I really don't have much to say. It would all be reiteration of what I've said in past chapters.

Disclaimer: I do not own Wings of Fire.

NOTE: In a few places the wording will be similar if not the same as the Sutherland books. This is done because a re-word would sound silly and the setting, plot, universe, and characters are distinctly different enough to not constitute an infraction of the "no posting the original work with thoughts thrown into the flow of the work" rule.

"It's not true." Flare said. "They wouldn't." Umbra sighed and Candor looked at both of them sympathetically.

"They definitely would." Said Tsunami. "They'll do anything if they think it's right for the Prophecy." The Dragonets all looked at Flora, whose scales had gone pale green. Even her usual aloof expression was gone. She paced around Tsunami's rock column, lashing her tail.

"But we won't let them." Clay blurted. "Right, Tsunami? We'll stop them."

"You don't have to get involved." Said Flora. "This is my problem, not yours."

"Of course it's our problem!" Ray exclaimed. "I – we care about you!"

Flora stopped pacing just to glance at him for a moment. The tips of her ears flashed magenta and rose pink, but it was gone as soon as she resumed her pacing.

"How will you stop them?" Tsunami asked, ignoring her. "All of us can't beat all of them. And I can't do anything." She pulled the chain on her neck dangerously tight.

"So we escape." Cyclone said in his usual tone that was similar to Dune's. "Right now."

"Seriously." Flora started. Red stripes flickered across her ruff like lightning. "You don't have to do anything. I'll – I'll fight her or – or figure something out. . . ."

"We have to do something." Ray said fiercely.

"If escape were that easy, we'd have done it already." Anion pointed out. He stepped around Flora, stood up on his back legs, and tapped on the boulder that blocked the entrance. "This is the only way out. And they have it rigged on a mechanism that only the big dragons can move."

"They do?" Clay asked.

Anion nodded. "You know how Dune never leaves, because he can't fly?'

Clay tilted his head.

Winter sighed. "He has a stone that fits in this slot." She tapped a grooved niche in the stone wall with her pointer talon.

Anion finished for her. "He turns it here to unlock something so they can roll the boulder from inside the cave. But when the others come from the outside, there must be a lever or switch they use to open it from out here.

"Oh." Clay said. Cyclone tried to hold back a laugh. He certainly wasn't the smartest one of the group, but he still was amused by Clay.

"So can we steal Dune's rock?" Flare suggested.

"Terrible idea." Flora said immediately.

"Nope." Ray laughed cynically.

"They'd catch us for sure." Tsunami said harshly. Her tail rammed against the cave floor. "Especially tonight, when they're already on high alert because of Wormhole."

"Calm down, Tsunami." Clay said. "We'll figure it out."

Umbra sighed again.

"Well then, what about the sky –" Flare asked.

"Is there any way to move the boulder without the rock?" Tsunami interrupted her.

Anion shook his head. "Only from the outside. It's impossible from in here. Believe me, I've thought about it."

"Maybe the sky—" Flare tried again.

"And we couldn't force it?" Clay asked Anion. "Even if we all leaned on it really hard?"

Winter shook her head. "No. It's a one way system in that sense."

"Guys, what about the sky hole?" Flare said in a rush, jumping into the brief pause in the conversation. "In the study room? Couldn't we fly up to it and squeeze out?"

"Oh, Flare, don't be ridiculous." Tsunami said.

"It's way too small." Anion explained. "We'd never fit, especially Clay."

"But maybe I might." Flare said. "I'm a little small and really flexible and I can hyper-extend on purpose – it doesn't hurt me. I could squeeze out and then go around and open the boulder from the outside, like Anion said. Right? And I could let you all out."

Cyclone couldn't believe she was volunteering for the most dangerous part of it without any hesitation.

"Or I could, I think." Umbra added. "All Darkwings are really agile and flexible. A Darkwing hyper-extension would be more like a painless dislocation."

"You both could break your wings, and being grounded is not safe out there." Candor pointed out, looking at Umbra with a stern-but-caring expression.

Clay seemed to have a small panic attack at that. He rushed over to Flare and wrapped his wings around her protectively, whispering to her.

"Trust me, it's not a way out." Winter said. "The hole is about one foot across. Too small for even our heads."

