Inferno and Seahorse flew a difficult path through the Claws of the Clouds, going straight over the snow-capped peaks rather than around them. This way, the two could collect snow and ice at the top of the mountains, Seahorse suggesting that Inferno could easily melt it to get water. He was right, of course. At least Inferno's curse was good for something.
As the two flew above the peaks, light glanced off the fields of white beneath the two, preventing Inferno from keeping her eyes on the ground. It was amazing. She'd seen snow before, but not in many years. As worried as she was about what Ash had said, it was great being out of the caves. The heated air beneath her wings caused strong updrafts and turbulence, making her flight harder than it would be for a normal dragon, but it didn't take her long to get the hang of it. She was a SkyWing. Flying in difficult conditions was in her blood. Even so, she still had to ask Seahorse to slow down every so often.
It was late in their first day when they started to land. With Inferno nearby, it seemed unlikely that Seahorse could get too cold, even sleeping on top of the mountain peak. The two gently landed on a the ridge of a snowfield. The snow melted into water as Inferno touched down, quickly started to steam. Regardless of being unable to feel it, Inferno gleefully trudged through the snow. "Snow," she giggled. "Seahorse, isn't it great? You've seen snow before, right?"
Seahorse curled his tail back and forth. "Yeah," he responded, picking up a chunk with a claw. "Don't you care that you keep melting it?"
Inferno shrugged her wings, causing more snow around her to melt. She was unwilling to let Seahorse's words crush her mood. "It's fine. I bet this is more fun anyways. I've heard it's cold and uncomfortable to touch; plus, the melting makes it feel all tingly."
Seahorse snorted. "I guess so," he responded. He walked into the clearing of snow that Inferno had melted out and placed down his large cloth sack and waterskin, his scrollcase still around his side. He looked into the waterskin. It was still pretty full. "Do you need water?" he asked Inferno.
"Er, that would be nice," Inferno asked. She glanced towards the snow, and attempted to scoop some into her mouth. It melted in her grasp, only drops of water getting into her mouth. "I think I can just do this though. It should work."
Seahorse sighed, and picked up the heavy waterskin with a single forepaw like it was made of air. "Open up," he said, "I can pour it into your mouth."
"Oh," Inferno replied, surprised, "that's alright. You don't have to come close. If you get too near, it'll be really uncomfortable, and you could get hurt."
"I'll be fine," Seahorse stated. With a moment of thought, he placed his scrollcase on the ground beside his other belongings, and twisted his necklace behind his neck. That was probably a good decision; there would be less risk that Inferno accidentally caught a claw on it and ended up touching him.
Seahorse carefully walked over to Inferno and lifted the water skin up as the SkyWing opened her jaws wide. He slowly poured it into Inferno's mouth, Inferno catching most of the water. Still, drops of it missed their target and started to steam, splattering onto Seahorse's scales. Inferno winced, worried that it might be hurting him, but the SeaWing didn't seem to notice or care. When Inferno had enough to drink, she backed away, and Seahorse stopped the flow of water.
"Thank you," Inferno smiled gratefully.
"It's nothing," Seahorse answered. He placed the waterskin back on the ground and put the scrollcase back beneath his wing. He glanced over towards Inferno. "Can I ask you something? I'm worried it's a little personal."
Inferno frowned. "Er, sure," she politely answered, unsure if she really wanted to answer a personal question.
Seahorse flicked his tongue in and out, thinking. "If you were given the opportunity, to say, remove your firescales, would you take it?" he questioned.
"Of course!" Inferno immediately answered. This was a question she'd certainly thought about before, and it had one obvious answer. "I'd be normal. I'd be able to talk to dragons without them too scared to get close to me. I'd be able to touch snow. Why wouldn't I?"
Seahorse dragged a webbed talon across the cold ground. A slight hint of wist crossed his snout. "I don't know. It's part of what makes you who you are, isn't it?"
Inferno snorted. "Sure it is. It definitely helped make me the dragon I am today. But just because it's part of me doesn't mean it's a part of me I want to keep. All it does is hurt me."
