DISCLAIMER: I do not own Wings of Fire; Tui T. Sutherland does.

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.

Also, I had this dream after watching too many Markiplier videos about well-known Youtubers being turned into one of the ten types of dragons from Wings of Fate and then put onto an ocean planet with flora/fauna/geography that suspiciously looks like that of the game Subnautica.

So I wrote about it a little. Turned out pretty cool. I'll post it if some other crazy person wants me to.

I know I'm weird.

As Tempest was landing behind Cyclone on his spire the following morning, he asked, "Won't someone be looking for you?"

Tempest shook her head, "I'm supposed to be down in the caves looking for black rocks all day." She said. "As long as I stay up here, behind you, hopefully no one will notice me. The guards don't feed prisoners until midday, the trial is set for dawn, see?" Tempest gestured toward the arena, which was filling with dragons already.

They seemed quieter, more subdued than they were for the fights. Skywing soldiers dragged two large boulders out onto the sand. One of them twisted three large iron rings into the ground in a triangle, then attached thick chains to them. Cyclone spread his large, Skywing wings to hide Tempest.

The queen, the prince, and the princess – his only living family – slithered onto their balcony. He noticed that they had traded their golden or silver chain mail for vests with small black chain links, studded with diamonds.

Kestrel was being hauled into the ring, hissing at the guards around her. She had a clamp on her mouth to keep her from spouting electricity at them. More heavy chains weighed down her talons and tail so she couldn't lash out.

"She's one of the ten dragons – one for each dragonet of their tribe – who raised us in caves." Cyclone told Tempest. "As a whole, they weren't exactly nice, but they still protected us. Until we escaped and got sent here."

"At least you had someone. I guess even terrible parents are better than no parents." Tempest said.

Cyclone frowned at her.

"I didn't mean it like that. I meant . . . uh . . . I guess it could have gone for both Kestrel and Her Majesty, huh?" She didn't understand the full irony of it. Kestrel might be her mother. Strange that his mother had raised her, and hers might've raised him.

Condor swooped down and landed on one of the two boulders, spreading his wings. The crowd's murmuring died down as another Skywing climbed onto the other boulder. His scales were a washed-out yellow, as if they'd been scrubbed with sandstone for a long time. He moved slowly, dragging his tail behind him like a carcass.

"That's Osprey." Tempest pointed out. "He argues for the defense. Not very well, or he'd lose his head. He's four hundred and twenty years old and almost blind. He's nice to me, though, because I'll listen to his stories of the old days. He told me he used to have tons of treasure, but a scavenger came to steal it and managed to paralyze his tail before he ate it. So now he can't fly, and he gave all his treasure to Her Majesty so she'd let him live here."

"Tough bargain." Cyclone snorted.

"Back in the way-old days before the Scorching," Tempest lectured, "before we had queens and kings and armies, he would have just died. Scavengers killed a lot more dragons back then. But now, because of our kings and queens, we rule the whole world, and dragons have help when they need it; we're organized now. Osprey was only a dragonet during the Scorching."

"You sound like Anion." Cyclone said. "Will there be a test at the end of this lecture?"

"He wouldn't talk to me, by the way." She said. "Not even when I asked him to tell me the history of the Scorching, like you suggested. He just buried his nose under his wings and ignored me."

"Wow." Cyclone said, looking at the slumped purple dragon. "He must be really depressed."

"I'm going to be really sad when Osprey dies." Tempest said suddenly. "He's only got eighty years left. Every dragon lives exactly five hundred years if they don't die of something else first. They die when they fall asleep the night of their five-hundredth birthday."

"Wormhole's scroll on the Dragonets of Fate says that we won't age past one-hundred." Cyclone said absentmindedly. "I don't really know if that's true or not."

"Really?" Tempest said with awe. "Why not? What about what happened with Cavern down there?" She motioned toward the arena. "Aren't you guys supposed to be, like, super powerful or something?"

"We actually don't really know how we're going to develop." Cyclone answered honestly. "Wormhole's scroll says that our abilities will grow only with time and practice." He paused, scowling at his claws. "If they even exist. What happened down there was probably it. I can't see dragonets with our luck getting these magical mystical powers that make it oh so easy to-"

"Look!" Tempest exclaimed, cutting him off and pointing toward the arena below.

The trial was about to begin. The royals beat their wings, and all the dragons turned their attention to them.

"Go on, dear." Queen Vulture said to Kite, patting her on the back with one talon.

"Loyal subjects," Princess Kite addressed them, "This dragon, Kestrel, once of the Skywings, stands accused of highest treason, disobeying a royal. In this case, my beloved mother."

The queen smiled darkly, "Prince Condor speaks for the prosecution." She announced.

"Dearest family," Condor said, bowing, but withholding crossed talons, as royals do when addressing one of their own, "the facts are clear. You gave an order. Kestrel disobeyed you and fled the kingdom. She has been living under your mountains for the last nine years, aiding and abetting the Talons of Peace, who refuse to follow royal orders. She deserves a long, painful execution. There is no need to drag this trial out."

The dragons in the seats charged up electricity, making a hissing sound in respect and flapping their wings. Kestrel glared at the queen, electrified clouds seeped from her bound mouth and nostrils.

"Well said." The queen nodded toward Prince Condor. "Osprey may speak for the defense. Or not, if he'd prefer to sleep through this one, too."

The crowd laughed appreciatively.

