IceWing circles were essential to functioning society. It kept the palace stragglers in their rightful place and the elite at the top, with positions earned with discipline, hard work, self control. The ranking list was everything. Prey hunting rights, permission to live within the palace, appropriate mate choices, all the intricacies and decisions were made based on that list. The most capable and ambitious rose to the top while the weak willed, immature, ineffectual were punished effectively. The perfect meritocracy.

The cold breeze made Ermine's eyes water slightly, but the wind didn't bother her. She had lived in the Ice Kingdom for 7 years, shifting between the fourth, third and second circle, but had been in the third circle when she had left. Her family tried to convince her to stay, but she had her mind made up. Ermine wasn't fit for politics and rankings and strict rules. The young violet-tinted scaled IceWing dragonet wanted nothing more than to be fly as far away as could the IceWing kingdom and be free. She knew that she wasn't like your typical and average haughty IceWing who used others to reach her dreams of reaching to the top of IceWing palace society.

Ermine wanted to go wherever she pleased without being constantly on the watch for higher ranked dragons in case she had to bow to them as they strutted past. She didn't want to be caught up in the drama of other higher-ranked IceWings and she didn't want to get bossed around and told how to stand up strait and other stuff like that.

Ermine knew how strict her tribe was when it came to formalities. She knew from experience that the slightest twitch in ears or rattle of spikes could be grounds for dismissal so she'd always stay completely still and stare straight ahead of her.

I wouldn't be much of a loss to anyone, Ermine thought as she breathed in the leafy forest scent. The war had been over for 3 years now and she believed it was quite safe to travel anywhere. The sun shimmered off her pale sky blue scales and lavender purple underbelly, making her seem as if she were a wild bluebell. Her perch atop the large boulder was a perfect spot to catch the warm sun, witch was a new thing for her. It had always been windy and icy in her kingdom.

She had left home with a bag containing all of her scrolls inside around her neck. And a necklace with sapphires hung around her neck while a ring, also embedded with a sapphire, was on her horn. Her pale blue jewelry gleamed in the light of the sun, as she rested her head on her front talons and curled her tail neatly over her back talons.

The trees in front of her were tall and the green leaves shimmered in the light of the sun, she was close to the rainforest, where she wanted to explore to try to meet a RainWing or NightWing.

A loud crash! And the cracking of branches in the forest behind her interrupted her peaceful thoughts, and she whipped around on the rock to investigate who had caused all of the noise.

Behind her was a small NightWing dragonet. With her scales a jet black light purple eyes, silver wing membranes and a navy blue underbelly, the young dragonet was tangled in some vines and one of her wings was bent in a very odd angle, and for the briefest of moments, Ermine pondered on helping the NightWing.

As Ermine continued to watch the struggling NightWing dragonet, she soon caught notice of another older looking NightWing appear from the tree-line, her navy colored scales glinted like obsidian in the light as she stalked over to the smaller NightWing.

"I told you not to play in the trees," The older NightWing said, trying to break the vines that entangled her friend. The other, who was stuck in the vines, tried to tell her that there was a stern looking IceWing watching them.

"Moons above! How many times have I told you not to go flying off without me?" The black dragon snapped, her amythyst eyes glinting in the sunlight, and her midnight blue lean frame emerged from the shadows like a serpent ready to strike. "How in the name of the Force do you screw that up? I told to scout the area, not to get yourself tangled in vines!

Steam curled around the small yet slightly large form of the nocturnal pitch black scaled dragonet's snout like curly-fry-shaped tendrils of ashen-gray smoke. Her prehensile prehensile eel-like tail flicking ever-so-slowly from side to side in growing announce, and her blueish-white claws glinted like freshly fallen slow in the faint glow of the early morning light of pre-dawn. "My rope has been tugged nearly to the breaking point! Force only knows how much more of this misbehavior of yours I can take before I blow a fuse! One more stunt like this one, and I'll have no choice but but to report you to either General Ghostchaser or Lady Dreamseer? And I mean it this time! There no changing my mind this time around, are we on the same page, my young apprentice?" The older female dragon paused for a moment, narrowing her eyes and sending a steely-eyes glare over her shoulder at who Ermine asusumed to be her apprentice or whatever in the name of the Force NightWing spirit set as the standard list of formal and in-formal twenty-or-so number of pages they had set aside.