"The minders wouldn't have left it there if it was." Flora said. She stopped next to Tsunami, waves of dark green with red flecks pulsing from her ears to her tail. "They're too careful. There's no way to escape."

"There must be." Cyclone said, hissing in frustration. He could feel time slipping away. Kestrel might come down to kill Flora at any moment. She wouldn't care if they all saw her do it. He growled and hit the nearest stalagmite with his tail. It cracked in a few places.

He could tell Tsunami was thinking hard. She kept looking at him like she wanted to say something, then stopped herself.

"What if we tried talking to them?" Flare offered hesitantly. "Maybe we could convince them to let her go instead?

"Yeah, sure." Ray said sarcastically.

Flora snorted. Nobody else answered. Flare sighed, pressing her wings back against her sides and leaning closer to Clay.

"You have an idea." Cyclone said to Tsunami. "I can tell. You've been working on an escape plan forever."

She wound her talons through the chains, hissing. "It's too dangerous." She said. "It was supposed to be me."

He caught her throwing sideways glances toward the river.

The river.

They'd only ever gone upstream, into the Guardian's cave. Downstream, the river flowed from the main cavern along the tunnel into the battle cave, and then . . . Cyclone had no idea where it went. The roof of the battle cave sank lower and lower until the river disappeared. Cyclone had never explored underwater in the there. He didn't really enjoy the icy water.

"Do you know where the river goes?" Cyclone asked Tsunami.

"No – I mean, I've seen the gap in the wall, but it's even smaller than one to the Guardians' cave." She said. "I've never been through in case I couldn't get back. But the river has to go somewhere."

"Can we get out that way?" He asked.

"Not all of us." She said. "Only me."

"And me." Flora, Winter, Clay, and Anion said at the same time, the last a little less sure.

She shook her head. "No, you can't. We have no idea what's on the other side. You four don't have gills – you could get trapped with no air and drown. It has to be a Seawing who goes. It has to be me."

"And even if you did get out," Umbra said, "how would you find us again? How would you get back to this cave from the outside?"

"The sky hole!" Flare said, finally being able to apply her idea. "I can start a fire in the study room, and you guys can follow the smoke back to us. Then you'll know the entrance is nearby, and once you find it, you can let us all out."

"Anion can't go." Winter said to him, worry leaking into her usual monotone.

Anion looked at her. "But I need to be there with y—"

"It's too dangerous, Anion." Winter interrupted him, shaking her ice-colored head. "Your tribe's breath capacity is an hour. That's higher than many, but not enough. You shouldn't go."

"But—"

"Let her go." Candor told him quietly. "She can handle herself. She'll be alright."

"And she's not alone." Flare smiled. "She'll have Flora and Clay."

"Yeah..." Ray muttered distantly, his eyes trailing the movement of his partner. "Flora and Clay."

"I'll start the fire." Flare volunteered, unusually straight-faced. "Heatwing flame lasts way longer than normal fire, and way way longer than that weird yellow fire that happens because of electricity and Skywing lightning."

"Heatwing fire burns things faster and hotter though." Anion pointed out. "It only lasts longer because it can spread to almost everything – and because it can burn the air." Flare frowned.

"You can just make a campfire-thing." Clay offered, brightening her expression. "Heatwing fire can burn on rocks, but it doesn't spread on them. You should be good."

Flora's eyes glinted. "I can think of a few scrolls I'd like to burn." Her scales shifted from their default emerald to gold with flecks of red.

"How do you do that?" Flare asked.

"What?" Flora responded. Tan ran down her tail.

"How do you make your scales go into that emotion mode – thing?"

She shifted her talons. "I guess it's natural. I just have to decide which mode I want to be in, but the mood mode is the choice if I don't care or don't choose."

"Oh." Flare thought for a moment.

Tsunami grinned at the shocked expression on Anion's face. "I'm going." She said. "Throw that horribly inaccurate On the Character of Royal Seawings on there and think of me."

"Stop joking about this!" Umbra cried. "You three you can't go, and that's final. You'll almost certainly die."

"Flora will die if we don't." Winter barked. "He has that Lifewing they've raised to be like a Voidwing. I've heard from our minders that Wormhole is prejudiced against every tribe but the Voidwings and Especially Lifewings."