Seahorse continued thinking for a moment. "Yeah. That makes sense. I understand."
Inferno doubted that. Seahorse seemed like the perfect dragon. No one hated him because he would literally set them on fire if they got too close. She glanced up to the sky. It was starting to get dark, and her wings were sore from the flight. Why had Seahorse asked that?
It was another two days before Inferno and Seahorse reached Jade Mountain Academy. Inferno had talked to Ash once during the time, but only briefly. She'd asked him if Seahorse was what he was worried about, and he'd told her that he wasn't. Still, Ash warned her to keep her guard up around the SeaWing, and Inferno had complied, of course. It was late in the evening when they arrived, and a young IceWing was keeping watch outside the entrance. Seahorse and Inferno flew down to meet him.
The small IceWing stared up at the two with a glare. Inferno gave him a kind smile back. "Hello," she opened, "are you a student here?"
The IceWing flicked his tongue out. "Who's asking?" he questioned. Inferno could tell that he wasn't in a very good mood.
"I'm Inferno," the SkyWing replied with a smile, "and this is Seahorse. Do you know where the headmasters are? I'd like to talk to them."
"They're busy. We have too many weird dragons at Jade Mountain already." He felt the heat radiating from Inferno's scales, and growled. "We don't want you here. You're like Peril."
Inferno bared her teeth angrily, her emotions suddenly getting the best of her. "I am not like Peril!" she hissed, a hint of flame rising from her scales.
Terror suddenly shot through the IceWing's eyes, and he scrambled back, seeing an angry dragon in front of him that could melt his scales in an instant. Inferno suddenly gulped, realizing that she'd scared him. She hadn't meant to do that. "Sorry," she quickly apologized to the IceWing, covering her mouth with a paw. Seahorse looked down at the ground unhappily.
It was already too late. The IceWing fearfully scuttled back into the entrance of the cave. A few seconds later, Inferno heard a booming roar through the entrance of the cave, almost knocking her off her paws. "WHO SCARED ERMINE?" it yelled.
A large SeaWing walked through the entrance, her ears twitching in anger. She had her webbed claws wrapped around the less-spikey bits of Ermine's tail and was dragging him towards Inferno as he ineffectively attempted to scramble away from the SeaWing.
"WAS IT YOU?" the SeaWing aggressively accused Inferno, walking towards her. "NO ONE SCARES MY STUDENTS! ARE YOU WITH QUEEN SCARLET?"
"Please don't get too close!" Inferno pleaded, taking a step backwards. "I'm not with Queen Scarlet!"
"She isn't," Seahorse concurred, quietly shifting his tail.
The angry SeaWing continued her stride, Ermine frantically clawing at the ground to try and stop her. As she felt the heat from Inferno's scales, she frowned, and her pace came to a halt.
"I'm so sorry about this," Inferno apologized. "I didn't mean to scare Ermine, I really don't want to hurt anyone and I'm with the Talons of Peace, please forgive me!"
The SeaWing cocked her head to the side and released her grasp of Ermine's tail. The IceWing immediately ran behind the SeaWing, keeping her bulk between himself and Inferno. "You're with the Talons of Peace?" she asked, surprised. "Why didn't you just say so?" She let out a happy laugh. "How's Riptide? Has he said anything about me recently?"
"Riptide?" Inferno asked. She thought for a moment. Of course. This must be Tsunami. "He's good," she explained quickly, "a bit busy with management, though. He thinks of you often, and misses you." That was true. She heard Riptide talking about Tsunami quite a bit.
Tsunami nodded in approval. "He's quite a good leader, isn't he?" Inferno didn't answer that. "It's been a while since we've talked last," Tsunami continued, "I'll need to go out there sometime soon, when my schedule here starts to clear up. You're Inferno, right?"
"Me?" Inferno asked. She nodded. "Yeah."
Tsunami swished her large tail back and forth, almost hitting Ermine with it. "Riptide mentioned you once or twice, but you've always been busy when I've visited the Talons. Well, I'm glad to meet you now. I would shake paws, but, well, you know."
