Reviewer Response

To BunnyBlues (SatelliteBlues now): Oh don't worry, it's not fatal. Yeah, the ember bit was shoehorned in there, but it was to prove a point. Spyro can and will lash out Violently. I use violently lightly because all he did was immobilize her, but had the potential to do much more harm.

To Sol1234: Sides will be taken.

Note: edited out duplicate paragraph, and other fuck-ups

Chapter 8: I Will WaitSong: I Will Wait - Mumford and Sons

A week had passed. The Guardians had been alerted the day after Cynder's short freedom and containment - they were not very pleased hearing that. All of them walked the lonely-night streets of Warfang together as they mumbled among themselves on what to do now. At this hour, nobody but them and the nightshift guard force was awake, making this the perfect time to both talk and get some cool, fresh air. The lack of information was the thing that was keeping them from being able to make a sound decision. Was it really possible to remove a soul from a body? Were the Buteos really capable of doing such an action if it was true? What would happen to Cynder her soul was taken from her body? There was no telling what could happen.

Even more of a hard-to-make decision was not tell Spyro about this in any way, shape, or form of the news of Cynder. No matter how much he might ask them to tell him about her, they simply couldn't tell him of the news, no matter how much they try to manipulate the story. The last thing that they needed was an emotionally compromised dragon chasing after his lover in a vain attempt to rescue her. As admirable of a task that would be, they needed him to be an emotionally compromised dragon able to fight off enemy soldiers.

While that was highly inconsiderate of them to withhold the information of Spyro's lover, they needed him in the Realms more than the far away land that the Buteos lived in. That's not to say though that they were not doing their part, the most certainly were doing their best.

Terrador had already begun drafting war plans for the eventual Quillian invasion, which in his mind sounded completely insane. If the intelligence he had at his disposal given through the claims of Cynder and corroborated by the Chronicler's dream messages, then the whole premise of an invasion from thousands of miles away was an endeavor that did not make sense to a dragon that had decades of battlefield leadership and combat experience. All of them but Pyra – she had been in a position working a nurse at the time - had seen some battlefield leadership position in one form or another. To all of them, the invasion was an enigma.

Cyril was still remaining quiet of the news of the death of Spyro's parents. He would continue to go to his room to check on him every now and then and found some positive improvements. Spyro had reported that the plaguing nightmares had let up in their intensity and frequency. However, he was still dealing with the loss of his parents, which was somewhat of a detractor. All and all, it was sort of unpredictable on how the purple dragon would be next week or next month.

Volteer had continued to dig through archives looking for answers to Spyro's condition. The task was a grueling one, but one that was gaining some progress. The old dragon was not prepared for just how deep that the rabbit hole would go. One potential lead would end with a rare manuscript that would be over a thousand years old - potentially even non-existent. With his current findings, there were plenty of hit-and-miss opportunities to come.

Pyra had been using foresight in the hopes that a vision of what is to come will appear. Of the many, she had seen, without any context made no sense whatsoever. A repeated motif was that of a prominent evergreen tree with a Buteo staring intently at it. Other than that, it was a repeat of what had been seen when Cynder had been there with them. She continued vigilantly for a new vision but had no luck in doing so, at least not yet.

Yet in all of their minds, the thought of the invasion was taking the forefront. If they were to be coming from the north, then the northernmost shores of the Dragon Realms would be their first target. It was easy to order soldiers to the coast, but convincing them of the threat was something that they could not so easily do. Even then, they had the advantage. The northern shore was mostly cliffs with very few access points from the beach up to the clifftops and plains that stretch far into the Realms. It would not be difficult to fortify these positions ahead of time and prepare a defensive of dragon soldiers.

What worried them was if they broke through the defensive line at the shore. After scaling up the cliffs, there would be no telling how far they would march in the plains before a true countering force could be mobilized to engage the Buteos. And that was not taking into consideration that they might try to open up a new front if that one didn't work. A successful defense of the Dragon Realms would require the whole cooperation of all the races, which was spotty at best.

