I do not own Wings of Fire.

PART TWO: WINGS OF SKY

Chapter 9

If the world had ended and everything had gone up in flames and smoke and death, Cerulean wouldn't have noticed. If she dropped dead - well, three moons, she was already pretty sure she was.

Because there was absolutely no way that this was happening.

Nope. No way. Her talons weren't red. She suddenly didn't possess blazing copper and orange scales, her wings were certainly not larger, and the ability to breathe fire was fake too.

No. No way. She was definitely still Cerulean. She was still the weird dragonet of her family. She was still the heir to the throne. She was still in the Sea Kingdom, with her friends - maybe not for long - looking at her like they'd seen ghosts, or maybe discovered that Blister was now the queen of the SandWings, or Anemone and Auklet were still alive.

And yet, she very clearly was no longer herself - or who she'd been.

She looked up from her talons, gleaming harshly in the dim lights from the library, the paperweight she'd enchanted glinting as well, but perhaps not as brightly - she looked up, and saw that Storm had once again buried herself in scrolls, furiously scanning and dismissing each one without barely touching them.

Chrysocolla still remained with an intensely confused expression on her snout, and Archipelago looked like he might faint.

Cerulean swallowed thickly, one of her talons finding the orca necklace that was still around her neck, then finding her bracelet that kept her at the perfect temperature, and then the earring that Orca had also given her. Still the same. Therefore, she thought illogically, everything else was surely the same.

And yet.

Nope. No way. Everything was very different.

She swallowed thickly again, and then spoke - "I'm - " and then broke off again, because of course her voice had also changed with her transformation. It was no longer Cerulean-sounding; no longer weak and unsure, revealing every emotion and, in her opinion, always seconds away from cracking. No. It was...better. It was louder, stronger, less terrified, revealed less emotion...it was a voice similar to the one Orca used when addressing some dignitary who was annoying her, the voice Cerulean wanted as her queen voice.

But she wanted this voice as her voice, not whatever she'd turned into. She also wanted everything to stop, because thinking of all the weirdness that had just happened and all the logic that wasn't there was making her brain hurt.

"I'm - " she tried again, wincing once more at how she sounded now, before plowing on with what she was trying to say. "I'm a SkyWing, aren't I."

It was more of a statement than a question.

"Well," Archipelago began, then looked to Chrysocolla, who very much looked like she wanted him to explain things.

"Well," she tried too, using a different tone of voice than Archipelago had used.

"Well," Archipelago repeated, sounding very agreeable.

"Well," Chrysocolla echoed, but now she sounded informative.

Perhaps they thought that they could get away with saying one word and not explaining anything as long as they just said that one word in a different way.

"I mean it," Cerulean interrupted, and winced as she saw them wince at her voice - no longer nervous or scared; now, she sounded regal and intimidating. "I'm still Cerulean. I swear on the moons that I am - it's just. Something's changed. I'm a SkyWing. I know that. Just tell me that."

"Well," Archipelago intoned, but he went on, "it appears you are. But yes, you're still Cerulean. We think. Unless you've been replaced somehow. Which it also appears you have been. But I don't understand. We heard you enchant that paperweight - we know the spell you put on it. So I mean, you did tell it to reveal history, but..."

"But you also enchanted it to answer questions to the best of the user's ability," added Chrysocolla. "Nobody asked it a question..."

"At least not verbally," Storm interrupted. "Cerulean, did you ask it a question in your mind?"

Cerulean shook her head. "No."

Again, with the voice. The old Cerulean would've sounded unsure, scared, wanting to know more about the situation. Now, she sounded almost...passive. Cold. Uncaring. Uninterested.

Storm set aside another scroll and picked up a new one in one single fluid motion, unrolling the scroll and then discarding it again. "Did you think anything of significance after you cast the spell?"

"Well...I did wonder if the spell worked," Cerulean replied, shrugging a bit. "I don't know...I've never seen animus magic before, so I guess I thought something big would happen."

"Me too," Chrysocolla added.

"You've seen Azure do magic," Storm put in. "And I'm sure that Orca's done plenty around you."

"Only for me," amended Cerulean, but realized that it was true; of course she'd seen animus magic before. "Okay, I guess I was just expecting more because it was, you know, my magic. Something of my doing."

