As soon as Torrent stepped near enough to Gila, his amulet stopped working, and the bloody battle between the SandWings and SkyWings resumed. Crystal and Schist quickly ran over to Torrent, standing by the now stone Gila, while the SandWings, seeing the state of their employer, continued to disperse, realizing they'd lost. Torrent, meanwhile, looked over the statue of Gila with a frown. The SandWing's pleading expression was frozen on his face, and he had a stone claw against a piece of his magical jewelry.
Gila's enchanted jewelry remained untouched by the stone that now formed the SandWing's scales. Torrent grimaced a little. Who knew what Gila had enchanted — Torrent would have to disenchant it all. He started to the task, and holding down the emerald on his dagger, raised the blade up to the second silver snake around Gila's horns. He touched the blade to the hornband, causing the spell placed on it to disperse.
Crystal looked up at the SandWing, walking in circles to examine him. Schist poked Gila's frozen tail barb before quickly pulling his talon back, as if worried it would come alive in response.
"Is he dead?" a gruff voice asked. Torrent turned around. The last of the living SandWings and MudWings had fled, and Boulder was behind Torrent, peering up at Gila with caution.
Torrent nodded in affirmation, and knocked a claw against Gila's statue. It was solid. "Yes," he replied. Torrent returned to Gila and raised his dagger, going to cut across a few of Gila's necklaces to disenchant them.
Suddenly, Torrent felt a claw on his wingblade, pulling him back. He looked back to see Boulder with a frown. "We can use those," the SkyWing glowered.
"Better you don't," Torrent remarked, "you don't know what they can do; they're probably dangerous. Sooner they're destroyed, the better." He forced the smaller SkyWing away by spreading out his wing.
Boulder growled as Torrent continued his disenchanting, touching his dagger to the amulet Gila had used. The SkyWing waved a claw, and a few more of the SkyWings came over towards Gila's body. One of them grabbed the end of Torrent's wing roughly, pulling the SeaWing off the statue.
"Look," Boulder hissed, walking beneath Torrent's wing to face the SeaWing snout-to-snout, "this is ours to choose what to do with. We're the ones who died for this, not you." he waved a claw over towards the end of the pier, where a large number of SandWing, SkyWing, and MudWing corpses layed down, many burning or singed. "We fought for this, and you're not going to take our victory from us."
Torrent faced the SkyWing down, giving the underboss a cold glare. "This isn't personal," Torrent growled, trying to shake the SkyWing free of his wing. "As I said, these are dangerous and need to be destroyed. You wouldn't want to activate an explosion in the middle of Evergreen's house, would you?"
Boulder snarled, his face contorted in anger, and spat in Torrent's face. The SeaWing turned his head, and it landed on the side of his snout. He lunged forward and broke away from the SkyWing grabbing him, going back to Gila's statue.
Boulder was about to give another order when Crystal stepped in the way of Torrent, giving him a look of warning. "Torrent just wants to make sure you're safe," she told Boulder, "but if you want to risk your scales for some jewelry, by all means, be our guests." She placed her claws around Torrent's horns and started to drag him away from the statue.
"What are you doing?" Torrent quietly hissed at Crystal. "Do you know what could be in those enchantments?"
"I'm saving your neck," Crystal whispered back, "Gila was the main threat, not some random enchantments he might have made. And I don't think Boulder is going to take 'no' for an answer."
She flicked her spiny tail up and looked over to Schist, who was still checking out Gila's stone barb curiously. The MudWing got the cue, and stumbled over towards Torrent and Crystal, trying to catch up to them. "We got what we came for," Crystal murmured, "c'mon, let's get out of here."
She spread open her wings, with Torrent and Schist quickly following suit, when she noticed that a circle of SkyWings had started to form around them. She gulped slightly; this wasn't good.
"Where do you think you're going?" Boulder snarled.
"We helped you with Gila," Crystal said, glancing back nervously, "that's all we wanted. You can do whatever you'd like with him and his enchantments."