That was not to say they were fucked when it happened. After the previous war, there were plenty of veterans to go around that would have more than enough combat experience to handle any invasion by a force fresh out of training. But there were other factors that were an uncertainty. How far along was their technological progress? It was easy to defeat an enemy that uses sticks and stones but one capable of mass-producing high-quality weapons was one that was much more capable.

They returned to the temple sometime later. They all went to their respective rooms for the night where they would rest for the following days to come. Little did they know that this rest would become extremely scarce in a few short weeks away.

/

Spyro woke in the middle of the night seemingly for no reason whatsoever. 'Ah shit, here we go again,' he thought to himself thinking that there would be more torture by his dark reflection. Time passed and nothing happened. That was a good sign. He figured that if he was going to be awake then he would make the most of it before going back off to bed again. First off was the standard trip to the bathroom where he gladly relieved himself. From there, it was to roam the temple halls and maybe get a small midnight snack or a drink of water if he desired one.

It was a strange feeling to walk through the halls at night, it was a somewhat calming experience. The dim light from burners on the wall gave off the inner walls a rustic feeling as flame danced, casting out light and shadows on the stone walls. He was sure to tread quietly to keep the guardians from waking. Where that would take him was outside.

Spyro made his way to a balcony. He walked over to the center of it and sat down on his haunches. Gazing up, he marveled at the stars. Many people had their interpretations of what the stars actually were. Some said that they were the ancestors watching them from above in their constellations. Others said that they were distant suns where other planets resided. He didn't care which was correct – he would be long dead before anyone would be able to fly that high to find out. Those shimmering dots in the distance were useful though: It gave light to a pitch-black night, providing navigational aids, and giving the curious-minded something to be in awe over.

Navigation… It reminded him of Cynder's journey. She had been gone for quite a bit, just shy of two weeks. Sure, diplomatic journeys take their time, but it was with each passing day that he began to think of her more and wonder what might have happened in that far off land. If he could, he would ask the Chronicler to tell him what had happened. There was, of course, the option of asking the Guardians to relay the information back and forth, which he would take under thoughtful consideration. Until then, he would have to believe in her strength and abilities.

He sat out there a little bit longer before going back inside to his room. This was a moment sent graced by the ancestors. There was no nightmare tonight, nor was there one last night. Those that he did have were much less intensive than the ones that he had previously. They even felt shorter and less painful too. Maybe now he would get better from whatever that plagued him. That though was one that he shouldn't have thought. His dark reflection was always present, even when he didn't feel his presence.

/

When Spyro returned to his room, he joyfully flopped onto the large cushion that he called a bed. He very quickly slipped back into slumber, only to find himself in the same place as he did when it all first began. "Are you kidding me?" Spyro asked with a sigh. He was already preparing himself for what was to come. He had almost become immune to the torture that he had undergone almost every night, becoming mentally numb to it all.

Dark Spyro naturally came to him, appearing to come out of the Dark Aether beam. This time, there was no attacks of the physical or breath kind, instead, the dark reflection just walked up to the dragon and sat down five feet in front of him. "No. I am not kidding you." Dark Spyro said in that very distinct voice again. It sent a chilling tingle down Spyro's spine all the way to the very tip of his tail. Spyro was familiar with the sound Dark Spyro ordinarily – a distorted version of his own – but this was entirely different. There was malice in that voice so strong that it was undeniable.

"Then what do you want? If you are going to torture me like you usually do, then why don't you start and get it over with?"

"Many reasons. For one, I feel a little bit nicer. There will be no disembowelment, or ripping your head off, or reducing you to bones, or-"

"Yeah, yeah. What's your point?" Spyro interrupted the dark reflection. Even a shallow-minded person could see that Dark Spyro was high on the thought of torturing the purple drake, so much to the point where he was getting sidetracked from his original conversation in mind. The entity just stared back at him with his blank and empty while eyes.

"Second is that I can tell you are getting used to this. I can sense it. Every night, you surrender to the fact that you will be coming here to face me, where you will lose every time for as long as I am in control here. You've become acclimated, and I intend on not allowing you to do that."

"What is it that you want again? I can't help but feel that all you are doing is getting off to this."

"I know you know just as well as I do. Full control, not just here, all of it."

"Still not going to happen."

"Very well then… Have it your way."

