Chapter Three

Eridanus Réalta

“You see, Lady Sundancer? This new spell could change the war forever. The wizards, armed with claws, fire,  and magic? Our side would be unstoppable!” Galning cackled happily, rubbing his newfound talons together. Queen Sundancer looked worried.

“Yes, I suppose this would be helpful,” she said in a mournful tone. “But I truly dislike using magic to win an unfair war. Especially when some of my allies have already proven themselves to fight without honor.”

Eridanus wondered if she was the only one who saw the tiny flash of rage in Galning’s eyes. He shook himself, flapping out his wings and tail in such a dragonlike gesture that Eridanus was almost fooled. But, too, dragons only tend to make that kind of movement when they are nervous… or angry, Eridanus realized. Sundancer was purposely angering Galning, either to get him to leave or to see how he controlled his anger, Eridanus didn’t know. But she could easily see the anger shuddering through his wing bones. It scared her.

For a few seconds, no one said anything. Then Eridanus, desperate to change the mood, blurted out, “Mother, – I mean Queen Sundancer, is it true you’ve pulled Unit 1176 out of the war for the time being and are throwing a returning party?

Eridanus was smarter than she looked. She had just turned the discussion to an equally important subject, while dismissing Galning and letting everyone in the room know she was Queen Sundancer’s adopted daughter, and provoking Galning by letting him know that they had plenty of soldiers at their disposal, ready to turn on the wizards at a flick of Queen Sundancer’s tail. The wizards would have gone extinct centuries ago if not for Mount Naga’s forces protecting them from Shadowwalker’s armies. 

Sundancer gave Eridanus a look that said You are incredible and please remind me to take you out for kitfu later, and turned to Galning with a relieved sigh. “Yes, indeed, Mount Naga will be hosting a Masquerade Ball tonight for the heroes returning from the war effort. Unit 1176 hosts a variety of heroes, namely Lieutenant Okeanós Nerokouvalitís, Colonel Ilanga Dzuwa, and Sergeant Deigh Ledas. This ball will be to celebrate their victories in battle, and Galning, please return to human shape. You look idiotic, standing like that.”

Indeed, Galning was standing on his hind legs like a human, and his wings hung loosely by his side, as he hardly knew where to put them. Anger bubbled in his throat at Sundancer’s barely concealed insult– or wait, was that…

“Look out!” Eridanus yelped, leaping over the table in front of Queen Sundancer. Her front talons thumped heavily into the queen’s side and Sundancer slammed to the floor.  A blast of burning hot steam exploded from Galning’s mouth, hissing outward. Fortunately, Galning didn’t seem to know how to injure anyone with his breath weapon – it only worked in close quarters, so even as the steam hissed against Eridanus’s scales, it siphoned away. 

Pain lanced across her skin. It was only a minor burn, but it still hurt quite a lot, and it was all Eridanus could do to keep from yowling.

Queen Sundancer had no such self-control. With a shriek of outrage, she surged out from under Eridanus and lunged towards Galning, clamping her razor-sharp teeth into his shoulder. He howled in pain and crumpled. He shrank back to his wizard shape as he tumbled to the marble floor.

“How DARE you,” snarled Sundancer. “You pawprint-livered, mangy-breath, moldering, sly, black-cursed, thin-scaled, wetterobe SNAKE! Burn MY DAUGHTER, will you? Get out of my palace and NEVER come back. You can tell Rahu or WHATEVER HIS DROWNWING NAME IS that I WILL BURN YOUR NEXT STUPID ADVISOR to a CRISP! GET OUT OF MY HOME!” she howled, her voice dripping with so much venom Eridanus was surprised that  Galning was still breathing. Four guards stamped up and surrounded the petrified Galning, their snouts wreathed in fire. One of them picked him up with two claws, as if he was an ugly little mouse, and carried him away.

Eridanus, who was fine by now, was staring at her godmother with newfound admiration. “Where’d you learn all those swear words?” she finally asked. Sundancer looked guilty. 

“Technically you’re not supposed to know that they’re cursing words either,” Sundancer said. ‘DrownWing’ was a really bad name for a turncoat, while wetterobe, thin scale, and black-cursed were both insults of varying levels. Pawprint-livered was Eridanus’s favorite curse word. She was somewhat disappointed that Sundancer had left out ‘gun einchainn’ and ‘ceann cruaidh’, which both roughly meant ‘hardheaded idiot (and then some)’.