"I guess that makes sense," Storm said, sounding like it didn't make sense at all. "I wouldn't know. I'm obviously not an animus. Any other thoughts?"

"Well, I thought I'd messed it up," Cerulean said, trying to remember what she'd been thinking, but it was hard - what she'd thought then, before she'd known that she was a SkyWing, apparently, seemed so simple and unimportant now. "And about I thought something like, 'who am I to know a lot about casting animus spells?'"

Storm abruptly slammed a scroll down on the table. "That's it," she said.

The other three just looked at each other with immense confusion on their snouts.

The princess shook her head, looking utterly exasperated with their cluelessness. "You thought a question, and the paperweight answered," she elaborated, and then, looking extremely annoyed at this point, went further, "you asked who am I to the paperweight."

"Oh," Archipelago said. "I guess that makes sense. But she didn't, uh, actually ask it to the paperweight. It was just a general thought."

Storm shrugged. "The paperweight doesn't know that. It was just doing what it was supposed to. The spell worked."

"We think," Chrysocolla added. "Not that I'm sure Cerulean is incapable of correctly casting spells - it's just, I'm sure it's easy for spells to go wrong? I don't know. Like I've said, I've never seen it done before." She silenced herself, and then realized that she'd called Cerulean Cerulean and not 'Your Majesty,' so she quickly added, "I meant Your Majesty, Your Majesty - so sorry. This is so weird. She's a SkyWing. The next queen is going to be a SkyWing. How is she a SkyWing?"

"Chrysocolla's right," Cerulean said. "On two levels; first off, what if the spell did go wrong? What if the paperweight's confused? Maybe I'm really not a SkyWing and this is all some big misunderstanding."

Both Storm and Archipelago were shaking their heads.

"No," Storm spoke first. "It does make sense. It explains Azure's trap that got you today - the one designed to catch SkyWings only. He did the spell right - you were a SkyWing, but we didn't know that. In a way, that spell should've tipped us off. It figured you out before you did."

"Also," Archipelago added, "it explains your purple scales - it's like you're a cross between SkyWing and SeaWing in color, and you've also got no gills. I think I understand now - I was kind of confused as to why you were named after a shade of blue when you're purple."

"But...my family," Cerulean argued, ignoring his remark about her old and odd scale coloring. "We're all SeaWings - we've been purely SeaWing for generation. I should know."

"Well, then maybe you're not actually biologically related to your family," Storm replied. "Maybe you're egg was brought to your parents on purpose, or on accident."

"Nothing makes sense now," Cerulean sighed.

"We'll figure things out," Chrysocolla assured her. "Now, what was the second thing I was right about? I'm sure it's important or I wouldn't've said it."

"Well, how did I get to look like a SeaWing if I'm really a SeaWing?" asked Cerulean. "Am I fully a SkyWing, or am I some weird hybrid?"

"Pretty sure you're a full SkyWing," Storm said. "Here - I found a scroll regarding disguises and animus magic. I'm betting you're egg was a SkyWing egg, but something interfered - this scroll says that it is possible to enchant a dragon egg and turn the dragonet inside into a member of a different tribe. But it also adds that most dragonets don't survive that long, so it's very rare."

"Why would you do that anyway?" Chrysocolla asked, sounding horrified. "I'm so against animus magic right at this moment."

"I don't know either," Storm said agreeably. "I can't see a reason for any animus dragon to enchant a SkyWing egg, bring it to some remote island in the Sea Kingdom, and then just leave the dragonet to grow up there. Unless the dragonet was important in some way. But also, I don't think the SkyWings have any animus dragons, except for that RainWing one Scarlet hired a while back, so that would imply that an animus from another tribe stole a SkyWing egg and did that. So then I'd assume that it was a SeaWing who did that, because you ended up here, but Azure was too young when you're egg should've been incubating, and we didn't find out he was an animus until he was two, and Waterfall is always busy with other things, and she doesn't like to cast animus magic when she can avoid it. So that leaves Orca."

"And Anemone," Archipelago added.

"She was dead before then," Storm denied. "Cerulean's four - Anemone and Auklet died, what, six years ago?"