Dark Spyro vanished in a cloud of black smoke. From there, the scenery shifted from one of darkness to that of a flat grassy field with a starry sky above him. There was nothing for as far as the eye could see. Only grass and the sky above him. It was a nice change in

scenery, sure, but there was something odd about it all that Spyro couldn't quite put his finger on. The thought that Dark Spyro would put him here was in a way more scary than if he had put him in a place to maim him even further. If that was all, then why did he put him here?

He walked cautiously through the field, making sure that there were no traps or anything that might have been used to trick him. There was nothing. This whole place was nothing. The usual time that he would spend in these dreams had passed and he had expected to return to the real world by now. Minutes turned into hours and hours turned into literal days here. All the while there still being nothing but the grass and the sky.

It didn't take him long to figure out just what Dark Spyro was trying to do. He had been trying to break him through physical and perpetual torture whenever he could. He was switching his tactics. Spyro had become accustomed to the perpetual violence to the point where it was becoming ineffective. If Dark Spyro couldn't break him through violence, he would drive him insane through isolation.

No time appeared to pass on the gassy plane, all without charge or interruption. For Spyro, the change was a welcomed one. There was not one-sided fighting that had been the staple of a night's rest. He began to regret it when his belly growled with hunger and throat dried. Spyro even tried to subside on eating the grass at his feet only to become down with a horrible case of diarrhea and bouts of vomiting. Worse yet was the idea that he would remain here until he died. That is if he could.

For what felt like weeks in this space, he starved and thirsted to no avail. His form began to languish as his hide began to pull up against his bones. His decaying state was not his only trouble. By that point, the isolation was beginning to take its toll on his mental wellbeing. With nothing else to do, he looked up at the sky just like he did when he was awake. That was all that he could do.

They drifted in the sky in a perpetual night. In this world of isolation, there was nothing to look forward to or back on – a constant state of meaningless existence. With nothing else but the fantasies of his own mind to keep him company, he shifted the world to his liking. The stars strewn about in a meaningless fashion began to make shapes and patterns that pleased his mind's craving for some form of interaction. For him, the one thing he desired most to see was his lover. The stars above him complied with his wish as they seemingly arranged themselves into her form above him. He began a conversation with the astral representation of Cynder. She talked back.

An unknown amount of time had passed. They continued back and forth to each other, each finding a new topic if the other one got old. Spyro with what strength he had left in his body rolled over on his back, planting his horns in the ground to keep his weary eyes to the sky. As far as he was concerned, this hallucination was better than the nothingness that had been before. They continued on.

"Cynder… I miss you." Spyro's voice was weak but still audible for the starry projection to hear him.

"I miss you too." the projection spoke back in Cynder's voice. It was like a symphony to his ears.

"Please come down here so that I might see you… you're so far away."

"I can't."

"Please..."

"I'm stuck here. I can't leave here, no matter how much I try to."

"I am too. Please keep trying. I would if I could."

Spyro laid there for what felt like years. Both he and astral Cynder kept trying to reach each other, both of them not seeing much success while doing so for obvious reasons: Spyro being physically incapable of and astral Cynder being made up of stars bound in the sky. It was a tragic scene. The tortured mind of Spyro had created a false reality to comfort him in his isolated pain, and yet that very mind's understanding of the stars kept the thing he desired the most from coming down to him.

Ages passed by once again as they continued to yearn for each other. Spyro's figure continued to decay further until his hide was tightly stretched over a skeletal frame with little to no muscle to speak of. Cynder's continued to grow in magnificence as more stars added to the night. Optimistically, he thought that maybe that extra star in her wings would be enough to allow her to soar to the earth below him. Meanwhile, he couldn't help but cry at how poor of shape that he became.

They continued to have their conversations of course. In their minds, there was always something to talk about, even if they had already talked about in one of the many 'days' that had passed. It was at that point that astral Cynder came to dominate the sky with her radiance. Maybe then she would be able to come down to him and relieve him of the desire to see her up close rather than far away. He beckoned to her one more time.

"Cynder, do you think that you are able to come down now?"

"I can try." As the sky lit up with her beating wings, Spyro's jaw dropped with awe. The heavens danced above him in an almost rhythmic fashion. "It's working! It's working!"