A small grin formed on half of Boulder's mouth, his scales tightening upwards. "You're coming with us," he commanded, "I believe Evergreen would like to say goodbye."
"No thanks!" Torrent snorted, starting to flap his wings. "We don't need any payment, if that's what she wants to give us."
Crystal gritted her teeth as Torrent started to lift off, the SkyWings carefully watching him, awaiting orders from Boulder. Clearly, Evergreen didn't have a reward in mind for them.
"I don't believe you have a choice here," Boulder commented. "Come with us, or we'll take you by force." Boulder's threat didn't seem to be idle — Crystal saw four SkyWings with a net hung between them. If she refused to fly, they could tie her up and hang her on that from her tail: not an experience she particularly wanted to have. There was no chance of fighting, either, they were hopelessly outnumbered.
"We'll go with you," Crystal responded, giving Boulder an icy glare. She looked up at Torrent, who frowned as his webbed paws touched the wooden pier again.
"Good," Boulder replied with a toothy grin, spreading open his expansive wings. "I'm sure Evergreen will be thrilled to hear about Gila's demise." He lifted off, with a few SkyWings going after him. Crystal, Torrent, and Schist went next at the SkyWings' orders, with a large number of the SkyWings trailing behind the three.
Schist looked down below at the pier. Most of the fires had been put out, but a few pieces of flaming wood still remained in the river, being pushed away along with the corpses of a SkyWings, SandWings, and MudWings. Pieces of the ship were visible, but entirely spread out. More corpses remained on the pier. Schist turned away, not wanting to look anymore.
The return to Evergreen's mansion was more direct than their flight out — the dragons crossed the river immediately, and headed straight over the SkyWing city, their flight lit by gently-glowing lanterns. Torrent saw the blue-shingled roof below, where Griffin would be right now. Not too far away was their destination, Evergreen's mansion.
"Down!" Boulder ordered the three as he soared down first, with a few SkyWings following behind. Crystal, Torrent, and Schist did as they were told. They reached the front of the gate, where two different SkyWing guards were. It appeared that there had been a change in shift for the night. After the guards had opened it, Boulder motioned the three through the gate.
As they walked down the path, Schist saw the same cat on the side of the pathway. If Trustbreaker was reading the cat's mind, maybe he'd be able to know where they were. Schist gently slided away from Boulder towards the cat. It didn't shy away from him. He brought his head down to look at the cat. "Good kitty, good kitty," he whispered, "do you want to come inside with us?"
Boulder gave Schist a confused stare. Cute-talking a cat didn't fit a dragon with scars like that. "No cats allowed," he growled, "get up, we're going inside." Crystal also looked strangely at Schist, until she realized what he was doing. Trustbreaker had read the cat's mind earlier, if he could do it again, maybe he'd alert Avalanche and Griffin.
Schist nodded. He closed his eyes a little. "Sorry, kitty," he muttered. With a quick swipe of a claw, Schist cut across the cat's fur as he stood up, drawing a line of blood. The cat hissed in pain and clawed at Schist's paw before scampering away. He hadn't cut too deeply, he hoped. It would heal. Hopefully, Trustbreaker would notice that.
Boulder pushed the three through the mansion's doors, with a couple of SkyWings following behind him. Crystal looked backwards. If she got a direct blast at frostbreath while Boulder was distracted, they might be able to get out of the house alive — but there were still the SkyWings at the gate to deal with. She decided not to risk it; maybe they'd have another opportunity. If she could take Evergreen hostage somehow, the rest of the SkyWings would be at her mercy.
At the end of the hallway, a SkyWing shoved open the door to Evergreen's room, then shoved the three through it. Evergreen was sitting as she was when the three had entered the room just the morning before — the short crimson spikes of her tail resting upon her desk. Next to her was a new dragon that hadn't been there the last time they'd visited. A haughty looking SeaWing with green scales the color of algae stood next to the desk, examining Torrent closely. He held a small scroll which he rested one of his forepaws on, swiveling the scroll on Evergreen's floor.