“Let’s get your burn looked at,” Sundancer said decisively, carefully shifting Eridanus’s wing to look at the burnt scales underneath. Where the steam had touched, each scale had curled up at the edges and had changed from its usual purply black to a dark blackish red, with the outer edges lightening to a painful-looking pink.

The next few hours were a bit of a blur. Eridanus did get her burn checked on by Queen Sundancer’s favorite healer, although that was nothing exciting. The healer had given her a thick, slimy green cream to spread on the burn whenever it hurt and pronounced her fine.

After that was all a haze of dragons darting in and out, hanging long, elegant streamers all over the place and hoisting up the sign that read WELCOME, SOLDIERS!  in a bright, cheery script. Artificial flowers, perfectly carved from a single jewel, whether ruby or emerald, gleamed on all the tables, twinkled on the walls and were littered all over the stage, refracting light like mini rainbows. Dragons with sopping sponges tied to their talons skated around the ballroom, first in perfect lines to clean it, then doing jubilant dances while soapsuds and water scattered everywhere in rainbow splashes. Behind them, a parade of wild hatchlings charged in harnessed to an enormous moplike device that wiped all the water and soap away, leaving the floor shinier than a sunbeam. Much to Eridanus’s amusement, a little dragonet, probably only a year old, sat atop the mop with a short rope that he kept cracking like a whip.

Eridanus truly loved Queen Sundancer’s palace, if not for the marble floors and elegant pearl columns, but most of all for its occupants. Every maid, servant, or butler had brought their dragonets to work dozens of times and was known by name. No one was stuffy or snotty, and it was common to see a few butlers having a food fight in the corridors. Everyone knew everyone else, and the wild skating party was probably one of many insane events that would be taking place before the soldiers of Unit 1176 arrived. 

After the meeting yesterday, Eridanus was glad to be free from her duties as a princess so she and her two friends, Lasair and Adan, had gone exploring. Sadly now it was time to start getting ready for the ball tonight.

After coming up out of a trapdoor in the middle of the floor after being in the catacombs all night she turned away reluctantly and trotted down the hallway to her room. Her tarnaitė, Lasair, was already there and pounced upon Eridanus with vicious enthusiasm.

A tarnaitė was like a maid, but specifically for preparing your appearance for special occasions. Lasair was a genius FlameWing who adored two things: Eridanus and art; so of course she volunteered to be Eridanus’s tarnaitė.

With a delighted squeal, she dragged Eridanus to her desk chair and began digging for the gold pigment.

Eridanus loved Lasair. She acted much like a fan dragon, but her fireblast was vicious and violent when put to the test. She was a genius with colors and paint, although she preferred scales to canvas. More than once, she’d snuck Eridanus out of the castle by covering her with sage green pigment powder and dreaming up Eridanus’s alter ego, Samanos, a grumpy, quiet EarthWing. Sundancer still wasn’t wise about that secret Eridanus shared with her tarnaitė.

With a chuckle, Lasair daubed gold paint around her eyes, cleanly outlining them with a shining outer layer. Eridanus. When Lasair had moved to highlight the edge of Eridanus’ snout, she accidentally sneezed, sending the powder everywhere, including her favorite blue storybook. Carefully, Lasair painted Eridanus’s claws with stardust and deep ebony blue and wove diamonds around her horns while Eridanus continued reading.

After Lasair made her clean her fangs with foul-tasting ash paste, Eridanus lost herself in the gold-stained book until Lasair shook her back to reality.

Peering into the ballroom, she sighed in relief. It was only 7:03, according to the giant tree-ring clock looming over the stage, while the soldiers and their families were slowly streaming into different rooms to get ready. They would be able to enter at 8:00, to give them time to refresh themselves and greet their returning relatives. Eridanus hated joining the party when dragons were already milling around the room and gawking at her jewels.

Queen Sundancer, at that moment, decided to come into Eridanus’ room to check on her, almost getting trampled by Lasair as she pelted to the kitchens to fetch drinks. Eridanus noticed Sundancer looking at her in her peripheral vision and tried to ignore her.

Her godmother was sitting on a windowsill mainly designed for Eridanus to sit and read on, that flaunted an intricately shaped window peeking into the ballroom. Eridanus wished that Lasair was back from getting their drinks because the last thing she wanted right now was to be alone with Sundancer.