"I knew you could do it. But how far away are you?"

"I don't know. I'll be there soon, don't worry."

"That's okay. I can wait… I will wait."

For the first time, Spyro felt alive again. Knowing that the love of his life was no longer bound to the sky and was coming to see him. He saw her running down at him. With what strength he had, he extended his front paws our to meet her with an embrace when she arrived. That would take a lot longer than he thought it would. For what felt like a lifetime, he could see that she was finally close. And like that, she was upon him.

He cried tears of joy knowing that he wasn't truly alone anymore and that his lover finally reached him. Time, however, was a much more degrading thing than he had thought. He felt his mind fading from him and a sense of tiredness that was welcoming, nearly as welcoming as his lover's embrace. "I've waited for so long," he said joyfully, but weakly. Their lips met each other in a long, drawn-out kiss. Spyro's eyes closed for the final time. Both he and astral Cynder faded away along the grassy field. The realm returned to what it had been previously: a dark void and the beam of Dark Aether

Dark Spyro materialized near the beam of was both touched and disappointed. He had to give the purple dragon credit where credit was due. He had not expected him to manifest in his pocket realms what was just a hallucination. And while he was the opposite of all that Spyro represented, he was not without emotion. He couldn't help but feel emotionally moved. It was worrying to him was that Spyro was able to manifest something within his realm. However, if he was too engrossed to know that he was able to do this regularly, then Dark Spyro's plan of breaking him would be significantly harder.

/

When he woke back up, the morning light was shining. He was glad it was over, but deep down was already missing that moment. Spyro knew that the Cynder that he saw there was not real and was a figment of his imagination; he didn't care if it was or not. For a brief moment in what was an entire lifetime in isolation, he was at peace. He remained unmoving from the bed cushion for a while, silently crying to himself – not of sadness, but of happiness.

It was a late-night order at Fort Ledura that had every ever veteran and fresh recruit's heart-stirring. It was a mobilization order from Field Martial Parker O'Brian himself – well, only signed by him – to prepare for deployment to the Dragon Realms effective immediately. The whole fort was in an organized rush to prepare for the deployment, making sure the horses were fed and that they had all of their supplies ready for transport. Among the first to have everything in their kit prepared was Lyle.

Poor Lyle. He was granted only those days of leave and only that. That meant that the only time that the had was to spend it with his grieving mother and relatives for only a short while before having to leave back to the fort. While he was there though, he a question that he had been wondering for a while since his father had screamed it. "Same applies to you too, you cheating bitch!" His father's words echoed in Lyle's mind. His mother had known the answer to that question.

Twenty years ago, Derick had a girlfriend before he had met what would be Lyle's mother. The two were almost perfect for each other. They loved each other deeply, even sneaking off to do the deed on certain occasions. They had a small falling out that made the relationship difficult but didn't end it. Well, when the news that a soldier had felled the most powerful dragon that the dark army had, she left him for the soldier that killed the dragon. That soldier was Bradan. Bradan did not know that she had just left another man fifteen minutes before meeting him so went along with it while Derick watched closely from the sidelines. The hate that he felt for her was naturally passed along to Bradan. In the end, it was just a big misunderstanding whose consequences would end up in the loss of his life.

With that behind him, he continued to help the others at the fort. They were unsure of when they would be shipped out. All they knew was that they were told to prepare for deployment and that is exactly what they were doing.

He had to think though of just where the war would take them. They were still, by all means, fresh recruits still in training. There was no way they were totally ready to go fight on the flanks or skirmish behind the lines. Unless they planned on having them continue their training but closer to their point of deployment. He could not be certain, but whatever time they had away from the battle was one that he and his group needed to continue to hone their skills.

/

The Metaphysics

team had worked at a brake-neck pace to live up to the goals that they had set. To contain the black dragon in the dungeon below, they had to devise methods to soul extraction and transport that would allow for effective containment. This lead to some interesting discoveries that perplexed them further than they already had been. For instance, a soul could be stored in an inanimate object for a short time before becoming unstable - requiring a host vessel to stay in this world, otherwise, it moves on to a higher plane of existence or, in laymen's terms, an afterlife. They learned that one the hard way. Those set for execution were used as test subjects from then on.

