“Or perhaps they’re dead,” said the soldier. “Especially if they tried going to the rainforest, from what I’ve heard about that place.”
“Hmmm,” Blister mused. “Dead. They’d never do anything so convenient for me. Even with a NightWing assassin after them, supposedly, if anything Morrowseer says can be trusted. Speaking of dragons I’m going to dismember as soon as I get my claws on them.”
She doesn’t know he’s dead — how could she? Sunny gripped the branch below her, feeling terror shudder through her scales. At least she’s not searching the rainforest yet.
“It doesn’t matter,” said Blister, her voice suddenly brisk. “I’m done with prophecies. I mean, I’ll still kill the dragonets when I find them, but first I have a war to win. My new plan will take care of Burn — and then the stronghold will fall, and the throne will be mine.” There was a chilling rattling sound, and the twist of smoke seemed to get a little darker.
“How —” began the soldier.
But just then Sunny heard a roar from the NightWings’ clearing.
Uh-oh.
She wanted to know what Blister’s plan was — but she needed to know how the three NightWings were reacting, and if she was in danger right now. She cleared the mirror quickly, whispered “Fierceteeth” to it, then breathed smoke across it again.
Immediately, three curls of black smoke popped up on the glass, rushing around one another like small tornadoes.
“How could you lose it?” Fierceteeth’s voice snarled.
“I didn’t lose it,” Preyhunter snapped. “Someone stole it.”
“Right out from under your snout?” Fierceteeth growled. “How, exactly?”
“I don’t know!” Preyhunter yelled.
“I do,” said a trembling voice that barely sounded like Strongwings. “It was the Darkstalker.”
Sunny tilted her head toward the mirror. What’s the Darkstalker?
What could be scary enough to terrify a dragon as big as Strongwings?
The other two NightWings didn’t respond for a long moment. Finally, Fierceteeth hissed, “That’s just a ghost story for little dragonets. There’s no Darkstalker, or if there ever was, we killed him centuries ago.”
“No, he’s real,” Strongwings said, edging toward hysteria. “Everyone knows he’s still out there somewhere, and now he’s found us. Look at this message! We’re going to die!”
“It could have been someone who wants us to think he’s the Darkstalker,” Preyhunter said dubiously.
“But who else would know we had the mirror? Who else would know that we’re flying to our death?”
“Snap out of it, Strongwings,” Fierceteeth barked. “Someone is trying to scare us, that’s all. You know the story. The Darkstalker, if he did exist, died a long time ago.”
“No. He couldn’t die,” Strongwings whispered. “They buried him, but they always knew he’d come back one day.”
Sunny had never heard of this mythical dragon. It must be a NightWing legend. Lucky for me. She hadn’t expected to tap into an old superstition.
“Maybe it was that SandWing,” Fierceteeth said, then immediately let out a dismissive snort. “No, that stunted salamander wouldn’t have the teeth for something like this. She must have gone back and told someone we had the mirror. I bet this was Deathbringer. Seems like something he would do, from what I’ve heard of him.”
Sunny was obscurely flattered and offended at the same time. She flicked her tongue at the dark glass.
“But Deathbringer would just kill us,” argued Preyhunter. “Strongwings is right about one thing — this is what the Darkstalker does, according to the stories. He plays with his prey for days, making sure they’re nearly paralyzed with terror before he strikes.”
“Yes, exactly,” Strongwings said. “He’ll come back the next time we sleep and kill just one of us, or —”
“So let’s not be paralyzed with terror,” Fierceteeth snarled. “Let’s go. The Kingdom of Sand is on the other side of those mountains. We can be there in a few days if we stop moaning and clutching our tails. Come on.” Her smoke tendril was nearly interwoven with Strongwings’s, as if she were trying to heave him into the sky with brute force.
“But the message —”
“We can’t go back,” Fierceteeth said. “Glory will kill us more definitely than any old NightWing animus ghost, and if she doesn’t, we’ll be the RainWings’ prisoners. I’ll take my chances in the desert, even without that mirror.”
The argument didn’t go on much longer. Soon the sound of wingbeats thumped across the smooth obsidian.
Sunny tilted the smoke together and breathed fire across it again until there was nothing but silence and darkness on the face of the mirror. The slithering inside of her faded, but she felt more tired and sick than she had in a while. I hope I don’t have to use this thing too often.
So I’d better try to keep an eye on them.