"We think," Chrysocolla added. "It's hard to remember. You both were pretty young then. If it was six years ago, I don't think you'd hatched, and if it was four, you still wouldn't've really remembered it."

"So it's another one of those things everybody knows about but nobody can remember," Cerulean mused, before realizing she'd had this thought aloud.

"Yes," Chrysocolla agreed. "Currents and sea foam, there are seem to be a lot of those. I do hope we'll figure out what that's about."

"Me too," Storm concurred, before quickly returning to thinking out loud for them all - she seemed to enjoy the stunned looks on their faces as she quickly came up with and dismissed probable causes. "But that leaves Orca, as I said. It must leave her. But then, I ask, why in Pyrrhia would Orca do something like that? I suppose she was missing for many years after we all thought she died after challenging Queen Coral - we don't know where she was during that - so in all reality, she could've gone to the Sky Kingdom and done it then, but then, chronologically, it doesn't make sense. Because she came back a good while before you were hatched, Cerulean. So no, then that couldn't be it, and besides, why would Orca choose the SkyWing dragonet she'd enchanted to be a SeaWing to rule her kingdom? Unless she has some giant scheme, but I can't imagine what she was planning. And what's the benefit of having a SkyWing-turned-SeaWing in the first place?"

Naturally, everyone just shrugged, trying to process most of the information Storm had just uttered in what seemed to be only one breath.

"So we're back at square one," Storm finished. She pushed aside scrolls, before reaching for a black one and, with some ink, dipping one of her claws and scratching a neat line of letters at the top of the scroll: Top Suspects For All This Confusing Animus Magic.

"Our top suspect," she said, dipping her claw back into the ink, "is probably Orca - she makes the most sense of all the SeaWing animus dragons." She scratched Orca's name underneath the first sentence, and then paused, looking at her audience with a triumphant smirk of some sort.

"What if there's another SeaWing animus?" Chrysocolla proposed.

"And what evidence is there of that?" Storm asked. She sounded a bit waspish, but Cerulean suspected she wanted genuine proof of a potentially unknown animus in the Sea Kingdom.

Chrysocolla cleared her throat, straightening up all of a sudden. "First off, as we've established, none of the known animus SeaWings are obvious suspects - I'm not saying Waterfall or Orca may have played some part - but given, I do think we should be open to the possibility of a hidden animus. Secondly, there's the whole 'not remembering important stuff' part of this that Cerulean - Her Majesty - keeps bringing up, and we can't figure out why any of our known animus dragons would keep this from us."

"Okay," Storm said agreeably, and wrote 'Unknown Animus' on the paper underneath Orca's name.

"Turtle?" suggested Archipelago.

"I thought Turtle was faraway from here and no longer an animus," Chrysocolla said.

"Well, he's still an animus," Storm disagreed as she wrote the disgraced SeaWing's name down too. "He just can't do magic."

"Is he still one then?" Chrysocolla asked. "I thought having magic was what made an animus an animus."

Archipelago shifted, as if he was nervous. "Well, it's hard to say, but I think just being born with magic is what makes an animus an animus."

"We're distracting from the point," Storm intervened impatiently. "Cerulean, any ideas?"

"I know you said Anemone died before I was hatched, depending on when she actually died - " Cerulean felt a brief step of panic and annoyance that, yet again, something important had been covered up and she couldn't find out what it was - "but what if she enchanted something to do that? Like, you know, Orca's statue in the hatchery before it was discovered?"

"But Orca was alive," Chrysocolla argued, "which is how it could keep on using its power, right?"

"No," all three of the others said.

"Animus magic doesn't stop working after its owner dies," Storm explained impatiently, as if Chrysocolla was a particularly stupid dragonet.

"So, you could use a dead animus dragon's body to cast magic?" the maid asked, wrinkling her snout.

"Ew, no." Storm wrinkled her snout too, but from disgust and not from thought.

"But that just disproves your whole 'animus magic doesn't stop working' thing," Chrysocolla said. "Doesn't the dead dragon still have animus magic in them?"

"You're confusing me," Storm said in a complaining tone. "And that doesn't happen often. Be quiet so I can go back to looking smart."

