Two MudWing guards waited outside Queen Moorhen's room. They looked similar, as if they might be brother and sister. Both were the same dark shade of brown, and had similar shaped faces. The female MudWing was a little larger than her brother. Siblings working and living together seemed to be common with MudWings, at least that was what Torrent remembered from his lessons with Whirlpool. Torrent wondered if his bond with Orca would last that long or stay that strong when they grew up. He thought about Coral and Shark's relationship; the two never really seemed happy around each other. Shark was always stiff and tense near his sister, and Coral tended to completely ignore Shark.
As Torrent walked by, they looked cautiously at him. "Hi," the dragonet said calmly, "is Queen Moorhen in there? I'd like to talk to her." He raised a wing and presented the royal starburst patterns beneath them. The MudWings didn't appear to recognize it, though Torrent didn't expect them too.
"Er . . . who are you?" the brother asked.
"Prince Torrent," Torrent replied. "I wanted to ask your queen something. No weapons, don't worry."
The MudWings looked at each other, then moved aside to allow Torrent in. A SeaWing dragonet wasn't much of a threat to the queen, even a large one like Torrent. And if he really was a prince, refusing him could cause unneeded diplomatic tensions between the kingdoms.
Torrent walked into the room, and the two MudWings moved behind him. "Queen Moorhen," one announced, "this dragonet says he's a prince and wants to talk to you."
The room inside had five dragons. Four of them were circled around one in the center, who Torrent guessed was Queen Moorhen by the jewels in her scales. The other four must be her siblings.
Queen Moorhen raised her head to see what the disturbance was, and her siblings followed. She looked over at her guards, and then to Torrent. The SeaWing prince lifted up a wing to show his royal patterns, and Queen Moorhen nodded in understanding.
"Yes?" she asked Torrent expectantly. "Did Queen Coral send you?"
Torrent shook his head, shaking slightly in apprehension. "Your Majesty, I wanted to ask you for a favor. It's nothing large."
Queen Moorhen chuckled at the idea of a dragonet asking her for something. "Well then, what is it? We're not sending more troops into the war, if that's what you want."
"No, Your Majesty," Torrent replied, bowing, "I was wondering if the Mud Kingdom had any libraries with scrolls on animus dragons."
Queen Moorhen frowned slightly. "Animus dragons?" she asked. "What for?" One of the queen's siblings whispered something to another.
"It's for a project I'm doing for my history class on the supernatural," Torrent smoothly lied. He had planned this excuse beforehand. "The Deep Palace Library is lacking in modern information; most of our stuff is on Albatross." He waved a claw around the carefully crafted cave walls around them.
Moorhen thought for a moment, tugging a talon on a small silver bracelet she wore. "I suppose I could ask our librarians," she replied after a moment of thinking.
Torrent bowed again. "Many thanks, Your Majesty. If there are any scrolls in the Deep Palace you're interested in, I can bring them to you the next time we meet."
"Oh, no worries," Queen Moorhen replied. "Prince Torrent, correct?" Torrent nodded. "The son of my ally is also my ally," Moorhen continued. "If something does come up, I'll let you know."
Torrent bowed one last time, and exited the room. He didn't know how long it would be before Queen Moorhen returned to the Summer Palace, and a solution in the MudWing scrolls was a longshot. Still, he could hope.
River regally waded into the large lake in the center of the palace, as regally as one could wade. She looked around in earnest, but couldn't find her mother anywhere. Queen Coral was probably in a private meeting somewhere. River growled just thinking about it. How come Orca was allowed to attend meetings and she wasn't? Mother didn't know that Orca was going to become queen for certain, did she? River should've been allowed to meet with the queens too.
She waded past two guards, and picked up a snippet of their conversation. " . . . the princess asked me for it." This sounded interesting, were they talking about her? She hadn't remembered asking any guards for anything. River stopped swimming, and hung around to eavesdrop on the guards.
"Really?" the second guard asked. "Did she say why?"
"Nah," the first replied. "Just told me to give her the key and left."
"Did you look to see what's there?"
" 'Course not, I don't wanna get my snout into any royal business, else it could get chopped off. You know how Coral can be."
River suddenly swam between the two guards, making herself known to them. "What room?" she demanded.
The guards splashed back in surprise. "Er, eleventh cave down the small tunnel," the first replied, pointing a claw in the correct direction.