Inferno decided not to tell Tsunami that Riptide always ordered her to stay out of the way when Tsunami visited. Making Riptide look bad in front of her might make her angry.
"Who are you?" Tsunami said, turning to Seahorse. She glanced up and down the other SeaWing. He was even larger than Tsunami, who was quite a big SeaWing to begin with. "Are you with the Talons too? I think I've seen you before."
"I'm Seahorse," Seahorse replied. "I joined the Talons of Peace after the war ended."
That was true, but a lot of the time Inferno felt like Seahorse had been around longer. Unlike Inferno, he seemed so integrated with the rest of the Talons, even if he didn't have many close friends among them. Whereas Inferno couldn't even get close without scaring dragons away.
"So, what are two Talons doing here?" Tsunami asked. "Did Riptide need you to send a message through the 'Dragon of Jade Mountain' or something? Does he need help?"
"Er, I was wondering if I could sleep here for a while," Inferno answered. Ash hadn't quite detailed what he wanted Inferno to do here. Did he want her to become a student? "I would like to learn more about the academy, I think. It seems like a nice place from what Riptide has said."
Tsunami thought for a moment, flicking her tail back and forth. Ermine whimpered quietly. "Are you planning on staying too?" she asked Seahorse. The SeaWing nodded in affirmation.
"I think we can do that," Tsunami continued, "any Talons of Peace are welcome here." Inferno let out a sigh of relief. She'd been worried Tsunami was going to reject her. "But," Tsunami started to say, "Starflight mentioned to me that we already have dragons staying in our guest room. It might be a bit crowded."
"Oh," Inferno answered worriedly. "How crowded?" Years of practice had made her very careful when in close quarters with other dragons, but she didn't want to try sleeping anywhere near anyone else. If she flicked her tail back and forth and accidentally tapped someone with it, it could be deadly.
"Not you," Tsunami interjected, "I can put you somewhere else; the guest room isn't fireproofed at the moment anyways. Speaking of that, I'll need to tell you about the firescales protocol we have here later. But Seahorse will have to stay in the same room with two other dragons. An IceWing and a hybrid, both around Inferno's age. Will that be a problem?"
"No," Seahorse answered, no hesitation in his voice. "Er, are there any other dragons with firescales here right now?"
Inferno glanced towards Seahorse. He must have known Peril was here too. Had he known that Inferno was worried about meeting Peril too? That was nice of him to ask.
"You mean Peril?" Tsunami clarified. "No, she's with Turtle and a few other students from the Jade Winglet in the rainforest, collecting fruit. Obviously not collecting the fruit herself. She's probably just there for moral support or something like that." Seahorse frowned, and looked slightly down-trodden at this. A sudden realization whacked Tsunami. "WHO LET PERIL GO TO THE RAINFOREST?" she roared, turning around and glaring directly into Ermine's eyes. "SHE'LL BURN IT DOWN!?"
Ermine squealed and bolted into the entrance of Jade Mountain, quickly disappearing within. Tsunami glared after him. "I'll bet they're not actually collecting fruit in the rainforest," she muttered. "They'll get a talking to after they get back."
She turned back towards Inferno and Seahorse, who'd both been startled by her outburst. "Ha ha, sorry about that," Tsunami apologized. "The Jade Winglet has an unfortunate . . . independent streak. A bit like me, back in my youth." According to the Dragonet Prophecy, Tsunami would only be nine. Not much older than Inferno herself. An adult, but definitely still 'in her youth.' Inferno decided not to mention that.
"That's alright," Inferno smiled. She was mainly just happy that Peril wouldn't be here, at least for a while.
Tsunami glanced up at the quickly darkening sky. "It's getting late. Lemme show you your rooms; I've got business to attend to. Like figuring out how to punish the Jade Winglet for whatever they've done now. Hopefully not deposing more queens." She turned around and started into the entrance hall of Jade Mountain.
"Deposing queens?" Inferno asked, following behind the headmaster.
