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Chapter Text

A RIGHTWING GUIDE TO THE

DRAGONS OF PYRRHIA.

SADWINGS:

Description: pale gold or white scales the color of desert; sometimes with some shades of blue; poisonous barbed tail; forked black tongues.

Abilities: can survive a long time without water; poison enemies with the tip of their tails like scorpions; this poison has an effect on the mind and nervous system and makes the target depressed, making them feel hopelessness and more willing to give up; they can bury themselves for camouflage in the desert sand, and breathe fire.

Queen: since the death of Queen Gloom, the tribe is split between three rivals for the throne: sisters Sorrow, Misery and Fright.

Alliances: Sorrow fights alongside Spywings and Madwings; Misery is allied with the Teawings; and Fright has the support of most Sadwings as well as an alliance with the Nicewings.

MADWINGS:

Description: thick, armored red scales, sometimes with amber or golden underscales; large, flat heads with a powerful jaw.

Abilities: can breathe fire; have impressive physical strength and are able to break a boulder in a few strikes; they're fast despite their bulk and get stronger with significant amounts of adrenaline as they sustain damage.

Queen: Queen Berserk.

Alliances: Currently allied with Sorrow and the Spywings in an unfitting yet effective alliance.

SPYWINGS:

Description: They come in multiple colors, although they're completely uniform among an individual; slender bodies with thin wings.

Abilities: the fastest of all the tribes. They can emit sound waves inaudible to other tribes, and these sound waves can return to them to reveal objects and creatures without requiring seeing them; their talons are padded and almost completely silent; and there is word of Spywings with rare and unique abilities.

Queen: Queen Hush.

Alliances: currently allied with Sorrow and the Madwings during the war.

TEAWINGS:

Description: Commonly have black or green scales for the majority, but they can appear in a wide variety of colors; webs between their claws; gills on their necks; glow-in-the-dark stripes on their tails/snouts/underbellies.

Abilities: can breathe underwater and see in the dark; they have a very powerful tail. Most have a lesser control on plants to help them grow while the royal family often has a stronger version; they can shoot boiling water from their mouths.

Queen: Queen Grey.

Alliances: currently allied with Misery in the great war.

NICEWINGS:

Description: soft white or light blue scales; very short and pitiful claws and horns; they have a very thin, useless tail; and they have forked blue tongues. Also happen to be the only tribe with any sort of fur for some reason, oftentimes white fluff on their chests and the back of the head.

Abilities: can emit puffs of cold, white smoke that has a short immobilizing effect; somehow standing close to one gives a feel-good sensation, possibly naturally emitted by pheromones or something within their bodies.

Queen: Queen Grace.

Alliances: currently allied to Fright and most of the Sadwings in the great war.

PAINWINGS:

Description: the smallest of the tribes; swift on the ground and even trees thanks to their prehensile tails; sharp claws and sharp fangs; they have slender wings.

Abilities: their claws have a numbing effect to immobilize targets; they can spit a deadly, acidic venom from their fangs or inject it with a bite; vast knowledge of many types of poisons and they make powerful assassins.

Queen: Unlike any other tribe, they don't have a royal family; instead anyone in the tribe can choose to fight the current ruler to show who's strongest; due to this they are the only case where there's been Kings in charge; and it is unknown who the current victor is.

Alliances: not allied to anyone specific, instead working for all the sides with their quality as assassins.

RIGHTWINGS:

Description: perfect and pristine gold or silver/platinum scales; forked black tongues and shimmering, expressive eyes; big and powerful; they can breathe fire.

Abilities: the smartest of all the tribes; they can store incredible amounts of knowledge and information within their minds; when asked a question they can always answer the right thing; some have prophetic powers and their words shape the future itself so they are correct.

Queen: the great and mighty Queen Perfection.

Alliances: too powerful and magnificent to be a part of the war, it would become too one-sided in favor of whoever they choose; however they're willing to share some knowledge to all the factions.

THE

DRAGONET

PROPHECY

When the war has lasted twenty years…

The dragonets will come.

When the land is soaked in blood and tears…

The dragonets will come.

Find the Teawing egg of deepest blue.

The right egg for the job will be brought to you.

The largest egg in the mountain's depths

will give to you the wings of secrets.

For wings of madness, search through the mud

for an egg the deep color of dragon's blood.

And hidden alone from the saddened queens,

the Sadwing egg awaits unseen.

Of three queens who bring misery and sorrow and fright,

two shall die and one shall learn.

If she bows to a fate that is stronger and higher,

she'll have the power of wings of fire.

Five eggs to hatch on brightest night,

five dragons born to end the fight.

Justice will prevail to bring what's right.

The dragonets are coming..

— Prologue —

A dragon was trying to hide in the storm.

He was panicking, not even his own calming aura was enough to slow down his heart rate and stop feeling afraid. After all, anyone would be after actually entering one of the many mountains controlled by the Spywings, and the constant sense of dread and of being watched were enough to tell him that he never truly went unnoticed.

Joyful exhaled, he had to keep calm and act confident, after all, his friends needed him, and most of all they needed this egg, the egg that will eventually hatch onto an amazing dragonet, the egg that will bring them hope and end this horrible war with so many pointless deaths.

Deciding to do this as safe as possible he began to descend until he was basically hovering above the ground, the egg held on his front talons and held against his chest as he kept moving forward, turning his head and eyeing his surroundings, even though he knew that if the Spywings were after him, they'll see him far before he spotted one.

The storm was just getting stronger, he was used to snowstorms and blizzards in the Nice Kingdom, but this type of storm with rain trickling down onto his scales, loud thunder booming in the sky and lightning bolts falling down, wasn't something he has gotten used to yet, but he still had to try.

He felt the light brown egg, it was already cold, and his own body temperature was not helping with the matter.

"Everything will be fine, little one," he said in a whisper, using a comforting tone. "We'll get to the cave very soon and then you'll keep resting, and in two days you and the others will hatch and be a happy family that'll help us all."

He didn't know whether the dragon inside the egg heard him or not, but he still wanted to be hopeful and to share it with them, this dragonet will have a bright future and so will the others.

However the happy thoughts were suddenly interrupted as he felt something wrap around one of his hind legs with a piercing pressure. His eyes widened and turned his head back as he saw a rope ending on a sharp hook twisting around his leg and latching painfully.

And not even a second later, another hook had gripped onto his other leg, and then two more caught his wings, forcing him to immediately fall to the ground right below, barely moving the egg over his head instead so he wouldn't crush it.

He heard a short snicker above him, so he quickly turned his head to look at the sky but couldn't spot anything for a moment until whatever it was just descended directly in front of him.

A dragon as black as the night itself had landed gracefully and in silence, her eyes were a dark hue of blue and the only other color present on the outside of her tall, sleek body, and seeing her made Joyful stop moving completely.

"Queen Hush," Joyful said slowly, using a respectful tone and trying to give a short bow with his head while literally restrained and sprawling on the ground.

She looked at him with a bored expression, but her eyes were moving all over his body and examining him in detail.

"A Nicewing, I never would have thought someone as visible as you would ever get this far, so you must've received plenty of intel before even attempting such action, my assumption is that Furtive aided you," the queen said in a matter of fact tone, as if just stating the obvious.

Joyful was taken off guard by her words, he'd heard about the Queen of the Spywings, but he didn't expect her to go as far as to perfectly guess the main holder of their information. But for now he tried a nervous smile.

"I'm really sorry for the intrusion, your majesty. But it just was something I had to do, the dragonet in here could grow to do great things, end this conflict. Isn't that something that you desire as well?" he asked softly.

"Correct," Hush said without emoting much. "But not this way. Dragonets are not smart, they can be taught and told anything and they would believe it, they are not the ones that should make such a decision."

"But most kingdoms believe in the prophecy, if it could end conflict in a few years, isn't that the best thing? How many of your dragons have been killed during these years?" He tried to reason, but Hush merely raised an eyebrow at him.

"Care to tell why I should say anything about my numbers? There is no need. We are not on the losing side, we can allow more years of war."

Allow the war to go on… Why should anyone? Why must we keep fighting? Joyful thought, feeling anything but happy right now.

Queen Hush looked to the side for a moment, opening her mouth as if she was going to let out something before closing it again and remaining silent for some seconds.

"My ally is approaching, she'll be interested in talking to you," she announced nonchalantly.

Joyful felt as if his breath got pulled out of his lungs after hearing this. Princess Sorrow was coming and all the tales spun about her were the very opposite of promising, oh this night was just getting worse and worse, and his allies were still waiting for him!

He attempted to struggle against the hooks restraining him, but all he managed to do was to get sharp cuts on legs and wings as the hidden Spywings around pulled on them to make the sharp ends hurt.

"It's pointless," Hush said calmly.

Loud wingbeats were heard, breaking the silence unlike the very silent dragons around him, and looking up once more he'd see dull yellow scales with red tints that were easily identified as dry blood, and there was the Sadwing landing with a loud thump close to his side.

Sorrow was terrifying, she easily was the largest dragon that he'd personally seen. Her claws were long and it was obvious she sharpened them herself, her long, strong tail ended on a cruel barbed tip that was coated in blood by how much it was used, scars were lining all over her body. And the worst part were her deep, black eyes, looking at him not as if he were another dragon, but just a prey to catch.