Of course though: Ermine was all-too-swear of the mind-bending truth that the rest of the IceWings back home were the most strict out of the seven dragon tribes when it came to following the rules and how to punish a young king correctly according to the placement of said rules placement on the list of instructions on the "Papyrus of Binding" also known as (The tittle of the scroll" which was written in perfectly-neat and curled letters, big, pencil-straight, darkened and warned by time.

And yet, even as the years passed by, and the ice grew thinner and thinner each night of the Winter Solstice that passed, the many, many, many, and many more to still be written today, the writing engraved into the very heart of the ices blue three-ringed ice pad was as clear as ever.

The millions and millions of tiny scribal a track contrast against the ice-blue notepad in an eye-catching artwork of large and bold, if a little glitter sprinkled in from time-to-time - alongside the jaw-dropping beauty of the penmanship of past IceWing queens, being so well-kept despite the circumstances behind. The hardback, and lined pages held inside the large rectangular-shaped piece of ice still eligible enough to read, and shimmering starlight in purple-blue ink. the scroll of the prodigal and or noemalalities

"Wait, what? No! No! No! No! Please, please, please don't tell the council of my foolishness." The small black dragonet cried in a rather high-picked aisle mixed with a nearly ear-shattering shriek. "I promise not to screw up again!

"I swear on the Force that I won't disobey you again! You'll see master, I give you my word! No more tree-diving or dada-wounding dive-bombs! From now on - I'll wake up before sunrise and even start to double-down on my training while I'm at it." The small black dragon paused to take a few deep breaths before continuing on with her speech.

"As a matter of fact: I'll start on improving my tracking skills right away once we've given our report over to 'Mistress Spooky Eyes', I-I mean - to Lady Dreamseer, haha heh!"

A nervous giggle bubbled up from the small navy blue star-patterned NightWing as she avoided the sharp look sent her way by her mentor, while at the same time shifting uneasily from claw to claw in the soul-earthy ground below her deadly-sharp snow-white claws.

"Ahem," Ermine stoutly announced from her rock. She had her tail tucked over her front talons and she gazed down at them with disdain. The older NightWing instantly stopped what she was doing and turned around to face her.

"IceWing." She growled. Her companion was still tangled in the vines, and remained there, for the unfamiliar NightWing walked slowly towards her.

"What's a lone IceWing doing out here, all alone, away from the Ice Kingdom? I thought you all stayed tucked away in your freezing igloo's." She stared at her with a frown.

"First of all, we do not live in igloos. We reside in ice caves and palaces. Second, thank you so much for your manners, stranger. I am Ermine. And you are...?" She trailed off to let her answer.

She gaped at her for a few seconds, before shaking her head and righting herself in a mannerous way.

"Forgive me, uh, Ermine. I am Silverdawn. And my dimwit companion in the vines over there is Nightstorm."

Nightstorm grinned at her again, but this time she had a pleading look in her eyes, like she was saying please get me out of these vines before my superior leaves me here to untangle myself.

"A pleasure to meet you both," Ermine gently smiled at Nightstorm, but her face went back to normal as she faced Silverdawn. "Excuse me for a skiing you this, but... why the Force are two out here? You're both NightWings after all! You know, midnight-black scales, night vision, the ability to blend into the shadows, and making it easier to blend in with the night sky. But oh no! You two are screw ir! We going out for the heck of it! But, whatever your strange reasoning might be, what I wanna know is - why the Force are you out and about during the hoist part of the day?" Ermine stopped mid-sentience upon noticing she was going off on a long-winded tangent for no reason whatsoever.

"As for what I'm doing out here, I am traveling. Adventuring, even. Unlike other IceWings, I want to see the world as it is and not read about it in scrolls. What about you two? Why are you so far from the rainforest? I thought NightWings stayed out only at night and slept during the day." She added a bit of Silverdawn's rude flare in there, just to be annoying.

Nightstorm started to speak. "We were goi-"

"Silence, Nightstorm! She asked me, not you. Now, we were-"

"Actually, it was an open question. But I would like to hear from Marsh, if that's okay."

Silverdawn frowned, but glanced at Nightstorm for her to continue.

"Uhh... Well... We're out here to do a bit of training, for me, and uh.. I was told to climb to the treetops and survey the area around me, but a branch broke beneath me and I fell. That's how I got all...Tangled... And... Stuff."

Ermine and Silverdawn stared at her for a few seconds, before she asked, "So... Where's the rest of your tribe?"

Silverdawn's jaw dropped slightly, but she then spoke, "in the rainforest, where else would they be?"

Ermine sighed and ignored Silverdawn's snarky attitude as she spoke up, "I'd like to come with you, if that's okay."