Tsunami nodded, and gave out a long sigh. "It wasn't really their fault, but a couple years ago, they got caught up in Queen Scarlet's machinations and ended up restoring her to power. Now, I can't really say anything bad about Queen Scarlet because she's a queen and we're a professional academy that holds no biases in our education, but she's uglier than an eel and makes Burn and Blister seem like Blaze in comparison. She hates us, and if we didn't have Peril and the support of three kingdoms firmly behind us, she'd burn the mountain to the ground and put each and every one of our students in her horrid arena." Tsunami lit up a number of her glowstripes in succession and gave Seahorse a smirk.
Inferno couldn't speak Aquatic, but she guessed that Tsunami was saying something not so polite about Queen Scarlet. Inferno glanced over to Seahorse to see his response, but he continued looking ahead, his expression remaining unchanged. Tsunami snorted indignantly and turned around, back to facing forward.
As they headed to the guest room, the three passed by a small group of dragonets crowded around what looked like some sort of game, maybe seven or eight total. They appeared to be cheering on two players, moving small, flat pieces around on a checkered wooden board with various images engraved on them. A few were standing behind an orange RainWing with black stripes on her scales, staring intently at the board. "You can do it, Tiger!" Inferno overheard a small MudWing whisper.
As Tiger moved a wooden piece forwards, her opponent, a young dragon with crimson red streaks across their vivid black scales, smirked, an earring in the shape of a conch dangling from their right ear. "Are you sure you want to make that move?" they taunted Tiger. Inferno stared closer at Tiger's opponent. She hadn't seen any dragons who looked like that before in the Talons of Peace. Were they a hybrid? That would make sense. There were a couple of hybrids who'd decided to join the Talons of Peace after the war had ended. Inferno wondered what tribes this dragon was from.
Behind the black and red dragon, Inferno saw another dragonet, this one slightly older, peeking his head out to watch Inferno. He also appeared to be some sort of hybrid, with his scales a deep blue with lighter splotches, but his scale colors were ordinary — he could have passed as a normal SeaWing or NightWing if one didn't look too closely at him. He had webbing between his spines, but had no gills or glowscales like a normal SeaWing would, and an leather eyepatch over his left eye.
Inferno was surprised for a moment to see two hybrids at Jade Mountain, but thinking it over, it didn't seem that strange. Jade Mountain was one of the few places on Pyrrhia which claimed to be accepting of all dragons, regardless of what tribe and kingdom they hailed from. Of course there would be hybrids here. The blue-black hybrid continued to stare at Inferno, and raised a forepaw, waving it at her with a goofy grin. She shuddered slightly. She wasn't quite sure what it was, but something about him really put her on edge. She glanced back to the game.
Tiger was hesitating, her talon still on the piece, refusing to take it off until she was sure it was the right choice. "C'mon, Tiger!" a SandWing prodded in the background. Finally succumbing to the pressure, she lifted her talon off.
"Good choice!" the red-black hybrid exclaimed. "But I still win." They made their own move, and Tiger winced, realizing that she'd lost.
"Good game," Tiger muttered, still staring down at the board. "You win, Skytaker. Again."
Skytaker grinned as Tiger continued to map out her opponent's future moves.
"Can't you move this?" the MudWing next to Tiger suggested, pointing her talon to a piece.
Tiger shook her head. "I could, but they'd be able to place down the NightWing Queen I sacrificed earlier over here." She pointed to a different square. "I'd have three turns left before they captured my Empress."
Skytaker grinned, then turned towards the onlooking dragons. "HEY!" the hybrid yelled, startling Tiger so much that she rapidly turned her scales invisible, then slowly went back into view. "Are you just going to keep staring at me like that?"
Inferno opened her mouth to apologize, then realized that Skytaker wasn't talking to her. The hybrid's eyes were focused on Seahorse, who was looking at Skytaker with a grim look. The SeaWing opened his mouth to respond, but couldn't find the words to speak. Skytaker snorted.
"Sorry," Inferno quickly apologized to the hybrid. With the dragonets' attention turned to her, they started to realize from the heat radiating from her scales what she was.
"Firescales," she heard a SandWing whisper, "like Peril." Inferno winced.
