Tsunami growled. “If he’s with the Talons, he should know that I don’t understand Aquatic, since he was probably one of the squid-heads who made the decision not to teach it to me. Maybe I should go over there and thump him and then pretend I misunderstood what he was saying.”
“I think he’s just suggesting we land,” Sunny guessed, since all the approaching dragons were now veering down toward the beach.
“Well. Sure. I could have figured that out,” Tsunami said. “But he didn’t have to rub my snout in it, did he?” She flapped on ahead and Sunny followed.
They landed on the sand, which was wet and clumpy between Sunny’s claws. Across from them were Ochre and five dragons from the Talons of Peace: an IceWing, a SkyWing, a SandWing, and two SeaWings — one of them green with black spirals on his scales, the other sky-blue with dark blue horns.
Wait, Sunny thought. I know that other SeaWing….
“Riptide!” Tsunami cried.
The blue dragon’s whole face lit up. “You’re alive!” he said, stepping forward.
“That’s far enough,” said the other SeaWing, flaring one wing in Riptide’s way.
“Of course I am,” Tsunami said to Riptide, ignoring the green dragon. “What are you doing with these —”
Sunny kicked her as hard as she could. Remember why we’re here, Tsunami. No insulting the dragons we’re asking for help.
Tsunami glared at her, but she seemed to get the message. “With the Talons of Peace?” she finished.
“Queen Coral threw me out,” Riptide said sadly, furrowing lines in the sand with his claws. “She considered killing me, or imprisoning me again, but she said I’d fought bravely in the battle at the Summer Palace. So she let me leave with my life. And I didn’t know where else to go — I thought the Talons might know where you were, but …” he trailed off.
“But we had no idea,” said the other SeaWing in a clipped, cold voice.
Tsunami gave him an incredulous look. “You’re not seriously mad at us, are you? Because no. I am mad at you; that’s how this works.”
“This is Nautilus,” Riptide interjected quickly. “The leader of the Talons of Peace.”
“For now,” growled the SkyWing, flicking her red tail back and forth and glowering through a trail of smoke. “Do you have the other dragonets?” She jerked her head at Ochre, who was munching his way through a banana and eyeing the seashells around his claws as if he was wondering whether they might be edible, too.
“We don’t ‘have’ them,” Tsunami said.
“But we know where two of them are,” Sunny added. “Our friends helped them get away from the NightWings.”
“They didn’t want to come back here, though,” Tsunami said. “We offered.”
The SkyWing scowled at her. “Which two?”
“Is Viper one of them?” demanded the SandWing.
Uh-oh, Sunny thought. She shook her head, but before she could answer, the IceWing hissed, “There’s a dragon coming this way.”
They all turned and saw someone flying over the cliffs around the beach, high above their heads. The sun caught on red scales and all the dragons on the sand tensed. Is it a SkyWing scout? One of Ruby’s soldiers, or someone working for Burn?
Or Queen Scarlet? Sunny thought worriedly before she realized this dragon was smaller and a different color.
He was also clearly heading toward them, as if he’d been watching them for a while.
“That looks like Flame,” said the SkyWing, squinting. “But it can’t be. What’s wrong with his face?”
“It might be Flame,” Sunny said, glancing at Tsunami. “He could have followed us. Maybe he changed his mind about coming back.”
“Maybe he just didn’t want to fly with us,” Tsunami said. “Or with him anyway.” She flipped her tail at Ochre.
“Flame?” called the SkyWing. “Flame?”
The dragonet was soaring down toward the sand now; when he heard his name, he faltered in midflight and nearly crash-landed on the dunes.
“Mother?” he called back, wobbling upright again.
The SkyWing shoved past Sunny and Tsunami and caught Flame as he dropped toward her. She let out a roar at the sight of his face.
“What happened to you? Who did this?” She wrapped her wings around him and pulled him close.
Flame seemed to collapse into her, burying his head in her neck. Sunny heard muffled sobbing and felt a wrenching stab of pity for the SkyWing dragonet. She’d only ever seen his mean, prickly, grouchy side, but clearly he could be someone else with someone who really cared about him.
I miss my mother, she thought, wishing she had large warm wings wrapped around her right then. I guess I’ve always missed her. But I miss her even more now that I know her. Thorn was so far away, on the other side of the continent. Sunny folded back her wings and lifted her chin. I’ll see her again soon. As soon as this war is over.