"You don't look smart," the maid shot back.

Archipelago cleared his throat. "About all those memories we've all seemed to have forgotten...um, maybe Cerulean - " he shot a quick glance at the subject of which he was speaking, saw that she was still a SkyWing, and quickly looked away - "maybe she could enchant something to reverse the effect?"

"That's not a bad idea," Storm mused agreeably, having gone back to rapidly looking at and discarding scrolls, keeping the one she'd found information on animus-touched eggs close by. "Ah. Here's a handy scroll about all animus dragons in history, as well as a known record of all animus-touched artifacts." She unrolled the scroll, pouring over it. "I don't think we've got to worry about those dragons from thousands of years ago. Ooh. What about Darkstalker? What are the reasons he could've done this? Why wouldn't he have done this?"

"I literally can think of no reason he'd be interested in enchanting a SkyWing egg," Chrysocolla said almost immediately.

"Then think figuratively," Storm replied drily, earning an eye roll from the maid.

"Fine," Chrysocolla said. "Despite everything that happened with Moonwatcher and her friends all those years ago, Darkstalker decided to steal a SkyWing egg and deliver it to a remote island on the ocean for his mysterious purposes. And that is why he did that."

"Maybe something to do with Clearsight?" Archipelago suggested. "Or getting revenge on Fathom - maybe this was his weird way of getting revenge of the SeaWings - like, here's your new SeaWing queen! PSYCHE! She's actually a SkyWing."

"That would be kind of funny," Chrysocolla muttered, unable to keep a straight face.

"It definitely wouldn't be," Cerulean disagreed, looking a bit horrified.

"Okay, so fine," Storm huffed. "Perhaps Darkstalker's not an obvious suspect, but I'm going to include him anyway." She wrote down his name. "Stonemover?"

He was quickly proved to likely not have any involvement, along with any other living animus dragons, which weren't that many. Storm set aside the scroll with animus dragons, deciding to continue looking through other scrolls before perusing some of the older and now dead animus dragons for possibly enchanting a SkyWing egg and bringing it to the Sea Kingdom.

"You should help me," the princess said in a bossy tone as she once again set about looking through scrolls. So Archipelago and Chrysocolla quickly leaned in to help, and Cerulean, who realized she'd been standing, pulled up a chair, setting the paperweight down - and immediately saw her red scales melt back to purple.

She was surprised by the sudden change, even if relieved that she was now the Cerulean she knew. None of the other dragons looked even the slightest bit concerned about it - in fact, they looked like they expected it to happen as soon as Cerulean lost contact with the paperweight, and Cerulean realized that she should've expected it too, because the paperweight was only doing what it was enchanted to do.

The library descended into silence, the only sounds being the rustling of scrolls and the occasional murmur from Storm as she read, perhaps unconsciously, aloud some parts of the scrolls she was reading.

"We should ask Mother," Archipelago said, disrupting the almost trance-like silence that had engulfed the nursery like a silent fire. "Even if she doesn't know about Cerulean's secret - " again he glanced at Cerulean, nervously - "but she might be able to tell us something."

Storm and Cerulean both opened their mouths to speak at the same time, but then they were interrupted by a new voice that, although calm and unassuming, scared Cerulean to hear - everything had changed!

"Tell you what?" asked Orca, stepping up to the table.

"Um - nothing," Cerulean managed.

"I've been looking all over for you, my dear," Orca said, embracing her heir in her large blue wings. Cerulean hugged the queen back, before stepping away, examining Orca critically, wondering if the queen knew what they'd been talking about, wondering what she knew -

"Tsunami's arrived," Orca was saying. "I thought you might like to see her - what's this paperweight doing here?" she asked, indicating the innocuous looking object. "I thought it was on that shelf - I'll put it back - " She reached for it, and was utterly shocked when Chrysocolla lunged in front of her, grabbing the paperweight from right under the queen's claws.

The maid looked embarrassed. "Excuse me, Your Majesty, I know that was rude, but, um, well, you see, I am the maid around here, and I feel so mortified that something was out of place - I feel obligated to do my duty by cleaning up - you're not supposed to pick up after others - I'll just be going then." Bowing and scraping, something, Cerulean felt, Chrysocolla shouldn't ever do, the maid vanished behind a row of scrolls.