"So," Sorrow hissed with a rumbling voice. "This is your intruder? A bit pitiful truly, I would've expected the Talons to try harder than this," she said in a disappointed tone.

"At least I wouldn't underestimate them, he entered one of my mountains," Hush scolded lightly, which only made Sorrow shrug.

"Doesn't really matter if I underestimate him or not right now, because he will not be doing anything else," the Sadwing said coldly.

"So I'll guess that as usual, you want to get a killing blow now instead of starting an interrogation, right?" Hush said bored and actually sounding deadpan.

"Oh, you just know me so well," Sorrow said with a cruel smile as she took a step closer to Joyful. "I don't think you'll be needing this," she said as she brought her talons over to the egg he was still carrying, he tried his hardest to keep it out of her reach, but restrained as he was, her superior strength quickly took it away.

"Be careful, please!" the Nicewing pleaded, scared of her strength. "That's one of the dragonets of prophecy that you're holding, you need to be gentle!"

"Hmm…" Sorrow said, turning the egg on her talons and looking at it with a critical eye. "So supposedly, this child will so happily choose either my rise, or my death, is that so?"

"Well, if you show everyone how good of a queen you could truly be, then your chances would be perfectly good," Joyful said with absolute honesty.

"But still, why leave something so important like the fate of my kingdom to chance?" Sorrow hissed. "These dragonets won't choose me for certain. Meanwhile on the other talon, simply defeating my sisters is clear, concise, and can be done with enough power, much better."

And then, the Sadwing Princess turned to the Queen of the Spywings.

"Hush, what do you say?" Sorrow asked.

"I appreciate you taking the effort of trying to act nice, even though I know exactly what you're wanting to do," Hush replied in a steady tone.

"And that would be…?" Sorrow questioned, looking at Joyful with a cruel smile.

"Break it."

"NO!" Joyful exclaimed, pulling himself forward the hardest he could and actually managed to get a few inches closer to Sorrow despite the incredible pain that came from the tugging, but her reply was to simply slam a talon on his head and then grab it.

"This is going to be great, I won't even need to pierce you so you can see how hopeless this whole prophecy business is, I'll just prove it right now," Sorrow said, raising the talon still holding the egg, before in a quick motion she brought it down to the ground and smashed it.

Joyful let out a startled gasp, his eyes wide open as he saw the life being broken in pieces, and underneath the scattered pieces, he barely spotted the tip of a small tail, and it wasn't moving.

"Too dramatic," Hush chimed in with a short huff, but didn't say anything else.

"And now, time for these worthless Talons to see that they stand no chance," Sorrow said with amusement and raised her long tail.

Joyful felt the worst pain he'd ever experienced in his chest, lowering his eyes he saw the barbed tip of the tail coming through from underneath him, and the only thing he could do was to let out a scream filled with pain and despair that broke the silence of the night for some moments, before it died down.

"Well, that was slightly fun at the very least," Sorrow said after the deed was done. "Shall we go back to your palace? There was that one large goat that caught my eye before I had to come out here…"

Hush nodded, and with a quick push from her wings, she took off to the air and immediately disappeared in the night with Sorrow flying after, and thunder boomed one more time.

Some time later when the coast was clear, a large grey dragon the color of storm clouds slowly and silently creeped closer to the aftermath, gritting her teeth in anger as she saw this scene, staring at both dead dragons, an adult and someone who never got to hatch, shaking her head in disappointment she walked back in silence for some time until she reached a cavern, it was tight and contained many turns, and seemingly ended at a very large boulder.

But she knew what was behind, and moving a talon close to beneath the large rock, she grasped a large, sturdy stick which she pushed sideways, slowly moving the boulder off to a side and revealing another entrance.

She was received by a green dragon with some pale white spots on his underside and who had webbed talons, who was looking worried at her.

"What happened? Where's Joyful at?"

"He's dead, Lemongrass, and so is the dragonet," she replied in a bitter tone, making Lemongrass step back in shock.

"No…! That can't be right, how could the egg…? How could it? It was prophesied to hatch, so how can that be wrong?" Lemongrass asked.

"I don't know, but it's what happened, Sorrow appeared and smashed it, and then killed Joyful. It's over," she replied.

"What's going on over here?" A deeper voice asked, as a Sadwing stepped closer, this one walking with a limp as he was missing a foot, he was large and bulky looking, with several scars trailing mostly around his legs and wings.

"The prophecy is a fluke, Pain, there's no Spywing dragonet with us anymore, they are dead," she repeated the events now, much to his dismay.

"Impossible," he grunted. "These eggs are everything we've been working for," he finished with a sigh, then looked around for a moment. "Furtive, where's Joyful?"

"Sorrow," she simply said, knowing it's more than enough, and Pain looked down after she said this.

"Terrible news, and after we've just lost someone else too… Ire returned while you were out, but she was badly injured by the crossfire of a battle and died right after giving the Madwing egg," Pain announced, making Furtive let out an angry grunt.

"Just great, so it is only you, Lemongrass and me to take care of four dragonets, so at that point, why even bother? Everything has been ruined," she said bitterly.

"It is still most of them, so hopefully the prophecy could still be delivered by the majority," Pain said, attempting to think of something.

"What would be the point of the prophecy announcing five dragons just to actually end with one less?" Furtive retorted.

"Maybe we could try to get a different egg?" Lemongrass suddenly proposed, making the others turn their heads at him.

"Idiot, Joyful was discovered despite all the directions and schedules I gave him, the Spywings will be on even higher alert now, we can't get another egg," she hissed.

"Then what about an egg from another tribe? All we need are 5 dragonets, with 4 actually being on the verses, so maybe…?" the Teawing said now.

"And where are we going to obtain such an egg just two days before the Brightest Night?" Pain asked.

Lemongrass thought about it for a moment before he frowned.

"I… Maybe I could try negotiating with the Painwings, I heard they can give plenty of services as long as they get a good payment or benefits, so maybe for one of their eggs?"

"A Painwing? You want to deal with that tribe and then have us take care of one of their little beasts? They're not even allied to anyone in the war, who would care about that dragonet's words?" Furtive questioned in a baffled tone.

"It's the only idea that I have, okay? And besides, if we teach them well enough then it could be useful. There are no Painwings among the Talons, we could do with that extra power if needed," he tried to argue now.

"Just do what you consider necessary," Pain said in a defeated tone. "I can't say I like the idea either, but it might just be enough, we have to follow through with the prophecy as much as we can."

"In that case I'll leave right now, so I can reach their kingdom tomorrow, then hopefully bring back the egg before the Brightest Night," Lemongrass said with a nod, walking towards the open boulder.

"Make haste and try to not fail," Pain said before he left. "Even if the prophecy is all broken up now, we must do with what we have, in eight years, when the Talons come looking for their Dragonets of Destiny, they must be there."

PART ONE
UNDER THE MOUNTAIN

Chapter Text

There were many things that Fury hated, getting the smallest chicken or goat during a meal, being sent to sleep early when he still had energy to do more and so he’d keep turning while trying to rest, spend over two hours listening to Truthful while he keeps blabbing about history, having to hear Lemongrass’ lessons about the many types of tea as if that would ever be important.

But most of all, he despised having one-on-one classes with Furtive, these were the absolute WORST.

Furtive could have been an interesting teacher, she’s the one that leaves the cave the most after all, and apparently she’d been in plenty of fights alongside her tribe before she deserted. But of course, Spywings just had to fight differently to anyone else so her fighting lessons were a bore .

How to be silent, how to hide, how to camouflage with their surroundings, how to detect someone who’s hiding, stopping to use their senses of hearing and smell, and they were SO tedious. And sometimes if Fury actually managed to find Furtive, which would then start a fight, her style was all about hit and run tactics, trying to get out of sight again, and using the environment instead of getting her own talons dirty.

“Focus, I can tell by your expression that you’re distracted and thinking about something else. A Spywing out there wouldn’t give you even one moment if they see you distracted before capturing you,” Furtive’s voice echoed in the dark cavern, the torches having all been turned off for the exercise.

He let out a grunt at this, then huffed some more. It was RIDICULOUS to think most in the group could be trained by a Spywing to be more like them. How’s Truthful meant to camouflage when he literally is SILVER? Maaaaybe Butterfly could blend in with the sky if she weren’t such a deep shade of blue, and Sorry might just be even more golden than some of these so-fabled Rightwings, so the classes are obviously ONLY helpful for Torment! And does she really need that much camouflage when she could just kill whatever under a minute? Now that is a better way to do things.

Fury searched for another minute, looking around the rocks and the stone walls, but found nothing. And then suddenly from above a shape dived down, landing on top of him, pinned him down and pressed against his mouth to keep it closed with a talon, all within two seconds.

“That was pitiful ,” Furtive whispered in his ear. “If you were facing against any other Spywing, they wouldn’t have just grabbed your snout, they’d already have tied you down, or stabbed you with a dagger to the neck.”

Fury let out a muffled grunt and tried to shake her off, but Furtive was decently fit for a Spywing and had a good grip and position so he was completely unable to.

“You’re supposed to be a hero , a living legend. And those are supposed to be powerful and intelligent, not only mindless brutes that can’t follow his lessons ,” she continued in a more angered whisper, her own teeth gritting lightly.