River nodded. Fortunately, she knew exactly where the spare keys were, up in her mother's room, just like the ones in the Deep Palace. She quickly flew to it, and looked in. Neither of the guards bothered her, they knew who she was, and knew that they could have their heads off if they tried to stop her. They had no reason to, anyways, River's own room was connected. Neither of River's parents were in their room, they were probably at a meeting, leaving the room empty. River stepped into the room and dug through a small drawer with the keys to most of the rooms in the palace. Finding the one she wanted, she left her parents' room, and flew down to the room the guard had given her directions to.
River inserted the key in the lock, and unlocked it. For a second, she thought that Orca must still be in the room, and backed away, River didn't want to be caught snooping on her sister's activities. Then, she remembered that if her parents were at a meeting, so would Orca. Was it Torrent in there? No matter, River would get to the bottom of this.
She pushed open the door, and looked around. The room didn't seem like anything special, it had no furniture except for a desk and a bed. Suddenly, the SeaWing princess noticed a feather on the ground, exactly like the one in Torrent's room. River frowned as she rolled it between her claws. What could it mean?
Suddenly, River saw movement beneath the bed. There was something alive under it. Whatever the feathers were coming from.
The princess's breath sped up. What if it was dangerous? No, it was too late for her to turn back now. River ducked her head down, and growled at whatever was under there. "Come out!" she snarled.
In a flash, the creature under the bed pushed scrambled past River, its feathers brushing past her violet scales. River turned around, and couldn't believe what she saw for a moment. A gryphon. But they were only in stories, weren't they?
The gryphon rushed towards the door, pushing it open. River wanted to claw her own eyes out. Why hadn't she closed it? Was she just that incompetent? It ran out into the corridor.
"Stop!" River angrily yelled after it, not knowing if it could understand her, or if it cared. She ran out into the corridor, and tried to quickly wade through the water. SeaWings might've been fast swimming beneath the surface, but they were just as slow as any other dragon while wading, maybe even worse due to the webbing between their claws. She could still see the gryphon heading down the corridor.
Suddenly, the gryphon spread its feathery wings and took off in flight. At first, it staggered and shook a bit, and River thought it would fall back into the water, but it started to get the hang of it, and flew down the dimly-lit tunnel much faster than River could follow by wading.
River roared in anger; she shook the water of her own wings, and tried to get into the air herself. The tunnel was too small for a full-sized SeaWing to fly in, but River was a dragonet, so she might be able to try. She opened her wings and lifted-off, focused on catching the gryphon ahead of her. She cringed in pain as the sharp stone walls scraped against her wing membranes, tearing gashes into them. She yelled out in pain.
River suddenly hit something, and fell back down to the shallow water, splashing through it before hitting the rigid floors below. When she got back up to see what happened, another SeaWing was in front of her, a larger and older dragon looking quite ashamed after being caught in the princess's in-chosen flight path, while only wanting to exit his room.
"Your Majesty, my deepest apologies," he bowed, shaking in fear. Even if it wasn't at all his fault, if Princess River was at all seriously injured, Queen Coral would take his head off. "Are you alright? Do you need anything."
"I'm fine," River growled. She pushed aside the older SeaWing with a paw as he scrambled out of her way. When she next looked down the tunnel, the gryphon was gone. She roared in frustration. The cave network around the Summer Palace was so big, there was no way she could find it now.
She seethed at the pain in her wings, the saltwater having splashed into her cuts. She looked over to see the bloodied membranes on her right wing. It wasn't as bad as it felt, fortunately, and would heal before too long.
"Did you see it?" she demanded of the SeaWing, turning to him.
The SeaWing looked down the hall to where the gryphon had gone, then turned back to River. "The eagle-thing?" he asked, somewhat surprised. "I think so."
"It wasn't an eagle, you dimwit. Eagles don't have front legs or dragon-like bodies," the princess hissed. "It was a gryphon."
The SeaWing nodded, unsure how he had gotten dragged into this.
"C'mon," she ordered, "we're going to see my mother."
The SeaWing nodded meekly, and followed River down the tunnel back into the lake at the center of the Summer Palace. River looked up to the pavilion on which River guessed Coral would be having her meeting, then back at her wing.
"Carry me up," she ordered the SeaWing.
The SeaWing bent down, allowing River to drag herself on him, and took off, gasping heavily for air. Eventually, he reached the top with River.