"What is the meaning of this?" Torrent burst out with a snarl. "We did what you wanted, Gila is dead."
Evergreen shook her tail, her spikes rattling and screeching across her desk. She glanced over to Boulder for confirmation. "Yes," the SkyWing muttered, "they killed him. Magically turned him to stone. The SeaWing made a fuss about us taking the cursed jewelry he was wearing. We brought it back with us, but it's being taken directly to our eastern warehouse. Didn't want any stray enchantments here."
The hybrid nodded. "And the black powder the MudWings were smuggling?"
"Got a fair amount of it before their ship was blown to the Ice Kingdom," Boulder stated. "Would've been nice to know that it explodes when it catches fire. A lot of our crew could've used that info."
Evergreen ignored Boulder's glare at her, and turned to the three captive dragons. "I applaud you for your victory," she said with a smile, "I'd like you to introduce you to my friend here." She pointed her tail to the SeaWing. "This is Sturgeon. He's the Sea Kingdom ambassador in our city."
"Well, I'd hardly deign myself to call you my friend," Sturgeon coughed, exuding an aura of arrogance. "Just to be clear, this meeting is completely off-the-records?"
"Yes," Evergreen frowned, slightly irritated, "believe me, I don't ever want to recall meeting you either."
Sturgeon nodded, then looked over at Boulder. "May you, er, lift the SeaWing's wings up for me to see?" he asked.
Boulder gave the SeaWing a look of confusion, then turned to Evergreen as if asking her for any objections.
"Go ahead," she sighed.
Boulder nodded and flicked his tail. The two SkyWings which had come in with him and the three walked to either side of Torrent and grabbed the edge of his wings, digging their claws into his wing membranes as they forcibly spread his wings open. Sturgeon looked down at the bottom of Torrent's wings, standing a fair distance back in case the struggling SeaWing attempted to fight.
"Yes, yes," the ambassador muttered in delight, "he really is Prince Torrent! I had thought for sure he was a fake! You see, just the other day, I had a SkyWing attempt to pass her mate off as the missing prince, who she had covered in blue paint! He was the most miserable creature I had seen, though not as bad as this poor MudWing here, it seems so unfortu — "
"Just give me the money," Evergreen snapped, getting irritated by Sturgeon's antics. "I don't care about your lizard-brained stories."
"Of course," Sturgeon muttered, looking slightly offended. He took out a small pouch and handed it over to Evergreen, who clutched at it greedily. "The rewards for finding one Prince Torrent, as promised."
Torrent gave Sturgeon a glare of anger as Evergreen ripped open the pouch, grinning at whatever she saw in there.
Sturgeon smiled over at Torrent. "You're going to be coming back with me to the Sea Kingdom," he stated, "where hopefully, I shall get my reward for returning Queen Coral's third-youngest prince to the Deep Palace!"
Third-youngest? Torrent thought in surprise. "I'm not going," he growled in defiance.
"Well, of course you are!" Sturgeon snorted, as if he couldn't consider anything else.
Crystal hissed at Evergreen. "We had a deal. We helped you with Gila! Let Torrent go!"
Evergreen snorted. "I make lots of deals," she replied. "Gotta keep up this desk somehow." She looked down at her desk with a frown. The spikes in her tail had created another few scratches in the lacquered wood. She sighed.
Crystal thought for a moment. "Well, if you want a deal, we can offer you a better one. Torrent is a prince. We've got more riches than what's in that pouch the SeaWing gave you."
"Really?" Evergreen asked, skeptically. She opened the pouch and pointed it over towards Crystal, revealing inside a necklace with tiny diamonds inlaid all along it. "More than this?"
Crystal nodded confidently, though only half-sure. "Yes. We can supply more."
Sturgeon started to say something in protest, but Torrent interrupted. "Yeah, I've got a ton of jewelry back in the safehouse. We can supply more than that."
