Thank you for reviewing. I was actually worried that no one would like it - at all - but seeing as the feedback is incredibly wonderful, I feel like I can't set it down anymore.

And yes, eventually there will be ten books instead of five. I can't wait to write Winter's.

Speaking of Winter, I actually had her as a character around the time Sutherland's "The Hidden Kingdom" came out. You should've seen my face when one of Sutherland's 2nd generation dragonets was named Winter. I flipped. My Winter didn't care.

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.

They stopped at Tempest's cave. Tempest was resting her head on one of the narrow window ledges, staring out at the sky. She turned and gave Queen Vulture a cold look.

Cyclone noticed that the full-length portrait of the queen was gone from the wall. A pile of pale yellow ashes smoldered on the floor under the spot where it had been. He saw the queen's eyes dart to the empty wall, and more clouds curled from her nose. King Stratus's smaller portrait was still in the corner.

"Out." She said to Tempest.

"This is my room!" Tempest snapped back.

"I'm the queen here." Vulture said. "You do as I say. Go sleep in the arena. If anyone tries to sing, fly up and rip out his tongue."

Tempest's tail lashed furiously. A moment passed, and then she stormed toward the door. The two queens had to scurry out of her path in a much undignified way, and Cyclone saw a few of the Skywing guards hiding smiles.

Tempest hurried off down the tunnel, barely glancing at Cyclone as she went by. He stared after her, worried. Maybe she's mad at me. But why?

"In here." Queen Vulture said, shoving Anion into the cave herself. He jumped over the pool of water and looked on while the others were shoved in. "You will not interrupt my feast again."

"Why don't you kill them?" Burn asked, her faded carmine scales glinting in the torchlight. She was much bigger than Vulture – almost as big as Wormhole; her head scraped the top of the tunnel, and her talons were twice the size of Clay's. She wore no precious jewels or chain mail, but her claws and teeth were stained a weird mixture of red, blue, black, cyan, and white from all blood she had shed, and a vicious scar was burned along her left side, below the wing. There was no white in her eyes at all, you couldn't even see her pupil; they were orbs of pure, menacing scarlet. He wondered if she had used an animus dragon to make her stronger.

"Because that wouldn't be fun." Queen Vulture answered. "I want to see them fight. We have a whole day of entertainment planned for tomorrow. It's my hatching day! I want it to be thrilling."

Cyclone was starting to hate the word thrilling.

Burn gave the Skywing guards a glare, and they shuffled out of the tunnel, out of earshot. She lowered her voice so only Vulture and the Dragonets could hear her. "But if they are the Dragonets of Fate, then the best way to break the prophecy is to kill them."

Vulture flicked her forked tongue in and out of her mouth. "I suppose so, but, wouldn't it be better if they died right in front of a crowd? If they just disappeared, then there would still be hope. If they die in the arena tomorrow, then all would see that these aren't the right dragonets."

"And what if they win? I've read Wormhole's scroll." Burn countered.

"They won't. I'll make sure of it. Besides, killing them ourselves is a solid backup plan." Vulture mused.

Vulture opened a tan pouch slung under her wing and scattered several round black rocks across the mouth of Tempest's cave, on the tunnel side of the pool of water. She opened her mouth and breathed on them, setting them alight, burning yellow, electric fire. There was a wall of fire in front of the pool.

Vulture's voice echoed from the other side. "Sleep well, so you'll be thrilling in the arena. I thought I'd get to play with you longer. But I guess you all have to be dead by sunset tomorrow." She sighed. "Nobody lets me have any fun."

The thump of the queens' talons faded as they left the Dragonets in Tempest's cave.

"Great. Now we're underground. Again." Flora grumbled, staring at the windows. Her scales were black with orange splotches and specks of acid green.

Ray lit up his glowscales and turned up his ambient glow, overcoming the yellow light of the fire with white. "Better?" He asked Flora.

She sighed. "A little."

Umbra situated herself as far away from Ray as possible, right next to the fire wall. She probably didn't want her scales to just suck up all the light he was making - or she just didn't like the light. One of the two. Candor sat down next to her.

"At least this cave has water." Tsunami sighed, crawling into the pool and resting her head on the stony, sloping shore. Cyclone didn't like seeing her upset, so he was glad that she didn't seem as upset as she could be when he was around. He used the electric fire as an excuse to get near her. He laid down next to the river where she was, stretched a wing over her to shield her from the static of the Skywing fire, and dipped his tail into the pool – twining it with hers to comfort her. She glanced at him appreciatively.

"I'm so glad you all are alive." Clay said, looking at his friends. In Cyclone's opinion, he was really looking at Flare.

"Parrot." Candor agreed, wrapping a wing around Umbra. "Parrot" is the phrase in this universe that I think would make a good replacement for "Ditto".

They sat and listened to the whooshing of the fire wall for a pause.

"This thing is uncomfortable." Flare said, pulling out the wire from under her wing.

"That was pretty smart, Flare. Pulling a melody out of two wires." Anion commended from Winter's side.

"Yeah." Winter agreed. "Well done."

Flare smiled. "Thanks."

Tsunami butted in, "So how do we get out of here? Any ideas?" She ducked her head into the water and sprayed it over her back. Wherever the water touched, her scales shimmered like sapphires. Like how gemstones shone with so much more colors when they were wet.

"Aren't we perfectly capable to escape now?" Ray asked. "I mean, Cyclone or Flare could just get really upset and hop through."

"Not really." Anion said. "We can't control it yet. I mean, out of all of us, Cyclone's the one who should at least have a little control."

Cyclone looked at him. "Why?"

"Because you've been 'in your element' for a few days now." Winter explained. "That has to help."

Cyclone shook his head. "I can't do it voluntarily. At least not enough to withstand that wall of fire." He held up his talon. "The best I can get right now is a little static charge."

"Maybe we could get Tempest to help us." Umbra suggested.

Cyclone frowned, "I don't know if Tempest will help us." He said. "I haven't talked to her since the trial. She might be mad at me."

"I'm not mad at you." Tempest stuck her head through the wall of lightning-fire and looked at Cyclone. Cyclone was just a bit taller than her.

Every Dragonet in the room stared at her, half of which were gawking.

"Oh, good." He said to Tempest. Would she help them? "Where have you been?"

"I didn't want to put you in danger." Tempest blurted. She flapped her wings, and the fire curled higher around her.

"Come inside," Cyclone said. "It's weird talking to someone on fire."

Tempest hopped over the pool into the cave. The other Dragonets made room for her. "I was afraid the queen would hurt you like she hurt Osprey." Tempest said miserably. "I shouldn't even be talking to you. If she finds out I like you, she'll do something awful to you just to punish me."

Candor winced. "Harsh."

"Can you help us escape?" Flare asked Tempest hopefully.

"Sure. I just hope Her Majesty won't be too mad at me." Tempest said. "Then again, if you aren't here, how can she punish me?"

Tempest pushed the rocks off to the side with her tail and motioned for the Dragonets to jump over the pool and exit her cave.

"Thank you, Tempest." Cyclone said, following the others out.

"No problem." Tempest carefully placed each rock back into a straight line, so that it would look like the Dragonets were still on the other side. "Now to the waterfall."

Thanks for reading!