River's guess was correct: the three queens, Orca, Gill, Shark, Tempest, a few other high-ranking SeaWings, and some MudWings and SandWings she didn't know were all feverently discussing plans for the war. Queen Coral looked up as she saw her daughter approaching with the other SeaWing behind him, and the rest of the the dragons fell silent and turned their eyes on the violet-scaled princess. River felt a slight shiver as the beady-eyed Blister glared at her.
"River, are you alright?" Coral asked in shock. "Your wing, what happened? Did someone hurt you?"
"It's nothing. Just tried to fly in the tunnels."
Coral shook her head in disdain. "River sweetie, you really need to take care of yourself more. You're getting older, and you should know by now that you can't fly in such close quarters."
River seethed, but kept herself from getting defensive. "Mother, we need to talk," River hissed back.
Coral sighed. "Can it wait? I'm in the middle of a meeting."
"No, it cannot." River snapped, giving Orca a short glare.
Queen Coral rolled her eyes and looked at the other two queens. "Dragonets," she tsked, loud enough for River to hear. Not that either of the other queens would have any idea what taking care of dragonets was like. "I'll make this quick."
River dragged herself back onto the poor SeaWing who had gotten stuck in this mess. The three flew up to a ledge on the cave walls of the Palace, leading to the royal chambers. "What is it," Coral hissed to her daughter angrily, "and why is it so important you must take me away from my meetings?"
At least to River, it was important because it could create a scandal around Orca that might eventually get River to the throne instead of her older sister, but Coral wouldn't care about that. The queen had seemed to have already decided that Orca would be her successor, not River. "Orca is hiding a gryphon in the Summer Palace," River bluntly replied.
Coral exasperatedly clenched her sharp shark-like teeth. "Gryphons don't exist, River."
"Apparently they do, and Orca is hiding one," she dragged the elder SeaWing behind her up. "He saw it too."
The elder SeaWing wasn't sure exactly what to say. He didn't want to anger the princess, but angering the queen would be far worse. "I mean, I might have, but it was really fast and kind of a blur."
Queen Coral looked at River and sighed. "River, it was probably just a large bird or something. Orca isn't hiding an imaginary creature in her room."
River let loose a low growl. "It was!" she whined. "And I'll prove it!"
She lept off the ledge, and started to fly away, before remembering her injured wing. River yelled in pain, and half glided-half dove into the lake below, causing a bunch of SeaWings to scramble out of her way. Fortunately, the lake was deep enough that she arose from the water uninjured.
Behind her, she saw her mother apologizing to the elder SeaWing for all the trouble, not batting an eye towards River. River knew what she had seen, and she would prove it to her mother. Then she'd get Coral to banish Orca, and River would be the next Queen of the SeaWings.
Rift looked out the entrance to the Summer Palace. His uncle Shark stood next to him impatiently, glaring unblinkingly at Rift. Rift fidgeted a little. He was also eager to be off—the two were going to start military training on an island in the west of the Sea Kingdom, where apparently a number of troops were already placed.
Rift looked back, and breathed a sigh of relief. Angler was swimming in the lake beneath towards him. His pale-green twin rose out of the water, an expression of grief on his face.
"Hey," Rift awkwardly beckoned, playing with the dolphin necklace that Orca had given him, "I'm glad you came."
"You can still turn back, you know," Angler commented forwardly. "Sure, Mother might be a little annoyed, but I know Gill wants you to wait a few more years, and h—"
"Angler," Rift sighed, shaking his head, "I want to go, and I'm not turning tail to embarrass the Sea Kingdom in front of our allies."
"Yeah, but you don't have to go now. You can wait a couple more years, until we're older, and you've had a bit more time to think."
"Look, did you come here to argue with me, or did you want to say goodbye?" Rift asked, keeping his voice calm.
Angler took a deep breath of air in, and closed his eyes for a moment. He walked towards Rift, his claws splashing in the shallow water, and wrapped his wings around his twin. "I'm going to miss you."
"Me too. Don't worry, I'll be back for a visit within six months, and the war will be over in a year if I have anything to say about it. I'll make sure to tell you everything, okay?"
Angler nodded. "Stay safe," he whispered, letting go of Rift.
"You too!" Rift called back. Shark was motioning to him that it was time to leave. "See you soon!"
Rift turned around, and followed his uncle, diving into the undersea tunnel, not looking back. This was the SeaWing prince's grand destiny, and he would face it head-on.