"Well, that was a bit strange," Orca commented, looking completely lost. This was also something Cerulean felt should never happen - Chrysocolla should never bow and scrape, and the queen should always know what she was doing. "Storm," the queen nodded in acknowledgement at the princess. Her snout seemed to curl again, the lost expression vanishing under thinly veiled disgust as she noted Archipelago's presence.

"Come along, Cerulean," Orca said, sweeping grandly away from the table. "We've got to talk a bit, and it's time for you to meet Tsunami."

Author's Note: So, I originally intended to be cruel and make my readers wait a long time before coming out with the first chapter of part two, just for, you know, suspense purposes, and despite the fact that every single person who's read this is absolutely AMAZING and I'm just a bit mean. But then I decided that I'd be nice - and also that I was eager to get on with the next chapter - so you can thank me, of course, for making your lives better and blessing you with this chapter and everything.

Just kidding. Although I hope that seeing an update was good. Anyway, I hope nobody's overwhelmed by everything that was in this chapter - lots of information was probably just thrown at your face, so if you have any questions, please ask me and I'll answer to the best of my ability without giving anything away.

YOU GUYS ARE ALL SO AMAZING. I don't deserve you all (because I'm better). No, because you're just all so awesome. Thank you all, seriously.

Any feedback is much appreciated! I'm no longer accepting SeaWing OC's - but if I have need for anymore, I'll let you all know. Thank you!

nanyruiz: Aw, thanks! When I saw your review I had the exact same reaction! I'm sorry that it takes me so long to update - it's just chapters take a while to write, and I want to give you guys quality stuff because y'all are so amazing. I will never say y'all again, and on a side note, I probably will. But I'm glad you really like this! And I promise that I will finish the fanfiction - I love writing it so much! And thank you for the compliment! Thank you! And no problem with using Storm. I like her, and I'm thankful for letting me use her. She's great. Thank you! I'm really flattered that you like this story so much! You're awesome! Thank you for reading and reviewing!

Celestialskyfire: Haha! Yeah, she is...OR IS SHE? It certainly seems so now...but I'm glad my plot twist was successful - some people already had guesses, but I still think it was a good cliffhanger...anyway, thank you for reading and reviewing!

MysticFire101: THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! That really means a lot. Breeze. I like that name, and I like the way you described how you can just 'glide among the clouds with ease.' I'm definitely looking for a SkyWing name for Cerulean, and will definitely consider Breeze! Thanks! Haha, yes, you were right. And you're not bragging - I'm really pleased that I wasn't too obscure with my hinting in previous chapters. I'm so glad you like Storm, too! I like her too. She's super smart, and she was actually the type of character I was looking for. And thanks! I'm glad you liked the chapter too! And I think this chapter was also pretty explanatory, but hopefully not TOO explanatory, if you know what I mean. Got to keep SOME stuff under wraps. I know what you mean about cliffhangers. They're so annoying but they're so great at the same time. I catch your drift. Anyway, thank you for reading and reviewing!

Someone: YAAAAAAAYYYYYY! I'm so glad you loved the ending, and here's the next chapter to postpone some waiting! I'm glad that you liked the suspense and the plot! It's also good to know that you're enjoying this story - that's great and super flattering for me to know! I definitely want to include something with Happenstance because you are absolutely AMAZING and all! I'm not sure whether that inclusion will be a brief mention of him or an actual appearance, but hopefully you can expect to see something. I will definitely keep writing! And I'm super happy you think this is great - haha, oops. I saw that after I published and I cringed and mentally cursed my knowledge of the English language. But yes, taken literally, that was a funny sentence. XD. I'll edit that out when I go through all my chapters and revise. My proof reading is terrible and shouldn't even be called proof reading. Thank you for pointing that out, and for reading and reviewing!

