The dreamy white landscape faded away as snow melted around the forest. Slushy snow was falling off the trees. It was mid-March and the climate was changing, at least, it was to Blade, who was getting further and further from the snowy regions of Sauria. She stumbled through the brush, clutching her stomach in hunger. All she wanted was something to eat, but she had to keep moving. She stepped over some branches, and experienced a sharp cold feeling on her head, she shrieked as snow flowed off her head from a branch above her. She slowly regained her senses and wiped the slush from her hair, cursing at the cold.

"You're not seriously thinking about it….are you?" Blade's ears perked up as she heard a voice, she spun around to see Scales, who had been stealthily following her.

"What do you want?" Blade muttered

"I'm just telling you, Cloudrunner Palace is a long ways away, and you don't even have winter wear on, you're going to freeze to death."

"Why have you been following me?"

"I have nothing else to do, I was just curious why you're going through all this trouble." after Scales said this, Blade's stomach growled loudly.

"Ah, you're hungry too, aren't you? That's not going to help any-"

"Just stop it already!" Blade spat.

"Hey, I could help you get some food, you must have forgotten how to catch food, since you've been away from Sauria so long, huh?" Blade hated to ask anyone for help, but at this point, she couldn't afford not to.

"Fine."

"Good, just don't go complaining to me about anything, we are still enemies." Scales leapt ahead of Blade.

"There's a river nearby, the fish should be out, there's not much snow now." Scales said. Blade silently curled her lips in a smile, for her favorite food just happened to be fish. Fresh fish would be even better. The two neared the river in a cautious motion. There were many fish swimming around, and Blade's eyes lit up, but as hungry as she was, she knew she couldn't eat yet. First they would have to catch the fish. Scales scanned the waters and darted into the river faster than Blade, she spread water everywhere with her feet..

"Gotcha!" Scales yelled as she brought her hand in the air, holding a fish by the tailfin, in squirmed in her hand, but she quickly rendered it motionless.

"That was fast." Blade said, gazing in awe.

"Maybe if you had the skills you could catch one too." Scales said in a boasting manner. This angered Blade, and she scanned the river quickly, once she spotted a fish, she brought her hand down to the water in a quick motion, but her claws only dug into the riverbed.

"Try harder." Scales said, and Blade kept trying. She wanted so much to prove Scales wrong, but she couldn't. Scales continued gathering fish from the river as Blade sat and watched.

The sun was down by now, Blade and Scales sat on opposite sides with their fish in a pile, and a bunch of wood in-between them.

"Well?" Scales gave a cold stare to Blade.

"What?"

"Aren't you going to use your great fire element to light a bonfire?" Blade hesitated for a moment, but then nodded. She extended her arm to the fire and waved her hand, the fire sparked from her hand to the wood and ignited it. Blade and Scales sighed as they tried to get warm around the fire.

"So, you want to see your mother again?" Scales said.

"Yes, I have to find out for myself what is going on, she's the only one that could help right now, she has all the power in the Cloudrunner tribe-"

"No, your mother is not the Queen anymore, I told you already, a new Cloudrunner has taken her place." Scales scoffed

"I just want to talk to her." Blade said as she took a fish from the pile and cooked it over the fire.

"Fine, if you think you can just fix everything somehow, then fine." Scales cooked a piece of fish as well.

"I know I can't just fix everything, but I have to at least get to know what exactly is going on! My tribe is slowly failing, there's no way it will last if a new ruler is trying to take over Sauria." Blade crunched the fish between her teeth and sat back against a tree.

"Well whatever, if you want to go that's fine, but I'm not going to save you if get chased by RedEye or something like that."

"I'll be fine, don't worry."

"Oh trust me, I won't."

The two sat and ate quietly. They both knew, tomorrow would be the day,

The day that Blade would find her mother.