“Eri. . .” Sundancer said with a no-I’m-not-sad-okay-maybe-I-am face. “At the ball, you will be surrounded by new dragons. This could be a great opportunity for you to ma–”

“If you’re going to talk about me making a new friend, or telling everybody my secret, the answer is no. I like my life the way it is.” Eridanus interrupted defensively.

“Eridanus, listen to me. This will be good for you. You have to have more friends. You can’t stay cooped up here forever.” Sundancer said. “And your trips to the market don’t count,” she added as an afterthought.

“I go hunting a lot. But I don't see why we have to tell everyone that I’m an EclipseWing,” Eridanus replied flatly. “Maybe they’ll think I’m a super dark FlameWing or something. I don’t want anything to change.”

“Well, we have to at least tell the Nerokouvalitís family and the Ikristalu’s.” 

“Or,” Eridanus replied slowly. “We can leave me here, in my room, with my books, and not go see more wizards and dragons. You know what? I like my idea. I think that’s what I’m going to do,” Eridanus said, trying to hide her smugness. Sundancer and Eridanus knew it would be safer for her to stay in her room, even though everyone at the palace knew she was an EclipseWing, and perfectly harmless. Most of the time.  She had the worst balance in the world. And that isn’t exaggerating anything. The last time that she had gone to a ball, Eridanus had accidentally collapsed all of the buffet tables and ruined a lot of fabric, so she for sure knew she had some leverage. But no one outside the gates had any clue Queen Sundancer was harboring an EclipseWing as her daughter, and she didn’t want to spread the secret.

“Hiya!” Lasair said, making Eridanus jump and spill clay-colored powder all over her talons. Sundancer quickly picked up a rag and carefully dabbed away the pigment.  “You know, if you want, I could find a date for you. I mean to go to the masquerade,” said Lasair, who must've been eavesdropping.

 Eridanus then took the rag and threw it at Lasair, making Sundancer laugh in a loud, sweet voice. Eridanus loved her godmother’s laugh but hated her ‘fake laugh’, which Sundancer only ever used on wizards and door-to-door salesmen.

“Dance with me, Bird?” Sundancer asked, using her nickname for Eridanus. She held out a talon. Eridanus took it.

“Sure thing, Mama Peacock,” she smiled, knowing Sundancer hated that nickname.

“Hold up, ma’am!” Lasair argued. “We still have to get you up to style with all the latest jewels! Ooo, you’ll be so pretty. And feathers! Feathers. Oh, I love feathers. Feathers are so in right now!” Lasair gushed, hopping from talon to talon and tipping over a jar of thick red paint.

 “I don’t like feathers,” Eridanus muttered. “They make me sneeze.”

“Fine, I’ll drop the feathers. But we still have a lot of things to do! Oh! You could dig out that old veil with all the sparkles and flowery things! That would be pretty!”

Eridanus scowled.

================================

Almost an hour later, with five minutes to spare before the opening, Eridanus was ready to go. Lasair, with the excuse that she had to ‘meet her date’, had fled, and Eridanus had no idea where Sundancer was.

“Mom?” Eridanus asked,  peering around a corner. She was only being cautious because Sundancer had had a Very Serious Talk with her about not showing anyone her scales until Sundancer called upon her to reveal herself. Which Eridanus disagreed with, but did not argue about it, because you did not argue with Sundancer during a Very Serious Talk. 

Sundancer was, indeed, standing there, and to Eridanus’s surprise was surrounded by large, muscly WaterWings with lots of scars and scratches. New bodyguards, maybe? She was this close to hopping out and declaring irritation when she noticed the dragonets milling around uncertainly behind the taller WaterWings and jumped back. This was the Nerokouvalitís family that Sundancer had been talking about. On second glance, the scars weren’t the clean, battle-induced wounds, but jagged scrapes doled out by rough clamshells and indignant moray eels, and they wore no armor, only a few small jewels and almost no marks of status. Only the oldest dragonell wore even a tiny topaz necklace, and–

Oh NO.

Standing behind one of the dragonells was that annoying green dragonet from the marketplace – Aquara, Aquarius? No, Aquarii. She was staring at high ceilings with nothing less than absolute stupor and almost didn’t notice Eridanus sneaking back down the hall.

Almost.