PART THREE

Inner Exile

CHAPTER 13

Howlite sighed. "Twilight, no one is doubting what you did when you were gone, we are all just impressed that you lasted this long, everybody started to bet on how long you would be gone for... we tried to stop them, but failed, so Moonstone figured that if we couldn't beat them, we could join them," he explained.

Twilight pounded on the boulders again. "I know that Howlite, why aren't you trying to help?" she asked.

"I'm a realist Twilight; that's part of my position; I know that it's impossible to escape, so the real question is why you're still trying, it has been hours... Come eat, please," Howlite sighed.

Twilight looked at her claws; beaten and bloodied from hitting stone for countless hours. Food can replenish energy, which means I can hit harder. She thought. "Fine, I'll eat, but I'm coming straight back here after."

"Perfect, I trust that you can find your way to the cafeteria?" Howlite asked.

"Yes, I'm not a hatchling," Twilight said.

She begrudgingly slithered to the cafeteria and the government's table; it must have been after dinner because there was nobody in sight.

There was one lone cow lying on a plate, next to some lettuce, and a looming invisible presence.

Twilight started to rip flesh from the cow before looking up from her dinner. "I know you're here, you can show yourself," she said, she didn't know who it was, but she knew somebody was watching her eat.

"I am under strict orders from Howlite not to reveal myself to you until you are finished eating," a voice said, clearly making his voice deeper so as not to be recognized, and it was working... unfortunately.

"Well... I just won't continue eating, what will you do about that?" Twilight asked.

"Carry you to your destination and then bring you your food, which would you rather have?" the voice asked.

"I shall continue eating here..." Twilight mumbled.

"Very well, good decision," the voice said.

Twilight continued eating her cow, she liked the legs, and then the lettuce, she was indifferent about it.

"I will be seeing you later, have a good night," Twilight said.

"Where are you going?" the voice asked, stepping out from the shadows and revealing himself to be Quartz.

"Back to the entrance, what's it to you Quartz?" Twilight snapped.

"Well, I've been told to get you to bed, so that's where you're going," Quartz said, returning his voice to normal.

"And how are you going to do that?" Twilight asked. She knew exactly how, Quartz was fast and strangely strong.

"You can either walk with me, or I can carry you; like I previously suggested," Quartz said.

"I am going to the entrance, and there is nothing you can do to stop me," Twilight insisted.

"Carry you it is," Quartz said, picking Twilight up in his wings and carrying her to her bed.

"Hey! Put me down Quartz!" Twilight yelled.

"Oh shush, I won't hurt you," Quartz said.

Twilight gave up, she stopped struggling against Quartz and went limp.

Quartz finally made his way to Twilight's bed and threw her down onto it. "What now?" she asked him. "You go to bed? Newsflash; I can still get up."

Quartz took a silver object off from around his hind talons- Oh, more chains, amazing. Twilight thought.

"This is 'what now'. You will be staying here until you calm down... Alright?" Quartz asked.

Twilight put on an angry face and did not take it off while Quartz tied her to a small post or even as he walked away.

Let's review what happened on my little adventure, shall we? Twilight thought to herself. First; King Frost forms The Council, then Princess Feldspar finds the Pool of Vision, I have to take Snowblade with me to Viper, we're forced to escape to the Stone Kingdom and then the Water Kingdom, and now I'm stuck in bed... Amazing. Absolutely amazing.

Approaching talonsteps, they were cautious, more dragons here to taunt her.

"Twilight?" somebody asked, it was her father, of course it was.

"What do you want?" Twilight said, exasperated, too many dragons trying to convince her to stop trying to do what was best for the tribe.

"How are you?"

"Not great..."

"Sounds about right."

"What do you want from me? To tell me not to get the entrance open?"

"Along the lines of that, yes."

"Well go on then with your speech, it looks like I have the time to listen to you ramble."

"Twilight, I'm becoming worried about you, I heard about what you're doing to yourself from Howlite."

"Sacrificing myself for the good of the tribe? You mean my job?"

"You were at that for five hours, that cannot be healthy for you."

"And the boulders didn't even budge, your point?"

"I just don't want you to hurt yourself in vain, that's all."

"Well, I don't need your pity, nor anybody else's," Twilight said, burying her face into her pillows.

Her father sighed. "Well, I can see when a conversation with my daughter has ended, have a good night, Twilight," he said, walking away.

So, there's that, if I go back to the entrance and try to get it open, I'll just end up back in bed with chains around my talons to keep me here, so no hope in that direction... Maybe that hole in the same room as the Pool of Vision can be expanded?

Days went by. Food became smaller and smaller until they were just a leaf... and then nothing at all... the food had completely run out.

Visits became rare, the PearlWings were now very visibly thin, they were going hungry. But eventually Rainbow came to visit her, with Moonstone at her side.

"Hello, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?" Twilight asked.

Rainbow and Moonstone explained that they had become a couple in Twilight's absence, and soon they left, like everybody else.

Howlite eventually visited her. "I figured that you should at least have the freedom to roam around before we all starve to death," he explained while removing the chain from around her talon.

"I think the first thing that I'll do is visit the Pool of Vision," Twilight sighed.

"Trying to escape again?" Howlite asked.

"If it were even possible, I would not be able to get the hole wide enough before dying from starvation," Twilight chuckled. "I'll use the pool, then come back to bed and await the cold claws of death."

"Alright, just... Have a good day," Howlite said.

"You too," Twilight smiled. Any day without chains now was a good day, she skipped her way to the Pool of Vision, took a pebble, and jumped in.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Wow, so they're all going to die soon, if I had known that, I would have made the Water Kingdom a whole 2 parts... JUST KIDDING! I've known this from BEFORE I EVEN WROTE THE DRAGON GUIDE! Come on, it's in the prophecy. "All but two are gone." But which two? *Rubs my hands together like one of the villains from the old cartoons*

Now... I feel like I'm forgetting something... OH! MERRY CHRISTMAS!

What do you think the vision is going to be? I certainly know, since I'm the writer, hey, fun fact, this whole fanfic wasn't even my idea in the first place, I just have a friend who likes Wings of Fire and he mentioned that he made some kind of continent with the ancestral tribes 'n all, he explained all the lore to me and I just straight up saw it as a story idea, so I started writing this.

Here's all the lore pieces that my friend (the co-writer) gave me:
-1: The tribes and continent
-2: The Council
-3: PearlWings being stuck under volcano and ALL being dead (I worked it around; told him that the MagmaWings lived at the volcano, that's the original name for the FlareWings BTW, so we moved it to the current mountain as you know it)
-4: PearlWings being the origin of Animus magic
-5: The existence of kings for every tribe
-6: PearlWing (Twilight (my name for her)) and BlizzardWing (Snowblade (his name for him)) being in love
-7: The wounded visit (I think he told me that it was a WindWing... IDK, we changed it to something else

Look, the announcement isn't working. I TELL you join the Discord, to ask me things, but do you? No, you don't. I tell you to reach out to me given my socials that are IN MY PROFILE but you don't, so I'm just not going to remind you anymore.

Merry Christmas!