Furtive’s head suddenly perked up as if she heard something, and then with a hiss she suddenly jumped off Fury and narrowly evaded a torrent of extra hot water coming her way.

“That would be more than enough, now if you may please stop pestering my little brother, I would be grateful to you for once,” Butterfly said in her usual elegant and refined manner, stepping into the room with her posture upright and just showing absolute confidence.

The Spywing silently muttered some curse words under her breath, and even Fury who was right next to her could barely even make out anything she said.

“... Okay, we were finished anyway, and it truly would be terrible if he missed any other classes, as these are having such a significant effect,” Furtive said as she walked off and into the shadows, her tone dripping with sarcasm.

“Go away,” Butterfly spoke to the shadows, throwing some hot water to the direction of Furtive’s voice. They both heard some quick shuffling in the dark then someone running.

“At least someone in the group is able to get her in the dark I guess,” Fury complained, feeling annoyed as usual by one of the Guardians.

“Not dark for me, it was simply a clear shot,” Butterfly said with a short laugh, also as usual reminding him of the fact she’s got night vision or whatever.

“Riiight, are you sure you can’t share your eyesight with me or something? Maybe that way, Furtive will stop being a JERK for one day,” Fury asked as some smoke escaped his nostrils.

“Afraid not, so I suppose giving her the fight of her life when you do catch her will have to do,” Butterfly said with amusement, making him smirk and show off all of his teeth.

“You’re right! And that’ll make her go from Hit and Run, to just Run,” Fury said, pleased by the thought of him being the one to teach his teacher a LESSON.

They walked together in silence for just a minute while heading to the cave they shared with the rest of the group, until Butterfly broke the silence.

“It’s really confusing, you know? With the way they treat us, anyone else would think we’re some group of troubled dragonets that keeps getting reprimanded by their… “Parents”.  Not like the dragonets that’ll end the world’s greatest war in a little bit, so where’s our bloody respect?”

“As distant as the chances of Truthful ever being legitimately funny,” Fury said with sarcasm, earning a slap from her tail, it was playful but still was felt due to her strength.

“Oi! Here I am talking about respect, and immediately after you disrespect him, truly unbelievable,” she said, shaking her head in amusement.

“Hah, sorry, I just had  to do it,” the Madwing replied as he laughed, and Butterfly followed for some short seconds.

“Okay now, if Truthful ever ends up doing something truly funny, I’ll call you out on this, I will remember it,” she said with a grin as they entered their cave.

This cave was mostly empty at the time. Truthful most likely was in the small library cavern reading something, again. And Sorry could be literally anywhere doing anything , that little gremlin’s mind had to be a tornado of thoughts and ideas.

So the only other dragon here at the time was Torment. Sitting up on her tall stone perch above the others, and she looked both as impressive and deadly as always. With her dark green color, dotted by splashes of black around her body, alongside these light red eyes were a perfect mix.

She looked up to them and acknowledged their presence with a short nod before just looking up, appearing to be in thought.

“Well, after such an heroic rescue, I will now reward myself by seeing if Lemongrass brought anything to dig in, but worry not, I’ll bring over some for you too if he did,” Butterfly said a minute after Fury entered the cave, rubbing her own stomach.

“I’ll hold you onto that promise, because I want a break right now,” Fury nodded as he plopped down in his usual spot, mumbling to himself about Furtive while Butterfly left.

There was silence for a few minutes in the cave, with Fury resting down, and Torment thinking while lightly scraping her dangerous claws on the stone, before her head slowly turned over to Fury.

“Do you think we could talk?” She asked, straight to the point and her tone never quite showing what she might be feeling or she could want.

Fury immediately jolted up, looking at her with a worried expression. “Oh! Will you give me the talk about how you’re going to kill me for eating too loudly?”

Torment looked at him with some amusement, bringing a claw down to her chin as if she appeared to be thinking about it.

“Hmm, a tempting offer to remind me of… But nah, you’re not in any hit lists so far,” she mused with a grin before casually jumping off her tall spot and landing perfectly on the ground, and barely even made a sound upon landing.

“I only wanted to talk to you about some more pressing matters,” she said as she stepped closer, her large prehensile tail dragging on the ground like a snake. “So based on what our to-be tea lover said, I can assume Furtive has been a pain in the tail again, yes?”

“Right, when is she not ? She’s the worst,” Fury said with a huff.

“I might give her a bit of a bigger spook someday, just to give you something nice, maybe,” she replied with a shrug. “But realistically, every single Guardian sucks in their own way, and I’m tired of it.”

“Do you really have too much to complain about? Out of the five of us, they always give you the least grief because they’re all scared,” he replied with a roll of his eyes, finding it odd that Torment would act as if she’d been wronged to the point of tiredness.

That was the wrong answer, as she let out an annoyed hiss. “And you think that’s enjoyable to me? Do you seriously think so? How dense can you possibly be?”

Fury stepped back in surprise, and also some fear after hearing that, then blinked confused. “Huh well, why would I think otherwise? After all, Painwings-”

“Stop, right there ,” Torment quickly interrupted him. “You’re just going to say these words, say how all I’d only care about is scaring and hurting others, and maybe if I were free and had a normal life raised among my tribe, I could think that way, fine. But I was not raised as a normal Painwing, so I care about you four despite how dense your meatheads might be, and I hate these three “guardians” that only treat me like a monster.”

So after that, Fury actually shut his mouth for a moment, he’d NEVER heard Torment talk like this before, and as much of a dense meathead that she might call him, he could at least tell that there was something going on in her mind.

“Fine, fine, I got it, I’ll try to remember it,” he quickly assured, defusing her enough as she looked calmer. “Now, are you going to tell me what’s going on with you? You’ve been thinking and talking more than I've ever seen you do.”

She let out a short huff of her own at his comment. “Wow, maybe you are not completely hopeless if you were able to read the room like that. Anyway I've been thinking… And supposedly in two years these Talons of Peace will finally come here to let us out and fulfill our “grand destiny”... And I will be honest, I don’t want to wait two more years in this place.”

Fury tilted his head in confusion. What is she talking about? As much as he absolutely hated it, he knew that there was no way around it until the actual time came, so what could she even expect? She must’ve read his expression because she quickly followed.

“If we are destined to win anyway… Why do we have to wait two more years to even get out? I don’t recall the prophecy citing “The dragonets are coming… After 8 years of captivity”, so this part is totally unnecessary. Maybe we’re supposed to accomplish the end goal in 2 years? But nothing says we have to be locked away until that point.”

“So what? Are you gonna try to convince the guardians to let us out?” Fury scratched the back of his head in confusion. “I’m telling you already, it is NOT gonna work, but I guess if the five of us pester for enough months??”

“Trust me, I know that nothing we say will get them to do anything, they’re rather useless. So instead I was thinking that we should escape,” Torment said, looking up to the ceiling, where the lone hole up there was the only thing that let them see the sunlight and the night sky.

“ESCAP-!?” Fury was about to exclaim in shock, before one of her sharp talons went right for his mouth to cover it, as she gave him a menacing glare that forced him to lower his tone after a few moments. “Escape…? You’re crazy? We don’t even know where we’re at, all the tunnels lead to walls and dead ends, and we can’t move that blasted boulder at the entrance.”

“I know that there must be something, we just haven’t actually all put our minds into making an escape plan. Oh and also for your knowledge, they’re boring , but I actually listen to some of Truthful’s lessons, and he sounded very certain about the fact that we’re somewhere in the Spy Kingdom.”

“And is that supposed to make things any better…?” Fury mumbled. “That’s like one of the most dangerous places if we don’t know every single thing, or at least that’s how Furtive hypes up her own tribe.”

And to that, Torment just gave off a shrug. “Fair, but I’d still rather test my chances with the outside world, than to wait two more years… For the chance that some righteous Rightwing will talk about how the prophecy is all messed up already.”

“Huh? What? How could it be? We’re doing EVERYTHING we can,” Fury protested.

“Oh naive meathead,” she replied with a sigh. “The spying lessons from our Spywing have been effective enough that I’ve spied on the guardians, and what they whisper about when they’re sure I am not nearby is very interesting, lately as the deadline approaches, they keep talking more about how they hope the Rightwings won’t have their heads because they had to settle for a deal with the Painwings instead of having the fabled Spywing egg.”

That gave Fury some pause, actually thinking of the words he was just told. He never thought about it that way, ever since they broke out of their eggs, they had their heads hammered with the fact that the five of them will fulfill a grandiose destiny and save Pyrrhia, so he never gave any thought to the fact one of the verses from the prophecy was all messed up.

“Listen, I am telling this to you first because you may be dense, but Truthful would certainly spill the beans to the guardians the moment I told him, Butterfly is oh so honorable and noble that hiding or actually attempting this could be blemish, and Sorry… 50-50 whether she’s the best at keeping this secret or the worst. But if you support me on this when talking to the others, it might sway them over,” Torment said in a tone that meant straight business, completely serious.

“I don’t want to spend two more years being treated like some monster, and I’m sure that you’re tired of the typical routine and lessons that go nowhere, you are a free spirit in an enclosed space, I just want you to consider this.”

Chapter Text

Torment's words were ringing in his meathead for a while, then he forgot about them while devouring the meat that Butterfly promised she'd bring over, and then he remembered again as the three of them walked towards the library cave to have… Sigh, another lesson with Truth.