Skytaker frowned, their eyes still locked with Seahorse. "Do I know you?" they asked accusingly.
Seahorse just barely tensed up. "Er, no," he answered, letting out an uncomfortable chuckle. Hiding his head in shame, he quickly started to walk away from the group of dragonets, catching up to a surprised Tsunami. Inferno gulped and went after him. She didn't want to hear more of what the dragonets had to say.
The three went further into the halls of the academy, none of the dragonets willing to follow Tsunami. As they got closer to the room, Tsunami turned to Inferno. "So, what are you?" she asked forwardly. "I mean, what's your position in the Talons. Riptide never told me. Are you like, their secret weapon or something? Their last line of defense?"
"N-no!" Inferno stammered, shocked. "No! I'd never intentionally hurt someone with my powers. I'm not a monster."
"Oh?" Tsunami pried curiously. "I suppose that makes sense. They're called the Talons of Peace, after all, I'm glad they're starting to live up to their name under Riptide. I just would have figured Morrowseer would have used you for something, like he used us." She said this last bit with hatred seething through her voice. "So why were you in the Talons, then, if not as Morrow's weapon?"
"Um," Inferno responded, "my mother brought me there because otherwise, I'd have been thrown off a cliff. That's what they do in the Sky Kingdom to dragons with my powers." It was probably for the better. Inferno was fortunate to have been raised in the Talons. They taught her to respect the lives of others, not to kill dragons whenever possible. But her mother and Avalanche had told that much of the Sky Kingdom, especially the southern regions, was militaristic in nature. A dragon with her abilities would be raised as a murderer. A weapon. Like Peril.
"Oh yeah, that's true," Tsunami commented, "I think Peril might have told me that. It takes a dragon like Kestrel to actually go through with something like killing your own dragonets, though."
Inferno squirmed uncomfortably, keeping her wings clenched to her sides. Even if she wasn't actually around, it felt like everyone was talking about Peril here. Comparing Inferno to her. Inferno was nothing like Peril, right?
Tsunami finally stopped, Inferno taking a careful step back as she did. She pointed a webbed talon to a small room off the side of the corridor. "This is the guest room, where Seahorse will be staying."
Seahorse poked his head inside. It was dark, and the guest room was slightly barren. There were a few small desks scattered about, along with a wooden scrollshelf on the wall, with only a few scrolls in it. A few leather pouches and waterskins were scattered across the floor, below a small rocky ledge with a young IceWing sleeping on it. He opened an eye and grumbled, glaring at the newcomer.
"What are you doing?" he growled threateningly at Seahorse, seeing him as an intruder. "Get out of my room, unless you want to get my claws down your snout." He stretched out his claws, a small silver bracelet visible on his left forearm.
Seahorse snorted. "It's the guest room," he answered, stepping forward and bringing his entire humongous form into the IceWing's eyes. He bared his teeth. "And I'm a guest."
Polar tensed up slightly, seeing the sheer power in the SeaWing's jaws. He could snap his neck in two with a single bite. He started to furiously think of ways to defeat him if he attacked, but Seahorse just turned away to another rocky ledge. "Is anyone sleeping here?" he asked.
"No," Polar muttered under his breath, defeated. Ink was sleeping on a different ledge. "You better not be noisy."
Seahorse flicked his tongue out of his mouth. "Believe me. You won't hear a thing." It was all Polar could do not to gulp. Don't show fear. Don't show weakness.
Seahorse dropped his cloth sack to the ground with a large 'clang' of metal, then placed down his and Inferno's waterskin, keeping his scrollcase beneath a wing as he laid himself down to sleep.
What is with this dragon? Polar wondered, his talons shaking. Pure power resonated through every movement he'd made. Not even the strongest First Circle IceWing could make him tremble like this. There was something unnatural here, and he didn't like it. It would be very difficult for him to get a good sleep tonight. Part NightWing or not, at least Ink was just cute and unintimidating.
Seeing that Seahorse was situated, Tsunami turned back to Inferno. "C'mon," she yawned, "let's get you to your room."