Sunny laughed, and soon the two of them were aloft, soaring north through the rainforest toward the Mud Kingdom.
“Do you think anyone will listen to us?” Clay asked her after they’d flown for a while. The landscape below was shifting from jungle to swamp, with shorter trees and brownish-green ponds visible here and there. In the distance to their right, they could see a shimmer of water that had to be the big lake. That’s where Queen Moorhen’s palace was.
They were definitely not going there.
Sunny tilted her wings to the west, heading for the mountains. “I think someone will listen,” she said. “We just have to find the right someone. A MudWing patrol, I think, not SkyWings or SandWings. I bet they’ll listen to you anyway.” As far as she was concerned, Clay could talk anyone into anything, because anyone could see that he was sincere and wanted the best for everybody.
Clay rumbled nervously deep in his throat. “Maybe we don’t have to do this. Maybe Burn will stay in her stronghold and just be there when we get there.”
“She’s more likely to go out again, looking for another battle,” Sunny said. She thought for a moment, then added, “Or looking for us. No, we have to make sure she’ll be there in seven days, or this won’t work.”
They found a sheltered grove of pines at the foot of the mountains where they could sleep that night. There had been surprisingly few dragons out that day — a few solitary scouts and some two-dragon patrols — but Sunny had decided to avoid them all. She wanted to get farther away from Moorhen’s palace, just in case anyone tried to drag her and Clay back there.
She’d expected to see more soldiers out and about, though. It was a little unsettling how quiet the skies were.
Clay was thoughtfully watching the stars as she curled up against him in the dark.
“Sunny,” he whispered, “I know I’m bad at remembering stuff, but … Pyrrhia only has three moons, right?”
“Of course,” she whispered back. “Why?”
“That thing over there,” he said, pointing with one of his wings. “It looks kind of like a moon coming this way.”
Sunny followed his gaze to a glowing shape in the sky. It was bigger than the other stars, although not quite as big or round as a moon. She couldn’t remember ever noticing it before.
“Freaky,” she said. “I wonder what it is. Not one of the regular moons — look, you can see all the others, there and there, and over there right on the edge of the mountains.” None of them were full, but two of them were more than halfway there and filled the sky with light.
“I might fly up the mountain a ways and take a closer look,” Clay said. “Is that all right?”
“Sure,” Sunny said, sitting up. “I’ll come with you.”
They climbed higher and higher, looking for a clear view of the sky, and finally stopped on a ledge not far from the peak. Clay seemed almost entranced by the strange new thing in the sky, and so it was Sunny who looked down, and gasped, and grabbed his arm, and pointed.
“Clay, look!” she whispered.
The valley below them was dotted with fires, almost like a lake reflecting the stars above. But they could clearly see the shapes of dragons gathered around those fires … and the glint of weapons being polished and sharpened and readied for battle.
“That’s where they all are,” Sunny whispered. “The MudWings are gathering for something. This must be almost their whole army.”
Clay stared down at them, his tail twitching.
That could have been him down there, she realized. If there had been no prophecy, he’d have grown up like any ordinary MudWing. He’d have led his brothers and sisters into battle. He’d have fought and died for Queen Moorhen, and by extension, her ally, Burn.
“They’re planning something big,” Clay said. “I wonder how soon.”
“Let’s go find out,” Sunny suggested, spreading her wings.
“But you —” he started.
“I’m just a SandWing,” she said. “I could be your ally. In the dark, maybe no one will look twice at my tail.” She curled it up in an imitation of the scorpion-like way the SandWings often held their tails.
After some arguing, she won the debate, and they flew down to the MudWing camp as cautiously and quietly as they could move. There didn’t seem to be any guards on the outskirts, and they slipped in among the campfires on silent feet.
Many of the dragons around them were sleeping, although Sunny saw at least one member awake in each small group. She remembered what they’d learned about MudWings in Clay’s home village. Each troop was made up of brothers and sisters, who fought alongside one another through thick and thin, led by whichever one was the biggest — their bigwings.
“Someone here could pass a message to Burn,” she whispered to Clay. “But how do we decide who? And what if they’re all going off to a battle tomorrow? Do you think we can stop them?”