Now, Truthful wasn't a bad dragon, opposite of that, he has made clear more than enough times that there's few things he'd like more than to help others whenever he can, which is a perfectly fine way to be.

But what's not fine is at the same time being an insufferable know-it-all, that clearly considered the other four in actual need of help, and not even the fun kind, but a lot of scrolls and babbling about history or geography or whatever! Ragh!

Oh well, at least he could just completely ignore his lessons and only think about Torment's words, his mind trying to imagine the wildest of escapes. In one scenario the five of them teamed up and beat up all the guardians until they revealed how to leave. In another, their combined power was enough to shatter the boulder blocking the exit in a hundred pieces. And in another, Truthful would lecture the boulder until it shattered in protest.

When they reached the library cave, Truthful and Sorry were already there. Truth with his silver body lined up with gold speckles and big eyes of the same color. He had a tall, lean build, sadly more fit for speed than to punch someone's snout.

And Sorry, she… Was interesting. Being the smallest of the group by a very considerable amount, but in a way that only made her even more dangerous, as everyone around had already seen by themselves, and long gone were the days they might have underestimated her.

She was straight up golden. Fury knew that Sadwings could have shades of yellow and blue, but he never saw images this vibrant. And then she also lacked the barbed tail filled with depression poison, and one of her eyes had a black color while the other was green.

Sorry was casually running laps around the library, flailing her tail around in a wild manner while her talons shuffled due to an excess of energy. All the while Truthful was just sitting in the middle of all this while patiently reading a scroll.

"Lo and behold, our friends arrived late again to their history lessons, luckily for them I obviously already knew they'd be late, and so I actually changed the time for it to start 10 minutes later. So congratulations, you arrived in time," Truthful said, his gaze leaving the scroll.

"So that means we get to leave 10 minutes early?" Fury quickly replied, getting Truth to glare at him.

"No."

And then, Fury suddenly had a headache as half a dozen scrolls, all of them still in their cases, were dropped onto his noggin and caused him to make a surprised sound.

"Ough!" He complained, looking straight up to Sorry, who had at some point stopped running and was hovering right above him.

"What was that for!?" Fury exclaimed in a grumpy tone as Sorry laughed and landed on the ground.

"You heard him! It's time to get studying! It'll surely be fuuuun!" She said, grabbing two more scrolls, throwing one at Butterfly who barely got out of the way, and at Torment, who casually caught it mid air with her talons.

"Blimey, Sorry, is today's topic that interesting or what?" Butterfly asked in confusion.

"Every topic we've had is that interesting," Truthful corrected. "But today it will be especially relevant. And to make sure certain dragons don't fall asleep during such lessons, I will make it more "fun" for you and teach it another way.

Fury was taken aback by this, and he noticed Butterfly looking at him with a slightly smug expression, but he ignored it. Truthful didn't even say yet what exactly it'd be, and he wasn't being funny, but just saying they might do something fun.

"I wouldn't mind something different for a change. So what's in your radiant mind this time?" Torment asked with a perfect mix of curiosity and sarcasm.

"First of all, thank you. And second of all, today we'll be learning about that fateful day where a scavenger killed Queen Gloom and started this whole war… And we'll do method learning."

"You talk as if we haven't already heard all about it for our whole lives, it's only the event most relevant to our situation," Torment commented.

"Well if you're so sure about your ability to remember it, then take it as a test instead," Truthful immediately replied.

"I still don't get how going through this again helps us, but okay," Torment replied with a shrug.

"Oh it's very simple! Of course we already know, but we have to do this right now for the ones that don't so they can learn!" Sorry suddenly exclaimed, turning her head to the side as if there was something in that empty space.

"Sorry, what in the world are you talking about?" Butterfly asked, but received no answer other than a wide smirk.

"Okay so, what's method learning?" Fury asked, tilting his head and changing the topic, making Truthful shake his head.

"Fury, it's very simple, we just act out the events, and then hopefully by enacting them, they'll stick in your mind better than just reading about them."

"I'm going to be the scavenger that kills Gloom!" Sorry suddenly said excitedly, hopping on the spot with plenty of energy.

"What!?" Butterfly exclaimed, actually looking rather worried by the idea, and so did Fury.

"Oh yeah, we already decided the roles of the two of us. I'll be princess Misery, and Sorry will be that pesky scavenger, she offered first," Truthful explained.

Fury, Butterfly and Torment all looked at each other, and even he was able to tell what it meant: nobody really wanted the role of Queen Gloom.

"How about an honorable game of… Rock, scroll, claws?" Butterfly quickly proposed.

"Best of 3," Torment agreed right away.

Torment casually beat the two of them by far, and then it was Fury vs Butterfly, he scored once, but then his impressive strategy of only using claws because surely she wouldn't expect claws thrice… Did not work, and so he lost and had to be Gloom. Meanwhile, it was decided that Butterfly will be Sorrow, and Torment will be Fright.

One minute later he grunted and ignored the amused expression that appeared on Torment's eyes as he walked to the middle of the room, head raised and with a straight posture.

"Oh, I am so big, strong and sad, and nobody will ever be as depressed as I am, because I am also so insanely rich and not even that can fill me with joy!" He said loudly, trying to act sad, but the regal kind of sad.

"Then you won't mind that I take some of it!" Sorry exclaimed, jumping in front of him while holding a stalactite on her talons as a weapon. "I mean, AGGRESSIVE SQUEAK!"

"Ugh, a scavenger, how sad and pitiful, but surely it'll be even sadder when it dies," Fury said with a scoff, menacingly looming above Sorry… Until she threw her rock weapon straight to his face and it hit with a hard smack. "OUCH!"

"Yes! Evil squeak!" She shouted before jumping up and bringing her legs around Fury's neck, latching on as she started to claw at the back of his neck and head as he screamed in pain, quickly bringing his talons to try pulling her off.

"You little… OUGH! Pest! How dare you-ungh! Strike a queen?" He tried to stay in character, prying her off his body with force and throwing her off to a side and against the wall.

"Squeak squeaky squeakers squeak!" She replied in a mocking tone, making him gasp before charging at her, raising his talons and striking, but she rolled out of the way, and with his leg being nearby, she gave it a quick bite.

He grunted in pain, and with everything that Sorry had been doing, he was starting to feel his inner energy spreading through his body as he took a deep breath of air while his body shook, and then with renewed strength, he lifted his leg while she was biting on it and slammed it against the wall!

She crashed hard against it and landed on the ground, a wide grin on her face as things probably got funnier for her, and then with a battle squeak, she launched herself towards him.

Fury reached his head forward and attempted to snap his jaws at her, but she barely moved to the side and then proceeded to not just punch or claw at his head, but she just slapped him then burst out laughing.

"A scavenger slapped me, oh I don't even feel sad anymore, I feel ANGRY!" Queen Fury shouted, doing a quick headbutt that sent her rolling back before he stomped over towards Sorry.

The Sadwing retaliated by… Throwing FIRE right at his feet, he did not expect her to just do that for this role, and so he stepped on fire and hissed in pain.

"Sorry! Scavengers don't breathe fire, as far as we know!" Truthful quickly called out to her in the middle of the show.

"Apologetic squeak!" She replied, at least realizing she made a mistake, right before Fury blasted her with a bit of fire. Sorry quickly closed her eyes and put her legs in front of her to block some of that short fiery stream and then she hissed as well.

"Angry squeak! I am going to kill you and take all of your treasures! Mwa ha ha!" She exclaimed and ran to the side, grabbing hold once more of the stalactite she had thrown earlier.

"I don't know what you said, but I feel offended by your tone!" He growled and tried to stomp down on Sorry, but she weaved around his legs and moved below, and after a few seconds she got behind him.

Wait, Sorry is behind him with a pointy rock, his eyes widened as he quickly tried to turn, but he felt an immense pain coming from right below the base of his tail.

"OOOOUGH!" Fury exclaimed, his body stiffening as he fell to the ground while everyone else besides Sorry winced.

"Oh goodness… Is that how the scavenger defeated Gloom in reality too? Tell me not please, that's a low blow," Butterfly asked, looking at Fury with pity.

"No, thankfully not, and there's no evidence for it, but not now, it's our turn," Truthful whispered.

The other three entered into the scene as Sorry left, giggling to herself while carrying a talonful of random rocks to act as the treasure, and Butterfly stepped forward, looking down in annoyance.

"Ugh, how saddening, mother is dead, and no heir to the throne had been decided yet. Oh well, it's so obvious that I was going to be it, that you two could just bow already," she hissed in a cold tone very unfitting for her.

"I have to disagree, you don't have the makings of a queen, and all that you'd accomplish would be making our tribe even sadder after they look at you trying," Truthful said in a sly tone, grinning to himself as he rubbed off some dust from his scales.

"Well now, those are some big words for someone much smaller than I am. And I'll let you know that I'd be the perfect queen: terrifying, the kind of queen that'd make any invader lose hope before even trying," Butterfly grunted.

"Good for you, but why would we even need to be invaded? I am so much smarter that after enough alliances and negotiations, nobody would even consider it," Truthful said smugly. "Oh and by the way, I also know 238 ways to make someone depressed."

"That's it, I hate you and I want you dead, and so I declare war on you because waging war sounds fun," Butterfly said, taking a step forward.