Osprey stretched his neck toward the queen, then toward Kestrel, as if he were trying to get close enough to see their faces from his boulder.

"Your Majesties," he said in a voice coarse with age, but still loud enough to be heard from the spires. "I do have one or two words to say in this prisoner's defense."

Queen Vulture's tail lashed slowly behind her as she stared down at him. "Certainly." she said as Kite smiled. "That's what you're here to do. Go ahead."

Osprey cleared his throat, spraying a few sparks ahead of him. All the dragons were leaning forward to listen. Cyclone could feel Tempest's hot static close to his scales as she tried to peek under his wings.

"Consider first the charge of disobedience. Kestrel did not do as you ordered – but then, didn't you reverse the order after she was gone?"

"Osprey. Speak plainly, or do not speak at all." Queen Vulture said with a hiss. "And let me point out that one of those options would be much smarter than the other."

"Forgive me, Your Majesty." The old dragon said, straightening his wings. "I must speak. Kestrel was one of your fastest and most loyal soldiers. Because of this, she was sent through the breeding program - on your orders - and brought forth one egg. Upon hatching, one week before your egg was stolen, it turned out to hold twin dragonets."

Behind Cyclone, Tempest gasped, nearly loud enough for the dragons below to hear her. Cyclone flapped his enormous wings, trying to cover the noise, but no one looked up. All eyes were on the trial.

"We know all this," Said Queen Vulture, yawning. "Skip to the part where we execute her."

"The dragonets were defective." Osprey went on stubbornly. "One was an Elemental – having too much elemental energy. The other had too little. As per Skywing custom, you ordered Kestrel to kill them both and stay out of the breeding program for the rest of her life."

"That doesn't make sense," Tempest whispered behind Cyclone. He ducked his neck to look at her. She met his eyes, shaking with confusion. "I'm the only twin Skywing egg hatched in the past ten years, but he can't be talking about me. My brother was dead when we hatched. I killed him. Then my mother tried to kill me, and Queen Vulture stopped her."

"Or maybe that's just what she told you." Cyclone whispered back with a hiss.

The queen rose to her full height and spread her wings so the sunlight caught on the golden gems embedded around the edges. "Quite reasonable." She said.

"But Kestrel tried to escape." Osprey pressed on. "She took her two dragonets from the hatching cave and tried to flee with them down the mountain."

"So you agree she disobeyed me." Said Queen Vulture. "Then I think we're done here."

"You caught her at the Diamond Spray River," Osprey said, somehow keeping his confident tone. "And there you issued a new order, overriding the previous one. You told her you would forgive her disobedience on one condition: She must choose one of the dragonets to die, and then you would spare the other's life, and Kestrel's own."

"No . . ." Tempest whispered.

"Then she did obey you, didn't she?" Osprey persisted. "She killed the dragonet with too little electricity, right there at the river. With her own claws and tears in her eyes."

"And then I changed my mind again." Queen Vulture said. "I am the queen. I can do that."

"You told your guards – I know, for I was one of them – to kill the other dragonet and take Kestrel back for trial. She tried to grab her daughter and fly away, but the power of the dragonet's scales shocked her talons before she was a wingbeat into the sky, and she had to drop her. She fled, leaving her only living dragonet at your mercy."

There was a heartbeat of silence.

"Sounds guilty to me." Queen Vulture said cheerfully. "We'll execute her tomorrow. And while we're at it, let's execute him, too. For boring me." She pointed at Osprey.

"NO!" Tempest shouted as she exploded past Cyclone. He flapped his wings for balance as she shot toward the sands. His right arm flailed free and he winced as bolts of pain blazed through his arm. Cyclone glanced down, and saw that Tempest had accidentally melted through the wire as she flew away. Which meant Elemental scales must be considerably more powerful than regular breaths.

His attention went back to the arena. "It can't be true!" Tempest cried, landing on the sand beside Osprey. "Tell me it's not true!"

Kestrel reared up with a muffled roar. From the look on her face, Cyclone could tell she'd thought Tempest was dead this entire time.

"Oh, yes." Queen Vulture said maliciously to Kestrel. "Didn't I mention she's still alive? And working for me?" She turned her gaze toward Tempest. "You're not supposed to be here."

"You lied to me!" Tempest shrieked. "You said she was dead!"

Queen Vulture sighed. "Look at the trouble you've caused." She said to Osprey. "Tempest, dear. Would you have wanted to know your mother was alive somewhere, raising other dragonets and wishing she'd killed you instead of your brother?"

Tempest hesitated.

"She could have escaped with your brother." Vulture pointed out. "You're the one who shocked her when she tried to save you. She thought she chose wrong. That's why she didn't come back for you."

Kestrel roared unintelligibly through the chains.

"Haven't I kept you alive all these years?" Vulture went on. "Finding you the black rocks, feeding you, making you my champion? Don't you appreciate all the things I've done for you? Aren't I a better mother than her anyway?"

Cyclone gritted his teeth to fight back a snarl.

"I want to stand for her." Tempest practically mouthed, almost too softly for him to hear.

Clouds hissed from Vulture's nose, billowing up around her horns. "What?" she said slowly.

"I call upon the tradition of the Champion's Shield." Tempest announced. "It says the queen's champion may stand forth for any dragon sentenced to execution. If I can defeat the next dragon you set me to fight, you must let her go free." She looked into Kestrel's eyes for the first time. "I want to stand for my mother."

Sorry for the delay. I got caught up with some things.

Thanks for reading!