BrightMind: Cerulago is one of my favorite ships now. Is that bad of me to say because they're my characters? And haha, I originally intended for Eddy to be Cerulean's sort of love interest, but with all the excitement, his character kind of took a back seat. I'm hoping to bring him back, and looking at it, I think I like Cerulian and Archipelago more! Now I'm trying to include brief moments between the two, but they might be few...yes, Sutherland explains quite a bit in Talons of Power, but of course, there's always stuff to interpret - that's what I love about the books. There's so much explained, but also so much to think about. I agree, animus magic is pretty god-like, so that's probably why the "losing the soul" thing comes into play. There can't be too much power without a price! And honestly, until Stonemover used his powers to turn his scales into stone instead of losing his soul, it didn't even occur to me what animus dragons could do. I almost don't like the vessel idea, where they store their magic, because there's no balance between the power and its cost, if you know what I mean. I'll explore my theory more in the story too, a bit, and also, there will be some explanations regarding the animus spells in this story.

About Cerulean and her spell: sorry for the confusion! At the same time, it is good to know I was subtle with her asking a question that would trick the paperweight into revealing her true nature. Hopefully, the explanation in this chapter helped to clear things up, but if you have any other questions, let me know. Thank you for reading and reviewing!

Jaysong: Me too! I'm pretty sure she'll appear in the next chapter. And no problem. I will also have someone call Spindrift Spinny. I'm sorry that both of your OC's didn't appear in this chapter, but of course, they will appear later. I'm glad you like Chrysocoll - I like her too! And your close with her name. It's really unique, and I love her. She's jadewolf334's OC. Also, I'm glad that the characters are fitting together. That was a bit of a challenge, and I'm going to add a few more, although they may not be in the story a lot. Orca finding out will be interesting on many levels. I'm not sure what the plural of animus would be...if we look at the rules of our language, then I think you'd be right saying animi, but that doesn't sound right, and English overall is a pleasantly complicated language. We'll see what Cerulean does with Orca now...I think Waterfall will also appear in the next chapter too, and I'm sorry she was only really mentioned before. I'm still figuring out her role, so if you have any other suggestions, I will take them into consideration. I love that you love this story! And thanks for the compliment - I'm beyond flattered that you think I'm an actual author. And who knows...MAYBE I AM...cue the dramatic music please. Thank you for reading and reviewing!

Pancake Unicorn: Haha, I get what you mean about knowing and not knowing. But I'm glad that, overall, the chapter was a surprise plot twist! Keep reading to find out how this will end...glad you find it fascinating! Ooh, I like the name Spire. I will definitely think about using her, and maybe think about her for Cerulean's SkyWing name. Tetra will likely appear in the next chapter, and I'm so sorry there hasn't been much with her. And you're not bugging me. I appreciate the reminder, in all honesty. I'm so glad yo think this is a great story, and hopefully this chapter didn't disappoint either! Thanks for reading and reviewing!

Remained unnamed: Vraiment? C'est très bon que tu peut parler français aussi. Moi, mon français n'est pas très genial parce que je ne suis pas français, mais en école j'ai une classe français. Es-tu, as-tu une classe français, ou parles-tu français sans une classes? I apologize if my French is awful, but maybe you understood it. Haha, sorry. I like writing in French. It really annoys me that the links do not work...I must figure something out, but alas I fear that fanfiction is designed to discourage the posting of links. I'm so glad you liked the chapter! And thank you! I appreciate that, but popularity, while it can be nice, is not my goal. As long as people enjoy what I write, that's enough for me. There are so many amazing stories out there (including yours :D)! But thank you for the compliment! And I'm jealous of what you write too - both of your fanfictions are awesome. Tu es fabuleuse aussi! XD Merci pour lirer et écrirer, parce que je ne sais pas comment on dit review en français.

jadewolf334: MWAHAHA. Yes, I believe she is. I mean, probably. I mea, I think so, but maybe she's not. Please don't die on me, though, because then I will be very sad and cease to write forever. Hopefully that is a decent threat to keep you from dying. MY WRITING CAREER IS AT STAKE. On the other hand, I'm super psyched that you like my plot twists! I'm glad you think Cerulean's awesome. I love writing for her, as with the princes and basically all the characters. Orca is probably the most difficult. I love Chrysocolla though! Thank you! I did t see a comment for the last chapter but I can check...mostly I was worried that I'd lost you :'(. I love getting your reviews, and I love responding! Here's more - hope you liked :D! Thank you for reading and reviewing!