Many working in the project were not sure if they had made enough progress to be able to remove and contain elsewhere the soul of Cynder. Sure, they had been able to do such procedures on Buteos, but dragons were clearly much a more dominant and powerful species than Buteos were. There was no telling if the soul of a dragon held a heavier weight that kept their as-developed procedure from working. The only way to tell was to try it, and they were in the final hour.

Cynder had been inspected by a medical examiner to determine the extent of the bodily injuries that she had sustained from Bradan sending her through the floor twice and thrown hard against a stone wall as well as the lance wound that Lyle had inflicted. It had been determined that the lance's damage had no lasting effect on the vital organs of the dragon. The injuries that had been sustained by Bradan was much more severe. Her legs had been broken as well as plenty of rips. It was a miracle that one of the fragments from the breakage hadn't caused any internal bleeding.

It was becoming clear that her injuries were healing and at a rate that I impossibly fast for a Buteo. It had been documented that dragons could use red gems for healing, but there were no red gems around nor was there any collected for study when they were last generated. Perhaps their natural healing was faster, but that was something that they would have to study later. While Cynder might be incapacitated and unable to do anything without intense pain following, there was no telling when she would be able to phase into shadow again, and that simply could not be allowed.

They worked all throughout the night as they had throughout the week to get it down right, and they were confident that what they had was going to work. With that, they prepared. The circle of the ground with a gap left in it to prevent it from activating before they were ready. It was not all that different than Bradan had prepared it, but more compacted to save on floor space. Then came up with the question of what will happen to her body if there is no soul in it for prolonged periods of time. If there was no soul in the body, you could consider it dead or at least comatose. They didn't want her body to physically die for the sake of containment, so solutions had to be found.

"We could have one of the work shifts living in her body. That way one of us could keep her alive by meeting her needed intake of food and water," one alchemist said. That would work, but that was another can of worms that they were not too eager to work on.

"What about returning her to it for a short while?" another one asked. That out of all of them would be the last resort. They couldn't risk a containment breach. Off to the side, a quiet alchemist raised his voice.

"What if we petrify the body? No bodily maintenance is needed and we can at any time reverse the spell at any time we need to. It might also make for a great decoration somewhere." Everyone in the room went quiet for a moment, followed by hushed discussion among themselves of this proposed idea. It was the easiest of them to deal with, and it wasn't out of their ability to petrify and de-petrify something. The exhausted team ran one more experiment to see if they could do it.

Another death row inmate was brought in and was used as the test subject. They first removed his soul and contained it in a quartz crystal for temporary storage – the crystal changing from its ordinary clear-ish white to that of light blue. They then petrified the body and let it sit for ten minuted before reversing it and returning the soul back to the body. The inmate was completely fine save for the mental shock of all that had happened. They knew at that moment that it could work. They removed the inmate from the laboratory and reset the circle. They were ready for Cynder.

She was retrieved from had become the de facto dungeon of the palace – a guard tower – and escorted to the laboratory. Cynder was visibly anxious for what was about to come, although she was not sure what to expect. There was no chance of escaping this on and she knew it. She had royally fucked up and she knew it. She knew that she should have listened to the advice of the Chronicler.

"Are you ready, Cynder?" Bradan asked her. Bradan meant it in a genuine, sincere way. Cynder only saw it as mocking.

"You're taking my soul, why would I be ready?" She retorted in a very smart ass tone. Bradan leaned in close to and whispered in her ear.

"Because unlike some people where that would gladly destroy it in an instant, I intend on giving you a chance." A chance? He raised back up and made an announcement to the room at large. "I will oversee her soul's disposal once the procedure is completed."

Another alchemist walked forward with a large quartz crystal. "The crystal, sir." The alchemist handed the crystal to Bradan, who placed it gently down in the circle along with Cynder.

"Thank you. Prepare for the procedure." He told the other alchemist who nodded in response to the order.

"Bradan, what are you going to do with me?" Cynder asked, her voice quivering in fear - fear if the unknown - of the uncertainty of what's to come.

"You'll have to wait and see."

"Then... I guess I will wait."