Crystal looked towards Torrent in almost horror as Evergreen grinned from horn to horn. "Oh, really?" the hybrid crime lord asked. "I suppose we might have to check out this 'safehouse' of yours, won't we." You stupid prince! Crystal thought, gritting her teeth. Torrent seemed oblivious.
Evergreen turned back towards Crystal, scratching behind a horn with a claw. "Don't worry, your SeaWing friend's stupidity hasn't lost you anything," she stated, "I doubt that what he has is worth anywhere near as much as, say, a sizable portion of Queen Glacier's treasury, as well as Prince Narwhal's hand in marriage?"
Crystal's jaw hung open in shock, unsure what to say. Seeing her expression, Evergreen chuckled. "You've been quite a notty IceWing, haven't you? Apparently, Queen Glacier's willing to pay a lot to find you and whatever you stole. And I've just been so fortunate as to have you fall right into my talons!"
Crystal shook her head in alarm. "You don't understand what you're doing!" she protested. "If you return me, thousands and thousands of dragons could die!"
"And why should I care?" Evergreen asked with a sigh. "Thousands of dragons will die no matter what. Pyrrhia is at war; it always has been, and it always will be."
"No!" Crystal said. "Not like this! Queen Glacier is trying to kill the entire MudWing tribe! She wa —"
"Quiet," Evergreen hissed in irritation. "I'm a hybrid, a freak. Why should I care about the MudWings, or the IceWings, or any part of the war for that matter? Do you hear that?" She turned to face Boulder, her ears twitching. "I told you to tell my guards to keep that cat away! Do you understand how irritating it can be to have a constant meowing interrupting while I'm wor —"
Suddenly, the doors burst open, and a flood of cats devoured the room. Cats of all sizes, shapes, and pelt colors ran across the floor before any of the dragons could tell what was happening, with a NightWing and a SkyWing closely behind them.
The guards holding Torrent stood in surprise as around five or so cats jumped on each. They tried to shake them off, and were able to fling a few across the room, but more of them kept on coming. One guard screeched in agony and flailed about, almost hitting Torrent, as a cat stabbed its claws into the dragon's eyes before scampering off. The second tried to claw at a cat running along his spines, but noticed, too late, a second cat jumping up to his neck. With a few bites, the cat broke through a gap in his scales and tore open one of the SkyWing's artery. Blood burst out of the dragon's neck, staining the fur of the cats below a dark red.
By this point, the other dragons had recognized the threat. Sturgeon had ran behind Evergreen's chair and was now curling up behind it like a frightened dragonet. Boulder swiped a paw at a cat in front of him and hit, causing the poor feline to slam into one of Evergreen's paintings. Boulder smiled in a short-lived victory as the cat slumped down to the floor and didn't get up, before Torrent whirled around and hit Boulder's head with his tail. There was a loud cracking sound as Torrent's tail made contact with Boulder's skull, and Boulder crashed to the ground, blood dripping out between his horns.
When Avalanche walked into the room, Evergreen was the only dragon left worth fighting, the others were unconscious or dead (the SkyWing who had gotten his eyes clawed had ran his snout into a wall and was now lying on the floor unmoving). Avalanche snorted in irritation and stretched her claws out. She'd only been able to fight one dragon today, and the guards at the gate had been untrained.
Evergreen opened her mouth to say something in protest, but Avalanche was there first. The SkyWing unlatched her jaws and let forth a frightening burst of flame. Crystal jumped to the side to dodge it, feeling the heat uncomfortably against her cold scales. Evergreen lifted a wing in front of her, trying to block the hit, and roared in pain as Avalanche's flames seared her wing membrane. The hybrid ducked down, trying to use the desk in front of her as cover, causing Avalanche to change the direction of her firebreath to the wooden desk. After a few seconds of intense flame, the desk caught fire.