"War? Good luck with that, and hopefully you don't start an attack on your own allies by accident," Truthful quickly said, taking a step back. And then both of them turned to Torment.

"And what about you?" Butterfly asked.

"W-Well, I want to be queen too, but…" Torment started to talk, doing a surprisingly good scared voice for someone that he'd never seen scared, then she cleared her throat. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

Screaming in fear in the absolutely most unfitting display for her, the Painwing ran out of the cave, still screaming, while the other two looked in bewilderment. And then Torment poked her head from a side of the entrance to look.

"Huh, well, great job everyone, I think this performance went as well as it could have for none of you being famed actors," Truthful said with an approving nod.

"I got stabbed back THERE, and then you'll insult my performance?" Fury questioned with a groan as he stood up.

"Not insulting, just take it as constructive criticism to become even better," he replied.

"Oh this was funny, let's do it again!" Sorry said, stepping back into the cave, with Torment being a fair distance behind.

"Maybe, but not right now, Fury deserves a break before he truly loses it," Torment said, looking simply mildly amused.

"What's with all the ruckus over here…?" A tired voice appeared from outside, as Pain slowly limped into the library. "Why is everyone screaming?"

"Oh we're just enacting the death of Queen Gloom!" Sorry eagerly explained.

"... And did it have to include such loud screaming?" He complained.

"Considering it's about the death of a queen, I think it would have more than that," Torment said, and as usual when she talked, the guardian made a small step back.

"In that case, even if historically accurate, could all of you just tone it down?" He grunted, still tired, and Fury wondered if they woke him up or something.

"We're all really sorry for this, I promise it won't happen again," Truthful quickly apologized, giving a firm nod to Pain.

"I hope so… Ugh, my head, I think I'll need some tea…" He grunted and slowly limped away, to find Lemongrass most likely.

"Well, this was fun, so I vote for having more lessons like this in the future," Torment said after he left.

"Yeah! Will keep things much more engaging for everyone than having us just constantly reading!" Sorry agreed

"I think I'd be fine with a balance, honestly," Fury admitted. He'd like having more lessons like this than less, but if it meant more chances of Sorry doing painful stuff, he was fine with a split instead.

"Hm, I guess I'll consider it," Truthful said after a moment of thought.

And with that, the history lesson was over and everyone was free to leave. Sorry ran off the cave first of everyone, going to who knows where. Butterfly said she was going to get some tea as well, and Truthful just stayed at the library to read more.

So Fury and Torment stepped out, with her giving him a look that was signaling to follow her. And although Fury was quite sure that if a Painwing asked you to follow, the best course of action is to not get any closer, he decided he trusted her enough.

They walked in silence, Torment at the front, and Fury realized they were approaching the main cavern, where the giant boulder blocking the exit is at.

"These last few days, I've been coming here when I know nobody else is present, looking, searching, for anything that might move it," she explained in a whisper. "So I thought maybe you could help me look, perhaps the contraption is hidden somewhere that needs significant strength.

He nodded at this, not having much else to do, and this is at least something simple after Sorry humiliated him so badly. So the next 10 minutes were spent with both of them looking around this cavern and by the boulder, trying any spot on the floor or the wall, with him trying to pull or push random spots.

Sadly they found nothing, but Fury actually enjoyed this little time spent doing that, just trying something alongside Torment, which is a rare occasion, united by the same cause. She stopped looking and just shrugged at him.

"Guess not, or at least not that we've seen. It's possible that maybe it's some mechanism right outside, but one could hope it's inside, no?"

"Yeah, but… If it's outside, then the guardians couldn't leave, no?"

She rolled her eyes at him. "Still dense I see. In all these years, did you never notice the long key that hangs around Pain's neck? Obviously it must be for this."

"Wait, for real? He just has a key right there? Then why did you even try looking?" He asked, very confused.

"Because we lose nothing by trying, better to be sure than not, so now I could try thinking of some other plan we could perform eventually."

That did make sense after considering it for a whole minute, so he just nodded at her, and then Torment turned her head and looked around for a few seconds.

"We've been here for several minutes, we should probably head back to avoid suspicion for being this close to the boulder. We'll try something again whenever its possible," she warned and being both quick and silent, she walked out.

Fury followed after her, although he stopped for just a moment longer, staring threateningly at the boulder, which didn't even flinch. The boulder that held a whole world that the guardians had been hiding from them, and it made him angry.

He will make sure this boulder won't be a problem ever again, eventually.

Chapter Text

"Fury,"

No answer from him.

"Fury, you have to wake up,"

"….."

"Fury! Wake up!" He felt someone touching him and shaking his body, so his sleepy self instinctively reacted, moving one of his legs and striking whoever was doing it, hearing a yell right after and Butterfly's voice shouting "Bloody hell!"

"Ooh, we're fighting already!? Sweet! … Eh, I wanna sleep a bit longer."

Fury finally started to stretch and open his eyes, looking off to the side of the cave. And there he spotted Truthful sprawled against Butterfly after he smacked him off to where she slept. The Teawing muttering to herself but gently helping him off.

"Why'd you even try to wake me up? Look at the skyhole, it's still absurdly early," Fury grunted, looking towards the hole at the top of the cave, the only view they ever get of the outside world, showing a still rather dark morning.

"As usual, I woke up early and I saw the Guardians running all around and doing preparations, and they told me to wake up all of you," Truthful explained, rubbing the sore spot where he got hit.

"Now, what could have gotten our beloved guardians so worked up on this random day?" Torment's voice appeared from above as she got up from her sleeping spot and jumped down to the ground in a fast motion.

"Someone must be visiting," Truthful immediately said. "That's the most logical explanation as to why they'd be cleaning some of the caves so early, and look nervous about it. My guess would be a high ranked member of the Talons."

"Ah, are we finally to meet the leader of the Talons? Now that's exciting, if it is, I'll talk to them and speak up of how these guardians have been rather dodgy," Butterfly said with a determined tone, looking at the entrance to their cave as if almost expecting that leader to just pass by.

"Even if it happened to be their leader, you will never convince them," Sorry suddenly spoke up with a rare wise tone.

"Eh? And why would that be?" Butterfly asked in a perplexed tone.

"That'd make our lives better and enjoyable! But obviously the story of the Dragonets will be one of drama! Tension! Love? Sooo we'll suffer or else there'd be no story, and no "us" standing here," she said cheerfully. "But hey, I'd accept some likely ending where at best half of us end maimed in some form!"

"Sorry, you scare me in many different ways, and yet at the same time confuse me in so many ways too," Butterfly said with a weirded out expression that everyone but Truthful shared, but Sorry only giggled.

"Anyway, since you're all awake you should go dip your faces in the river and clean your scales, everything must look perfect for the guest!" Truthful commands.

"You are not my boss," Fury said for the hundredth time before he went towards the river anyway, better look sharp in case it was needed today, and the rest followed.

He dunked his head in the water, Torment just cupped some water on her talons and brought it to her face, Butterfly slowly entered fully into the water, and Sorry dive bombed in and caused a splash.

Some minutes later they would get the soft, squishy steps coming from webbed feet as Lemongrass walked into this cavern.

"Oh good, you're all awake, hurry up, we have someone requesting your presence," he said in a hurried tone, looking nervous.

"Who-?" Butterfly tried to ask, but Lemongrass was already leaving. "Seriously?"

"Guess we'll know when we see them," Torment said without much interest as she stepped out as well.

The rest followed, with Fury hurrying to be basically right behind, since ending as the last one in line is obviously dumb.

Everyone reached the main and biggest cave, where all of the Guardians were already waiting. Furtive throwing them uncertain looks and wincing, while Pain just looked even more depressed.

"You're all here…" Pain said with a sigh. "Great… We have a guest, who came from far away just to see you. So you will make sure to prove your worth… Showcase that you can fulfill your destinies…"

"And huh, try to sound grateful, too…" Lemongrass stammered slightly in a whisper before clearing his throat.

Grateful for what? Useless tea lessons? Terrible stealth lessons? Breathing cave air every day of our lives? Fury mentally snapped, having so many negative thoughts about them.

But he was quickly snapped out of these thoughts when the largest dragon he'd ever seen or read about entered the cave.

He heard a gasp or two coming from some of his friends when they saw this guy. If they stacked the three Guardians on top of each other then maybe they'd catch up to the newcomer. His body was a radiant silver color, the massive wings pressed to his sides had several golden streaks lined on their undersides. His eyes were deep and silvery, showing some profound knowledge, and his claws looked gold-tipped.

"Greetings," his voice was strong and rich. "This is a meeting that was always bound to happen, and it is my pleasure to finally meet this fateful group."

"Greetings to you too, sir, who might you be?" Butterfly asked with her respectful tone.

"My name is Flawless, the deliverer of fate, loyal follower of the ever so shimmering Queen Perfection," he presented himself, and Fury almost let out a snort.

I almost forgot one of the Queens is literally named that. And Flawless? Really? These names have to be some sort of joke. They can't seriously be that…?

His gaze went from one dragonet to another, and Fury felt as if he was being quickly analyzed in detail by merely standing there. Tilting his head to look at the others, he saw that Truthful was looking absolutely amazed, Butterfly was standing upright, head raised high and silent during the examination. Sorry… Oddly enough, she did not look pleased about the big dragon, moving and her body twitching a bunch. Torment kept a fully neutral expression.