"Wait." Anion interrupted. "You won't be able to see the smoke before daylight." He said worriedly. "Flora will be gone, but won't Kestrel come before then?"

Then Flora smiled, her scales shifted to a warm, rosy pink, accented with yellow swirls. "I know what to do." She said. "Anion's method."

"Act like a lump and hope no one notices you?" Tsunami said sarcastically.

"Hey!" Anion protested.

"Exactly." Flora said. She crouched down to the floor. Slowly, as if the stone were eating her alive, grays and browns and blacks crept over her scales. Her emerald scales and malachite wings faded away. The shadows and crags behind her appeared perfectly reproduced, as if the Dragonets were seeing right through her. Even her eyes were camouflaged.

"The guardians don't know I can do this." They all jumped as Flora's voice came from the top of a stalagmite. "I guess it's a good thing we never formally studied Lifewings. Only Paradise knows. She says that only Lifewings can camouflage like this. But so you guys aren't punished, Ray, Umbra, and Anion can use their camouflage and hide the rest of you. I have to stay far away from any Guardian."

"Voidwings, Darkwings, and Lightwings can camouflage, but not perfectly." Anion recalled. "Voidwings have this gravitational distortion while they do it, and you can spot them by watching for lensing of light or a bunch of grass all leaning toward one spot. Darkwings seem to suck up the light around them, and this effect is even greater when they're camouflaged, so you can see them if you watch for inexplicably dark patches. The same goes for Lightwings, except they're patches of ambient light. There's a little distortion with the latter two, but not as much as with Voidwings." He held up a talon and camouflaged it, waving it around to show the distortion. "Only Lifewings can camouflage without noticeable tells. Like giant chameleons."

"This is no time for a lecture." Ray said flatly.

"How do you do it?" Flare asked.

Flora's voice came from right in front of them. "I guess I take in my surroundings. I feel the rock, smell the wet, dusty air, listen to the river bubbling, and focus on how the fires flicker across the stones, and my scales to it involuntarily. It becomes easier after a while, I just have to will it to happen."

"Cool." Flare smiled.

"If Anion and Winter are right about where this cave system is, then only Clay and I should go." Flora realized. "Any Skywing will kill Winter on the spot. The rest should go and burn our least favorite scrolls in the Scrolls Cave, just underneath the sky-hole." Winter frowned knowingly and took her place beside Anion, who seemed a little more relaxed than before.

"Then it's settled." Cyclone said.

"I hate this." Tsunami grumbled. "I hate this a lot." She beat her wings against the chains that trapped her.

"I don't love it either." Said Flora's voice.

"Shhhh." Anion scolded from the riverbank.

"Are we sure this is the only way?" Flare asked, splashing the river with her tail. "I bet I could think of more ideas, with a little more time."

"We don't have any more time." Clay said.

"I want to come." Tsunami insisted, lifting the welded part of the links. "I have to come. Just in case. Flare, get over here."

Flare obeyed and stared at the chains in Tsunami's talons. "Fire?"

Tsunami gave her a "duh" look, and Flare motioned for her to drop the chains. Tsunami did, and Flare immediately began blasting them with a plume of red fire.

"Follow the current." Anion said to the three. "Don't leave the river. If it goes out into the world anywhere, the current should take you there."

If. Cyclone thought.

"Stop and rest anytime you find a place to breathe." Anion went on, directing his voice toward Clay and Flora. "If you can't find a place where the river surfaces, don't panic or you'll run out of air faster."

Clay's muscles tensed up and he suddenly turned around. "Go hide." He said to all of them as Tsunami – now free – slid into the water.

"Don't you dare die." Flare ordered.

"Or we'll have to kill you." Ray added with a sad laugh.

Cyclone looked at Tsunami and nodded toward Clay and Flora. "You keep them alive." He told her. "And please come back." He added in a whisper.

"You all stay safe too." Clay said. He nodded to his friends, took a deep breath, and dove into the river after Tsunami with Flora trailing close behind.

The next chapter is going to be in Flora's point of view, as obviously Cyclone couldn't go.

Seriously, should I make a guide to the tribes?

Thanks for reading!