Everything was ready, all that was needed was the circle on the floor to have the gap filled, then Bradan took the crystal to dispose of her for good. He stepped out of the circle and look at her for a final time. "Why don't you strike your best pose while you are at it?" He suggested. In turn, Cynder slowly but surely did. She sat tall and proud as if to give them one defiant look before the inevitable defeat. "Any last words?"

"Fuck you."

Bradan smirked. "How classy. I like that attitude." He told her. "Let the procedure begin."

Those that had been opposed to the idea looked away from the black dragon in the center of the lab while those supporting were eager to watch. It was the one that handed over the crystal to fishing the circle with one quick motion of a paintbrush. The circle was complete and the mysterious energy that they still fail to adequately understand came rushing out from it, blasting through the young dragon.

The seconds felt like minutes as they waited for the quartz crystal to fill with color, indicating that it had contained a soul. The crystal began to shift color slowly from its clear-ish white to that if something they hadn't expected: a vibrant golden color. It worried them that it wasn't enough to remove the soul because of the time that it was taking for the crystal to fill with color. It wasn't until it flashed brightly that they were alerted to the procedure's completion. They had done it. They had finally permanently contained a dragon.

They waited a couple of seconds longer before they broke the circle and the mysterious energy stopped to ensure that the procedure was complete for sure; the dragon in the center was unmoving and the quartz crystal was shining vibrantly. Soon after, the spell of petrification was cast on the still upright body. They watched with amazement as they frankly beautiful form of Cynder began to change into cold, hard stone. The petrification was a bottom-up process, morphing the body's tissues to stone at the bottom and gradually working its way up before the whole body was converted into a statue. Some say that before her face had been converted that her still-open eyes let loose a stream of tiers, the process petrifying them too.

Nodding in approval of the overall success, Bradan picked up the golden crystal and made his way to the exit. There were some in the room that gave him reassuring nods while others would avoid all eye contact at all costs. In the end, it was his decision and nobody else. "Put that statue out in the lobby for decoration or stash that in the sturdiest part of the vault," Bradan said as he gingerly carried the crystal out of the laboratory. "No damage to that statue will be tolerated."

This moment was a monumentous one in the terms of the implication, but Bradan was not all that sure on how to feel about it all. On one hand, he had successfully found a way to contain her but at what cost?He exited the lab and made his way to the exit to the palace gardens and walking trails. He needed to find some living organism that he could put her soul into to keep it from moving onto the afterlife. There was no wild game on the walking trails that he could put her in. There was one other option, however. One of the walking trails had an unofficial path faintly worn out by foot traffic from long ago. This trail was a winding one,

but one that when traveled to its end would lead to one of the tallest hills in deepest part the royal estate parklands. At the top of the hill was a singe young White Spruce tree. He was unsure of it, but he was willing to try. He would bound her soul to a tree.

As an added precaution, he quickly preformed the soul-extracting procedure by cutting up the grass and exposing the dirt in the shape of the iconography and the circle that bound that all together. He wasn't all that devout when it came to dealing with the gods nor the lesser deities and spirits so he was not all that worried that he would face retaliation for what he did to whatever spirit he might have just evicted from their home. Even if he did, he was more than willing to accept what he did to him for all that he has done. With that done, he began the procedure to move Cynder's into the young tree. Once completed, he saw the color drain from the quartz before it had completely lost all trace of the vibrant gold – the crystal back to its empty, clear-ish white color. It had been done.

Assuming that she might be able to hear him somehow, he expressed his apologies. "I'm sorry for all that I had to put you through, but I couldn't have out on the lose again. I also couldn't have you giving any information back to the Realms either. And for clarification, I have nothing to gain from the war but I have to support it because of my profession." Bradan sat down in front of the White Spruce tree with his legs crossed. With that over, it was the perfect time to vent on all that he was feeling.

"You know, a lot of people didn't support the invasion. Remember Bevan? Yeah, even he didn't want to go through with it either. There was no victory condition… We literally could have just occupied a small section of the northern coast of the Dragon Realms and the invasion would have been a success and the war a victory by a technicality. The news of your arrival was kept in the highest circles of the kingdom's political and military leadership but the news of you killing Royal Guardsmen and charging at the King and Queen was most certainly not. If there is one thing that you never do in conflict, and that is going after the leaders, especially if they are monarchs. Now the whole kingdom knows about what you did was is crying for war.