Speaking of Torment, when the giant dragon's gaze stopped on her, he froze, his head slowly turning to look at the guardians with a displeased expression.

"Is this what some of the tribes call a "prank"? Because I am not amused. Are you trying to show off how you tamed one of these Painwings and expect me to congratulate you? Fine, congratulations, now please present the Spywing."

The Guardians were visibly grimacing at this, looking at each other for a few seconds until Furtive took a single step forward.

"We don't have it," she whispered.

"... What?" Flawless questioned, his eyes staring thoroughly.

"We never got it…" Pain said with a sigh. "The egg… Sorrow was there when one of the Talons was retrieving it."

The big Rightwing remained silent for a moment before shaking his head. "I had no idea, that poor dragonet… Even from a neutral perspective, what the princess did was not dignified, at all."

He threw another glance at the dragonets, and his expression was impossible to read this time as he glared for a minute.

"However, that still doesn't explain why there's a Painwing among the five."

"It was our-" Lemongrass started to talk, but the other Guardians threw him a quick glare, making him mutter to himself for a moment. "My idea, to at least have a complete group. And besides, isn't having four out of five basically good enough?"

"Good enough," Flawless repeated slowly. "Is that how you see things? How much you care about this war? Just doing everything "good enough"? Yes, let's just ignore 2 decades of war and don't even bother to try hard, an imperfect team is clearly good enough to end all conflict," he finished with a huff, his tail hitting the floor a few times.

"Excuse me sir, but if I may have a word, I want to say how I'd hardly consider Torment an imperfect choice. She may not be a Spywing, but she still trained and learned as much as us, is an incredible fighter, and I basically consider her my own sister," Butterfly spoke up once more, taking a step forward in defense of Torment, whose neutral expression dropped to look at her in surprise.

"Agreed with everything she just said," Fury quickly commented. He just recently started to get more of Torment's trust so he couldn't stay silent.

"Yeah, so don't you be a meanie to her!" Sorry shouted, still looking bothered by his presence.

"I don't think you quite understand the situation," he replied, turning again to look at the group. "I always know what I'm talking about. Are you aware that I spoke the prophecy that your whole lives are based on?"

Fury froze upon hearing these words, and he heard a very loud gasp coming from Truthful's side. Meanwhile he couldn't even believe what he just heard. This guy? The dragon named Flawless? That's the dragon they "owe" their current lives to?

"You?" He finally managed to say, still in disbelief.

"Three moons! The maker of the prophecy!" Truthful exclaimed with a giddy tone.

"Yes, that's right. And the future I was shown was brilliant, beautiful and peaceful, the whole continent got to know it because it'd give hope, they would believe in these 5 dragonets. But now there's a whole new variable and I can't predict things will go as well for you," he stated in a serious tone, lowering his head closer to them. "Even if somehow you managed to tame a Painwing, she is not a part of this future, it's wrong."

"Well, she's here now, you can't change that, so just deal with it?" Fury said, and he felt Truthful's eyes glaring daggers at him for his tone.

"Yeah, I don't caaaaare!" Sorry agreed.

"Impressive, so not only these three failed to get one more egg, 6 years and they still don't appear mature nor all learned respect? And that Sadwing… Why is she moving like that? What have you been doing?" He huffed at the Guardians.

"Teaching them how to survive," Furtive said with an angered tone. "And I don't think you can complain about the other 4, these are the dragonets you asked for, so however they are, that's just destiny, no?"

"Furtive…" Pain warned, stepping slightly away.

"Ah, no, let her talk," Flawless argued. "So that's what you believe? That you're not to blame for these faults just because they're in the future? I already showed how the future is now wrong with a different dragonet, is not exact, and if you keep messing things up like this it will only become worse," he finished, raising his tone at the end.

It was cathartic, in a way. This giant just complained about Torment's whole existence and called them "disrespectful", but at the same time was putting the Guardians in their places and telling them how they messed up, even if not exactly in the ways that Fury really cared about.

"We've done what we could, it's not easy to take care of several different kids when there's just 3 of us, the other Talons haven't even helped us ever since," Lemongrass protested. "A Madwing named Ire was going to be here too, but she died the same night as that egg."

"Done what you could? If this is you trying your best, I can't even imagine how it'd be to deal with your worst," Fury huffed, wanting to add more fuel to the fire.

"Silence… Do not interrupt…" Pain grumbled.

Fury saw how Flawless turned to look at him with a strong gaze before turning his head back to the trio of dragons.

"So for 6 years, you kept things this way, most likely with plenty of flawed teachings since as you say, it must have been so hard for you, and none contacted for help?" He then straightened up. "Are the other Talons aware of this little stunt you've pulled with these very important dragons?"

"They…" Pain replied after a few moments, but he got quickly cut off before he could say anything else

"Just as I imagined," Flawless said, narrowing his eyes after that small delay, showing his back to the three dragons and focusing on the Dragonets.

"Your Madwing was right in one thing: it already happened and I obviously can't just replace her with a Spywing…" Fury noticed Sorry tensing up, earning her an odd look from Flawless. Seriously, why was she being even weirder than normal? "So while I do not see her as a Dragonet of Destiny, I'll see at least how you four work out…"

"Whatever you want to ask us or make us do, I'm sure we can do it," Truthful quickly talked, giving an eager nod.

"At least that's slightly promising," Flawless admitted. "Very well, in that case… You three, step forward." he ordered, looking at Fury, Sorry and Butterfly.

They looked at each other for a second before stepping forward, Fury wondering why only they were called over.

"I do not need to test the Painwing, and I know the Rightwing is already perfectly good," he claimed. "And if there's one thing that I can at least see if these three actually taught you something correctly: your ability in a fight. It is a dangerous world out there, and some tribes might require… "Convincing" before they actually hear you."

Fury quickly straightened up, now this was more up his alley. The giant dragon wanted a fight? He's gonna get the fight of his life then.

"Eager to fight, as expected from a Madwing," he commented after seeing his expression. "However you three might find relevant that despite our neutrality, my tribe is perfectly capable of training fighters, like me."

"Well that only makes it even better," Fury said, baring his teeth. The thought of getting into a fight with the largest dragon in the world was simply thrilling.

"Oh this is gonna be GOOD!" Sorry said, hopping from talon to another, raising her useless tail.

"I promise we will not disappoint, mister," Butterfly said, giving a short bow to their opponent.

"Hey, be careful, okay?" Fury heard Torment whisper from right behind him, so he subtly nodded his head, he could see a good amount of muscle on the Rightwing coupled with his size.

Truthful and Torment backed away from their side, and the Guardians at the other side, leaving plenty of space in the cave for even Flawless to move without much issue.

"Make your move," Flawless commanded, and both Fury and Sorry pretty much immediately flew off the ground while Butterfly remained further back as she looked thoroughly for a moment.

Fury rushed up and forward, moving back one of his legs and preparing a good punch as he aimed for the head, however the Rightwing moved up one of his own legs to cover his face the moment before, making him strike there instead. He managed to push it back a bit but Flawless then quickly moved it and swatted him away.

Sorry on the other talon, was doing quick circles around the giant opponent, throwing fire from wherever she could to little effect as his scales were taking her small flames rather well, but he still reacted, doing a sharp turn on the floor and whipping with his big tail. She managed to dodge with quick flaps to propel herself upwards, but then he'd quickly turn his head to look behind himself and quickly shot out a short stream of golden flames, forcing her to cover her own face and fall down.

"Fury, let's enclose," Butterfly quickly ordered from the Madwing's side as she took off and went to the right. Nodding quickly he flew the opposite way, and when they were positioned she fired her super hot water, and he fired his own flames, the idea being that at least one of the two attacks is likely to be a direct hit.

But Flawless was massive, so of course his wings were as well. He moved his head back and raised his wings to the sides to work as side shields. And even though at least the boiling water clearly hurt as it was able to slip through scales and made him hiss, he was still holding up.

His guard was then momentarily dropped as a growl left his throat and he began to quickly move and slam down his tail, which had a very stubborn Sorry clinging onto its tip and biting down hard on the weak, soft spot there. And she wasn't afraid to scratch there as well.

This gave them a short opening, which Fury took, diving straight forward the fastest he could. Flawless' talons moved to swipe at him but a second too late as he barely managed to swerve to the left before proceeding with his charge and actually landing a punch straight on the Rightwing's face.

It probably hurt Fury as much as it hurt Flawless. His scales were incredibly tough and he winced after launching himself at them at high speed, but at the same time the big dragon flinched and his head jerked back as he took a step backwards.

"Not bad," he conceded, before very quickly moving one of his front legs and grabbing Fury between his talons before proceeding to press him against the ground.

Fury immediately tried to resist, grunting and pushing while underfoot, but it was far too big to just move. And annoyingly enough, even though he was being pressed against the ground, Flawless wasn't pressing further or dragging him around so he wasn't even being damaged much, the Rightwing knew what he was doing.

So while he was struggling against his talons, for a few moments he could only spectate. Sorry had turned up the aggression, now trying to blast him off with her fire from the front, aiming for the face and eyes a surprising amount. He'd turn his head or close his eyes and claw with his free front talons, or lunge his head forward and try to snap his jaws and she was barely dodging.

