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It was yet another late night underneath the mountain. The so-called ‘dragonets of destiny’ were sitting in their study cave, surrounded by what seemed like hundreds of scrolls laying on the floor. They had all memorized those scrolls front and back, it seemed useless to study them anymore. Yet, they did. It was an order from their watchers.
“Okay, please remind me. Who are all of the SandWing queens allied with again?” Clay asked tentatively, afraid his friends were going to make fun of him for not remembering.
They didn’t, luckily. Clay knew they wouldn’t. That was either Kestrel or Dune who’d make fun of him for not knowing things. The other dragonets were much nicer than them. “I’d be glad to,” Starflight beamed. “Blister is allied with the SeaWings, Burn with the SkyWings and MudWings, and Blaze with the IceWings and most SandWings.”
“Wow,” Clay muttered, resting his head on the floor. “I can’t believe my kind is allied with Burn.”
“I can’t believe my kind is allied with Blister,” Tsunami said. She and Clay laughed together, though both knew the seriousness of the situation.
“And Blaze is a complete idiot, too,” Glory complained. Her scales were covered with swirls of emerald green and bright violet. “All of our options are complete trash.”
Starflight winced. “Well, maybe our options aren’t ideal, but we have to pick one of them. In order to fulfill the prophecy.”
“Yes! The prophecy!” Sunny suddenly jumped up from her position on the floor next to Clay. “The prophecy is very important! We’ll make the right choice eventually, guys,” she smiled, which everyone couldn’t help but be cheered up by. Sunny was too cute.
“I hope so,” Clay muttered to himself, too quiet for anyone else but him to hear.
“But what if they don’t let us pick?” asked Glory. “It’s obvious that they don’t trust us. What if they’re just using us?”
“Well, we’ll be older by then,” Starflight reminded her. “They’ll probably trust us more then. We are technically just kids, after all.”
Tsunami groaned. “But I don’t feel like a kid!” her head flopped onto her tail. “I never have,” she pouted. “All of the fighting and training and studying we have to do. I just want to go be out in the ocean with my family. I bet my parents will be happy to see me.”
“Mine too,” Clay smiled. His wings still ached from an earlier sparring session with Kestrel.
“God, I can’t wait until we’re out of here,” Glory stared up at the ceiling. “Once this dumb prophecy is over with and we can do whatever we want, without the watchers on our backs.”
“Hey!” Sunny shouted, offended. “The prophecy isn’t stupid! It’s important for all of Pyrrhia!”
“That’s just what they want you to think,” Tsunami muttered behind her teeth so Sunny couldn’t hear her. None of them wanted to let Sunny down. She was too innocent.
“Well, we don’t have to fulfill the prophecy for multiple years,” Starflight reminded the others. “We don’t have to decide who will be queen of the SandWings this instant, you know.”
“Well, why can’t the SandWings just decide on their own, huh?” Tsunami asked. “Why did they have to wrap all of the other dragons into it? Why’d they have to start a war?”
“And why’d the NightWings have to make a whole prophecy about it. Just let them decide, they already like Blaze,” said Glory.
Clay was having a headache. “This is a lot of pressure.”
“Well, for starters, the NightWings didn’t ‘make up’ the prophecy, Glory, they foresaw the future!” Starflight corrected. “Second, the NightWings are never wrong. That’s what the scrolls say.”
“You’re a NightWing and you’ve got no fancy powers,” Tsunami pointed out.
“I’ll get them eventually,” Starflight said, clearly not very sure in himself. “I’ll probably get them when I’m older or something. Or maybe I’m just weird, like-” he was about to say “like Sunny,” but he didn’t want to insult the SandWing. He hung his head.
“Like what?” Sunny tilted her head.
Starflight shook his head. “Nothing.”
Clay jolted up. He had an idea. “Hey, why can’t Sunny just be the queen of the SandWings? That’d solve everything!” he pointed at the golden SandWing, who froze.
Tsunami and Glory fell on the floor laughing. “Hey!” Sunny was genuinely mad at them, which was a rare sight. Clay was actually scared of her then. “I would make a great queen!” she straightened up her back and tried to look as regal and serious as possible. It didn’t work. Clay couldn’t help but laugh too.
Suddenly, Starflight and Sunny were laughing along with them. They all fell on the floor, laughing so hard they couldn’t breathe. They were all so lucky to have each other. If they weren’t underneath this mountain together, they all would’ve gone insane.
“Hey! HEY!” someone shouted. The dragonets all sat up and saw that Kestrel was standing in the doorway, looking angry as always. “What were you guys doing in there? I thought you all were studying!”
“We were,” said Clay, hanging his head.
“Well, clean this mess up and get to bed,” Kestrel ordered them. “Not a single word from any of you tonight, okay?”
“Okay, Kestrel,” Sunny said meekly. Kestrel snorted and walked away from the study cave.
The five quickly and quietly cleaned up the scrolls and put them back. They made their way to the cave that they all slept in, ashamed.
They all ended up in a huge cuddle pile that night. Clay, the biggest out of all of them, was on the bottom. His tail was intertwined with Glory’s, whose head was lying on Starflight’s chest. Sunny was holding claws with Starflight, and she was also holding claws with Tsunami. She rested her head on Clay’s chest.
“Good night, everybody,” said Starflight. They all fell asleep in a matter of minutes, comforted by the warmth of the others’ bodies so close to theirs.
They didn’t have to worry about the future or prophecies or evil SandWing queens then. All they had was each other, and that was all that mattered to them.