing looked her over: the young SilkWing had shining yellow, pink, purple, and green scales, with white along her back and tail.

Then a RainWing walked over to them, "Sapphire winglet you say? Me too," he said, shifting his big red wings that drooped beside him. 

"My name is Kumquat." 

Was he part SkyWing? Normally RainWings didn't have wings that big unless they had a physical defect. Kumquat looked mostly normal except for that, bright scales, fangs, prehensile tail.

"I wonder who else there is. So, we have, Kumquat, Cecropia, me, Copper, and Mandarin," Palo said. 

"And there's Flytrap the LeafWing, my clawmate, sometimes he talks about Sheer. And I heard about this Empathy the NightWing, and I don't know who our HiveWing or our SeaWing is. . . ." Kumquat interrupted. 

"My clawmates are Junix and Drift, who aren't here yet, so I have a private cave for the time being," Cecropia flicked her tail and took another bite of her banana.

GONG, GONG, GONG!  The three dragonets heard the bronze gong again. "Our first class! Come on!"

"Opal Winglet, you have History! Agate Winglet, you have Pantala and Geography! Peridot Winglet, you have Art! Lapis Winglet, you have Botany! Amber Winglet, you have Science! Sapphire winglet, you have Small Group Discussion! Diamond Winglet, you have Healing and Hunting!" Clay bellowed from his rock, flying off it and ushering the rest of his students out of the Prey Center.

Copper, Palo, Mandarin, Cecropia, an IceWing, a LeafWing, Kumquat, who was now an excited gold color, and a purple NightWing jogged out of the Prey Center as well.

The dark red SkyWing led them all to the Great Hall, then they went into a dark tunnel that led to a cave room open to the sky, had a river flowing by a corner, and had skylights with leaves covering them, but still allowing light to come through. An ingenious idea if you asked Palo.

A deep royal blue SeaWing sat in the middle of it, next to a scowling HiveWing who had yellow scales flecked all over with red and orange and a green silk scarf. 

"Hi! You must be the Sapphire Winglet, my name is Tsunami, you can call me 'Head of the School' by the way," Tsunami said loudly, nearly whacking the HiveWing in the face with her wings, who scowled even more. "Everybody sit down and tell me your names and something else about yourselves, starting with... you! You, um, Manda, is that your name?"

Mandarin made a face, "Mandarin,"  he corrected her, "Before you ask, the duck, not the orange. I like food." 

"My name is Palo, and I like to write and draw," Palo said, and then looked at Copper. 

"My name is Copper and I like to race."

The IceWing raised her head, attempting to make herself look imposing. "My name is Sheer and I did not agree to come to this garbage dump." 

Tsunami looked as if she could rip Sheer's head off. "This is not a garbage dump, IceWing! You probably don't even have a school in the colorless wasteland of a kingdom!" she barked. 

"Ooo!" everyone cooed. Sheer gave up.

"I'm Kumquat and my favorite color is orange," Kumquat said, letting his scales ripple to even brighter gold with a hint of pale pink. 

"My name is Empathy and I like to play games," the purple NightWing said, flicking her tongue. 

"My name is Junix," the yellow HiveWing growled, narrowing her black eyes. 

"My name is Cecropia and I like to birdwatch," Cecropia murmured. 

"My name is Flytrap and I like to garden."

"What else do you guys want to talk about?" Tsunami asked. 

"Can we talk about how the school was made?" Palo suggested. 

"That's a good idea," the SeaWing said. "So, when we heroically ended the war and fulfilled the fake prophecy, we needed something to keep the peace, and my friend Sunny came up with the idea of this school! Any questions?"

"Oh! Me! Me! Me!" cried Empathy, her talon shooting up. "Empathy?"

"When did you figure out the Dragonet Prophecy was fake?" 

"Um. . . thirteen... fourteen years ago?" Tsunami answered unsurely. "Anyone else?" 

"Me!" Mandarin blurted. 

"Mandarin?" 

"When can we meet Sunny?"

"Whenever you want! As long as she's not busy. Anyone else?" It was silent. "Do you guys want to go hunting?" Tsunami asked. 

They agreed. 

"Alright! Let's go!"

The Sapphire Winglet leaped into the sky, a rainbow of colors.