Butterfly meanwhile had approached for his aid, opening her jaws and firing a stream of super hot water towards the large silver leg, steam quickly rising upon impact and making Flawless flinch, but he did not even raise it a little or loosened on the pressure.

"Butterfly! Do it down here!" Fury suddenly shouted from beneath these large claws, and luckily the Teawing only needed a second to realize what he's planning. She opened her jaws again and spat a new torrent of boiling water, this time aiming for the foot itself… And Fury.

The Madwing howled in pain as part of the waterbreath got around the sides of the talons or between them and reached him, the liquid slipping between gaps on his scales and making it even more painful, but it was worth it.

Energy start to fill him up mere seconds later while the water was scalding him, and so with an angered roar, he brought his own talons against Flawless', and started to truly push them back much to his apparent surprise, foot leaving the floor as Fury fought against the pressure, and when he got enough space, quickly rolled to the side and freed himself.

And then while he still had this extra energy, he tilted his head straight up and fired a fiery blast from his mouth towards the silver underbelly, the fire much stronger than it normally would be, and it ended up blackening a few scales and make Flawless let out one short pained roar.

"That's enough," Flawless suddenly announced with an authoritative tone and a stomp on the ground that managed to lightly shake the floor. "You three… I had my doubts… I still have them, but at least maybe not everything is lost just yet. The fact you even managed to land more than one good hit on me is… Commendable, despite some irregular strategies."

Fury took a deep breath, rubbing a few parts of his body. Did they win? If he got himself scalded by Butterfly for nothing he was gonna be mad, so he just stared up, meeting the gaze of the large dragon.

"Hehehe, it was easy! Kinda short though," Sorry exclaimed proudly, raising her head.

"Sorry," Butterfly called her out in a reprimanding tone before she cleared her throat. "I'm very glad that we managed to exceed your expectations, mister."

"So you three pass, but so far this one exam. There's 2 years left until you can go and prove the prophecy right, so I expect us to meet again, and hopefully by that time you'll have learned a few things," he said, looking again at the Guardians for a moment, his words clearly referring to both groups of dragons.

His head turned one more time as he glared at Torment, who easily glared back without flinching, making Flawless shake his head.

"As for you, I do not know yet. But I know that Pyrrhia wouldn't want a Painwing as a symbol of peace," he stated before turning the other way and started to walk out, with Pain slowly limping behind him.

So that left the Dragonets with the other two Guardians for a few minutes, and based on their expressions, especially Furtive's, they were not looking happy.

"Go away," she hissed at them, "We'll deal with you later for how you've acted and what you brought upon us. But know that you're in so much trouble…"

Chapter Text

Everyone had returned to the river to either wash themselves, drink some water or just sit down after what just happened a few minutes ago. Fury personally had gone fully underwater to counteract the stinging sensations of Butterfly's boiling water from before.

"That was fuuuun! Did you see it? He had to stop the fight early because he knew we were gonna kick his butt! Oh that felt good. Wish we could've ended the fight," Sorry said gleefully, bringing her front talons to the water and splashing wildly.

"Hey now, I'm sure that he had to stop it because he didn't want to harm you too much," Truthful quickly argued. "He didn't really move all that much, so if you had really pushed him too hard then it would've gone dire. So you did great, but you wouldn't have beaten him."

"Boooo! Partypooper! We certainly would have if given the chance. Butterfly and I would just need to give Fury a lot of third degree burns, and then he'd knock him down with a single strike!" Sorry denied, shaking her head quickly and giving a toothy grin at Fury.

He personally wasn't feeling like getting burned and scalded more than he already was. Well, he would be totally willing to do so if it was really needed or he truly wanted to beat up somebody, but if the strength from a simple rage boost was enough, he'd do fine.

"Yeah, because you're a very unbiased judge. Just let them have this," Torment said, rolling her eyes and looking at Truth, who shifted back nervously. Then she just looked away, resting her head on her front legs.

Now, he might be a meathead, but even Fury could assume that she might be feeling even a bit down from Flawless' words. He knew he'd snap if he was told what she got told, which would lead to breaking the nose of whoever had said that.

But unlike him, Torment was just lying there, her expression remaining as neutral and impossible to read as always, she looked back at him for a moment after noticing his look, gave him a bit of a look back then just stared off once more.

Sorry actually had an odd moment of camaraderie, approaching the Painwing without any fear and then sitting down right in front of her. Torment's head slowly turned to gaze straight back at the smaller dragon.

"Yes? What do you need?"

"Need? I need to ask if you're okay! And if you ask me what I want, I want to give you a hug," she said with earnest honesty, making everyone in the group look weird at her, making her turn in confusion at the rest of them. "What?"

"I don't know why I still feel confused whenever you say something, I should just expect it every time," Torment said, straightening herself. "And anyway, I don't do hugs. And I'm okay, I don't care, it's not a big deal."

"Aaaaare you sure?" Sorry asked, leaning dangerously closer to her.

Torment let out a short huff, pressing one of her palms against Sorry's head and pushing her back, but then Sorry just pushed back against it and suddenly nuzzled it, making Torment raise an eyebrow.

"Sorry, you should let her be if that's what she wants, miss," Butterfly said in a slight reprimanding tone, but the Sadwing ignored her.

"Okay, fine, you can just stay like this if you really want," Torment said, staring at Sorry with her sharp red eyes, her palm and sharp talons remaining still.

"Hehehe, is this making you feel better?"

"You're making me feel baffled at least, guess that's better than feeling negative, which by the way, I was not," she said, sarcastic.

"Woohooho! I knew that would work," Sorry said, sounding very satisfied with herself.

"Yeah, yeah, great job Sorry, you're literally distracting me," she said with a roll of her eyes, but her expression had softened slightly.

"Huh, you were disrespectful to her personal space, and yet it worked out in your favor, you certainly got lucky, mate" Butterfly commented.

"Thaaat's me, I can do anything!" She replied, sticking her tongue out.

"So anyway, shouldn't all of you be feeling more interested about what we just learned? We met the maker of our future, why haven't you reacted a lot?" Truthful asked after a minute.

"What does it really change? Doesn't really matter who he is or what he did, we're into that prophecy anyway, seeing who did it isn't a big deal," Sorry suddenly said more sharply, making Truthful deflate a bit, and Fury laughed at this.

"He called off the Guardians for some of the things they've done. I find rubbish too what he said about Torment, but I'll commend putting these three in their place," Butterfly said.

"Meeh, he could've done much more," Sorry replied with a shrug, making Truthful look even more taken back.

"Okay, okay, fine, the first other member of my tribe didn't meet your insanely high expectations," Truth said grumpily. "Moving on after you curbed my enthusiasm, did this at least change your outlook of the future?"

"Nope, why would it? I don't really care about the expectations of a guy I just beat," Fury said with a shrug.

"You guys truly are impossible," Truthful said with a deadpan tone, making Sorry answer with a giggle.

"Hey, I don't want you to feel bad about this, it's just our opinions, but you still keep the right to feel as proud of your tribe as you want to," Butterfly said nicely.

"Oh don't worry, that's not changing, I am just in disbelief at the density of your heads," he replied.

"That only means that we can let things sink better into our heads!" Sorry commented, making him blink a bit.

"Anyway, I think I'll just go to our cave to rest, thanks for the distractions at least," Torment said, getting her palm off Sorry's face and standing up, throwing a quick glance at Fury before leaving.

"Oh yeah, I should go too, I think she's signaling me that," Fury quickly said, standing up as well. Torment's head quickly snapped to look back at him with an incredulous expression.

"Why would you…? Ugh, you idiot," she said, facepalming and shaking her head. "Whatever, just follow me anyway."

"Oh, I wasn't supposed to say that outloud," Fury said in realization.

"Torment wants to be alone with you? Oh Fury, we will remember you dearly, for the most part," Truthful said after a moment of surprise.

"That's not funny even as a joke," Butterfly quickly interjected. "Torment's not going to kill Fury."

"Of course not!" Sorry said, having a wide smirk. "Why would murder be your first thought? She clearly wanted some kind of one-on-one talk with him, maybe because there's a certain feeling in the air?"

And then she started to sing in a gleeful tone.

"Fury and Torment! Sitting in a cave, their tails twined, snouts pressed as the D!"

"What!?" Fury exclaimed in shock, his head quickly turning to look at Torment, who was giving Sorry a death glare.

"Sorry," she hissed. "If I actually had a hit list as some of you probably believe I do. You'd probably be close to the top after that."

The Sadwing just smiled proudly at her feat. Torment groaned and then stared at Fury.

"Why are you looking at me like that? Let me assure all of you, I do not care romantically for anyone in this room."

And with that said she quickly walked out of the room, clearly annoyed enough that her steps weren't as silent as always.

Fury rubbed the back of his head, and quickly ran out of the cavern as well, knowing very well that Sorry was giving a cheeky smile behind him.

He reached their cave, and there was Torment, still visibly annoyed, her tail lashing out from behind sometimes, her gaze quickly met his.

"We will never talk again about what just happened, got it?" She immediately said on sight.

"Got it," he decided to follow along and quickly nodded.

"Anyway, I want to say that I am feeling worried about all of us," she said after looking away for a moment. "You heard the guardians, they're not happy with us after what we've been saying to that big guy."

"Well, so what? That's what they deserve after all," Fury said with a grunt.