Evergreen stepped out from under the burning desk and jumped on top of it, wincing as the flames licked against her scales. Using the desk to launch herself, she threw her body at Avalanche, her claws out to attack. Avalanche took a quick step to the side and raked her own talons against Evergreen's rose-gold scales as she tumbled past. Evergreen quickly turned around, swinging her spiked tail at Avalanche, and smashed it into the SkyWing's side, the short spikes piercing into the leathery scales just beneath Avalanche's wing. The hybrid smiled as Avalanche hissed, blood leaking from the SkyWing's side.
Evergreen tried to pull her tail out from Avalanche's body, but felt a force resisting it — Avalanche had grabbed ahold of the hybrid's tail and was keeping it in place. The SkyWing thrust her claws a short length from the tip of Evergreen's tail, stabbing into the sensitive spot all dragons had. Evergreen screamed as Avalanche used the leverage of her talons, deep within the flesh of the hybrid's tail, to pull Evergreen's tail-spines from her body and drag the rest of Evergreen to the ground.
As Avalanche stepped over Evergreen, pulling her talons out from the hybrid's tail, Evergreen attempted to claw at the scarlet SkyWing's underbelly, but as she started to rake blood from the SkyWing's scales, Avalanche stomped on Evergreen's neck, causing the hybrid to choke. The Skywing placed one of her hind legs on Evergreen's now fully exposed underbelly and rolled her over, keeping her pinned to the ground, then wrapped her claws around the hybrid's neck. With a short twisting motion, a loud pop reverberated throughout the room as Avalanche snapped Evergreen's neck.
Avalanche stepped away, then looked over the room. The desk was still on fire, and it was quickly spreading across the room. Sturgeon poked his head out from behind it. "Mercy, please!" the SeaWing screeched.
Avalanche snorted, and stepped towards him to end his pitiful existence when Schist scooted between her and Sturgeon. "Don't worry," the MudWing tried to comfort the frantic SeaWing, "we're not going to hurt you."
Avalanche gave Schist a glare, but stepped back. Sturgeon meekly nodded and crawled from behind the burning desk. As he stepped past Avalanche, she suddenly lurched forward and stabbed her claws into the SeaWing's throat. His eyes flew open in alarm and he attempted to step back, but it was too late. As Avalanche stepped backwards with a smile, Sturgeon collapsed, dead.
Schist glared at the SkyWing in horror. "WHAT?" he yelled. "I said we weren't going to hurt him!"
"He would've notified everyone that we were here and killed Evergreen," Avalanche growled threateningly. "If he'd survived, everything we've done could've been lost. We can't afford that, not after Nautilus. You'll thank me later."
Schist stepped forward angrily, and was about to bark a protest, when Torrent interrupted. "Not now," Torrent mumbled, pointing a webbed talon at the burning room, "later."
Schist clenched his teeth, and scratched his claws against the floor of the room. Sturgeon's death wasn't needed.
Crystal looked around the burning room, then opened her jaws, ready to breath frostbreath and put out the fire.
"Don't," Avalanche ordered, "this way, all her wealth dies with her, along with any evidence." Crystal closed her mouth and turned around.
"Then we need to get out of here," Torrent suggested, glancing anxiously around at the spreading flames. He walked towards the exit of the room, stepping around Evergreen's corpse, then exited the door. Crystal, Schist, and Avalanche followed, with Trustbreaker and a trail of cats leaving after them. The group quickly got down the stairwell and exited the mansion.
As they reached the gate, two SkyWings lay on the ground, both dead. Schist suddenly stopped moving as a horde of cats ran past him, dispersing into the dimly lit streets. He stood completely still and held his balance on three legs, not wanting to step on any. Turning back, Trustbreaker remained with Sapphire by his side, and the cat that had lived by the now burning mansion, now with a large gash in its fur. "Sorry," Schist apologized, both to the cat and Trustbreaker, "thank you for saving us."
The NightWing nodded, and looked back up at the burning mansion. A large portion of it had caught flame, and looked like it might soon collapse. Smoke sailed upwards as the fire lit up the night sky.