"You've galvanized the nation together under a cause now. I can see the nationwide headlines in the newspapers: "Dragon attempts murder of the royal family! any guardsmen dead!" Heh, I thought the army twenty years ago was large, I can't wait to see how much bigger it can get after that rallies the people. It was an admirable cause to come here by yourself to our distant land to stop a war that you somehow knew was coming in advance, but in the end, you've done the opposite of try to stop it, you've only escalated it."

Bradan lifted himself off the ground and picked up the quartz crystal. He was ready to walk down the hill and out of the woods back to the laboratory. He turned back to the tree one last time. "If it makes anything up for the animosity between us now, I will do my best to take care of the tree you now inhabit. Your body back in the palace has been preserved. Maybe in the future, I will return you back to your body and you can go free. But for now, I leave you as you are." And like that, he was gone. Like a new chapter in their lives, the sun rose on a world at a crossroads.

It saddened Ignitus of how things were unfolding. Not only was there a presumed large reconnaissance presence in the Dragon Realms as evident by the accidental encounter by the green dragon Petra and her son Gran't, but also the slim chance for the rescue of Cynder was now gone. The Buteo Bradan did exactly what he said that he would. Yes, her body was stone and he soul bound in a tree, but those could surely be reversed somehow. If Spyro could turn Gaul into stone with Dark Aether, then perhaps the power of Light Aether would have a restorative property. Oddly though, the Book of Dragons listed her in the pages even though she was technically not dead. He didn't make the rules on what classifies as death and what does not, he just had to keep the book.

What he did have to document however was the war, which now had enough events to start documenting. Like any good conflict, it needed a fitting name. The Quillum-Realms war? The Hawk and Dragon war? The Buteo-Draco war? The last one sounded the best to Ignitus. He willed forth a book of appropriate size that would be needed to document the entirety of the war. What he was not expecting was that instead of one large book, there were several stacks of books of a massive proportion. They were three feet wide and three feet tall but were incredibly thick. The pages were already numbered, which would have been a relief if not for the fact that the numbers reached an intimidating ten-thousand.

Ignitus let out a prolonged sigh. If it would take this many books to document this war, then he was going to have a task much larger than he had ever expected to undertake and the war much longer than what he originally had thought. With a heavy heart, he levitated one of the books up as well as willing forth a scriber's quill – it was magic with no need for ink as it just appears on the page – and began to write down the casualties and fatalities. The first dragon causality was Petra for being shot in the leg and accidental burning from tumbling into a campfire. The first fatality to be documented was Cynder. He didn't like the fact that he had to write her as a fatality knowing that she was still technically alive, but he wasn't going to have the records mismatch because of a technicality – that would be dishonest of him to do so.

He wasn't sure if he should have that information relayed to the guardians or not. News like that would get misconstrued very quickly if not properly communicated. He was lucky that they had done a good job of keeping sensitive information to themselves. If this information got leaked out to the general public or the ancestors forbid Spyro, then the panicked reactions were likely to cause pandemonium. In the end, he would give in and share the information of Cynder's documented death but explain to them in detail that due to technicalities that she was still alive. Maybe they will keep hushed about it. But it would only be a matter of time before they would have to give in and let him know that she wasn't going to be coming back anytime soon.

He looked back at the stack of book, then towards his pool of vision. By the way that things were going, he was not all that thrilled to go take a gander at them. He gave in and decided to go look in the pool. The only visions that he saw were that of the conflict to come. Those of an army on the move somewhere, a fleet of exotic looking ships engaging ships crewed by dragons and canines, and that of a group of Buteos flying over a group of terrified dragon soldiers.

Not a whole lot, but I accomplished a lot that I was wanting to this chapter. Sorry if it took a bit longer to post this than the other chapters, but I was taking it a little easy after that massive 15k word chapter; I'm not going to be doing one of those for while. Anyways, I hope all of you had a great Thanksgiving. I'll see all of you next update.

-Abyssal