"And I'm not denying it, but now it's very much possible that they somehow could get even worse. Their teachings were criticized and put up to a higher standard, so I wouldn't be surprised if they got even harsher."

"Oh come on, they already suck, and now they might sucker?"

"Not the right use of the word," she replied with a deadpan tone. "But yes."

He grunted even harder, and punched the nearest wall, causing some pieces of it to drop off to the floor.

"So what do you suggest? That we make their life even worse as well?"

"Any other day, I would agree right away with that idea," she admitted with a bit of an amused expression. "But no, I think we should be more proactive with our plan. This is an even better reason to get away."

"I mean yeah, as nice of an idea as that always is, we still don't really have many options in that regard, because nothing really changed from yesterday to today to make an escape," Fury replied with a huff.

"True, so I think we might have to expand our options sooner," she replied. "I've been thinking some more, and maybe with the two of us, if we show that we truly mean it, Butterfly could help us, or at least not go against us if the worst happens."

"You want to recruit her now?" He asked, tilting his head. Butterfly was a great dragon, and while she was clearly dissatisfied with the treatment of the guardians, but with how honorable and respectful she is, she might not like the idea of leaving their "parental" figures who had raised them.

"What do we have to lose? If the guardians are going to become even greater jerks, we just might as well try," she said with a shrug.

"Hmm, okay, fine, you want me to call her over here?"

"Yes, but please don't just say "Torment wants to talk to you so we can plot how to escape this place", okay? Seriously, don't," she said with a stern tone.

"Hey, I wouldn't go that far," he complained, grumbling to himself before starting to leave the cave to find the Teawing while Torment waited there.

He found her just sitting in the library cave, head leaning forward to look at a scroll a good amount of steps away from her, while she occasionally moved back to take a sip of a cup of tea she was holding.

She turned after hearing him come in, smiling at Fury. "Ah, I knew you'd be fine. And I'm not seeing you looking sore or anything, so I can just assume it's all alright."

"Yeah, we just talked, and it was nothing crazy, just to have that clear," he quickly said, making Butterfly chuckle for a moment. "Anyway, I was looking for you."

"Oh? What is it? Do you perhaps want a cuppa?" She asked, looking at the cup she was holding.

"No, no thank you," he said while shaking his head, not being much of a tea dragon himself. "I just wanted to ask if you could follow me, I would like to talk to you about something."

"Oh, sure thing, I suppose today is the day of private chit-chat, huh," she replied, finishing her cup with a long sip before placing it on a table with a happy sigh. "Ah, okay, I'll be right behind you."

They stepped out of the cave, and then went back once more to their sleeping cave, where Torment was just sitting down while waiting.

"Well, this is ominous," Butterfly commented, turning her head to look at the two of them.

"Now that you mention it, yeah, it does look ominous," Torment admitted, looking up to her. "But let me assure you that this is nothing bad, I just wanted to ask you something."

"Oh, alright then, feel free to ask away," the Teawing nodded.

"So, Butterfly, this is serious, and I want you to not speak of this to anyone else at the ime, can you do that for us?"

She tilted her head at this for a moment, before giving them a nod. "Sure, I am no snitch."

"Good, I knew I could count on you in that regard at least," Torment said, looking more at ease. "And what I'm about to say, you might consider it… Controversial, but it's something that both Fury and I want to do."

"I'm all ears, I promise I'll stay calm," she assured, sitting straight.

"Alright so: We want out," Torment explained, looking her straight in the eyes.

"Out? You mean as in…?"

"Out of this cave, out of this mountain, out of the guardian's grasp," Fury finished.

Butterfly gasped at this, looking at the two of them in surprise. "What? You want to leave? But it's supposed to be in two years when we're ready adults. Why would you do that now?"

"Well, first of all, today we just got reminded that I am not exactly even meant to be here for 7 years," Torment quickly retorted, and both him and Butterfly looked at her, him feeling sheepish about already forgetting that again, and her with sympathy. "But besides that, it's not just something about me, I do want to help this group as a whole too."

"But how does that help? Escaping would only make things harder for us," Butterfly pointed out.

"Because I believe things will be much harder for us in here very soon anyway, the guardians are clearly not happy about today, they looked like the incompetent joke that they are."

"Hey now, mate, aren't you exaggerating with this? While I will agree that they haven't cared for us the best, I don't think it is going to literally get worse."

"Are you serious right now? The guardians are always a pain on our tails, and Furtive literally said we're in trouble and that they will deal with how we acted," Fury grumbled.

"Well… You do have a point there," Butterfly admitted, rubbing one of her forearms.

"And there was clear, stated disappointment from that big dragon as we are seemingly "lacking", so how likely it would be that they might double or triple the training, lessons and harshness?"

"It is… Not unlikely, when you put it that way," she had to concede again.

"So you can see why I feel like we should have some sort of contingency ready, a quick way out when things inevitably become too much. Wouldn't that be fair? Don't the big heroes of the continent deserve a break, freedom and being able to see their families as much as any other dragon?"

Torment really was smart, and had picked her words perfectly. Because now the Teawing would have to think about fairness and justice, and when weighting either way it should be clear that it's not balanced at all.

She furrowed her brow, staring down for a few seconds, thinking in silence about this, clearly hesitating to answer until she let out a sigh. "No, it's not fair. I think about it basically every day, you know? About the time I'll see my family. But I have to keep up with this because if we do as the prophecy says, then they will be safe."

Torment looked at her with what could only be considered respect coming from the Painwing, giving a short nod. "I get it, it's complicated and it just sucks. But at the same time, if we're literally destined to win, what's wrong with getting a break? The prophecy only says that we will come after 20 years of war. So, we'll actually come to save the day in two years. But it doesn't say we won't or can't come out before that."

"Also, being outside means more herbs and tea than the three or so that Lemongrass ever gets from close outside," Fury quickly added.

"Hmm, more tea…" She said in a more heavy consideration, tapping her chin with her talons.

Torment looked at Fury with a surprised expression, and he gave a smug grin from giving such a compelling argument.

"Okay, I'd be lying if I said that you aren't doing a blasted good job at convincing me, and I hate lies," she said with a shake of her head. "I don't really like it, and I'd like to ask, what about Sorry and Truthful?"

"I don't feel it'd be smart for them to know early. You just know that Truth would tell the guardians, and it is impossible to predict what Sorry would do."

"True that, okay, I won't tell them, I promise," she said in a serious tone, pressing her palm against her chest and standing upright.

"Thank you, I really appreciate it," Torment said with a nod. "Now as for whether you want to help us find an actual escape route?"

"Well, I already know of one."

"..."

"..."

"What?" Both Fury and Torment question in different tones, Fury exclaimed it and Torment just sounded baffled.

"Oh yeah, I knew about it for years now," Butterfly admitted, letting out a soft chuckle from their reactions. "But don't get too excited, none of you could actually use it."

"Huh?" Fury asked in confusion.

"... Of course, the river," Torment muttered, looking at Butterfly with interest. "It would have to connect outside after all in some way, wouldn't it?"

"Exactly, you got it right. I saw a long tunnel while swimming around the river once, I decided to go through out of curiosity, but after 10 minutes of swimming and seeing it still didn't end, I came back as I assumed it would lead outside and that'd be dangerous."

"Great, so it's literally useless for everyone else not a Teawing," Fury grunted.

"Sadly yes, I am rather sure none of you can hold your breath for that long," Butterfly nodded.

"No, you two are not thinking far enough," Torment shook her head, her red eyes looking in thought. "We can still use that to escape, because Butterfly is able to use it."

"But I don't want to leave this place while leaving all of you behind, that'd be a betrayal," Butterfly argued.

"I'm not saying that, but if the need comes to be, you could help everyone else get out, because as we know, the rock blocking the entrance is too big, heavy, and a massive hassle. I know that Pain holds a key, but never saw the others with one even when they leave, so that would mean they have a way to open the cave from the other side instead."

"And how does that help us?" Fury asked, feeling out of the loop, especially since Butterfly appeared to have realized.

"So you think I could circle all the way back to the other side, and open it for the rest of you?" She asked.

"Exactly, if it's some sort of mechanism or such, then anyone, even a dragonet, should be able to open it if they know that they have to search for it."

"Hm, quite the task. And then the rest of you would just walk out when it's open? Wouldn't the Guardians just grab us and close it back?"

"I don't know how confident would the guardians actually feel about trying to grab me," Torment said with a shrug. "And besides, obviously we'd be coordinating so that it's done when at least one is out of the cave or something."

"That might work," Butterfly said in a hesitant tone. "Okay, I don't want to immediately run away, alright? I would like it if we actually waited at least some longer, see if it really gets worse, and then I might attempt to swim all the way through. Sounds fair to you?"

"Hm… I don't really want to wait, but I can't really just force you to do this either. Fine, until we can confirm that our lives are getting literally worse, I can hold on longer," Torment accepted.

"Until then, I will not mention any of this to the others, but you have to promise you will explain this to them if we ever get to the day where I have to make the trip before we leave."

"I promise," Torment agreed, and Butterfly looked satisfied by this now, standing up and bowing for a moment at the two of them.

"I'm glad that we were able to negotiate something acceptable for all of us, I'll have my eyes open and we'll talk again about this if the situation arises."

With that said, Butterfly left the cave.