In Death, Sunshine

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Authored by BronzeRattle
Complete! Started on February 25 2023. The idea that ended up being the final plot for this story started on May 7 2023 and was technically finished on July 21 2023 and then actually finalized on July 29 after an intentional break for review. Last important edit was on August 12 2023 to move the story here.
This is the new location for ; see writing history there. Additionally, visit the for a summary of major changes (most of which are talked about in trivia).
Reading Ice on the Horizon is strongly recommended for comprehension. There is currently no finished sequel.
Please ping (@BronzeRattle) BronzeRattle if you want me to see your comment in a reasonable time span.
=== Summary ===
The name Mooseblight today brings nothing but fear and bad memories to IceWings, but it hasn't always been so. A certain IceWing anomaly proves that under danger and needless suffering is a completely different dragon willing to be free. This is the tale of an uneasy relationship.
__TOC__
IN DEATH, SUNSHINE
A bright light shone into an IceWing's eyes.
She blinked, catching sights of a hooded figure. Talons felt rope keeping her in a chair.
"This can either end very amicably or in a landslide, IceWing. I have a sole question for you. Answer it honestly, and I will let you go back to your Tempest master. Refuse to answer...well, you won't see the end of it."
"I don't understand why you want me," the IceWing softly spoke, "I didn't do anything wrong."
"I want to know about someone. You know him. The Shallows deem he Mooseblight. The Hybrid."
She tilted her head the opposite direction.
The figure cracked a grin. "I see. What's your connection to him?"
"There were others involved. Dozens."
"You know something the others don't. Your experience with the monster is more unique. I've heard the same old story thousands of times. But you seem to know more on him than others. So speak or a nice Crestbreaker will make you speak."
Her eyes made up a strange blade slowly being pulled out of darkness.
She swallowed and looked ahead. "Fine. I will speak. Just..." The IceWing eyed the devilish purple blade. "Get that thing away from me."
== Change of Plans ==
5,068 AS
The first day of her job had caused her last. Unintentionally.
She should've known it the instant she had to report to the barracks that late afternoon, along with at least twenty other IceWings. Not one of them knew how much danger they'd be in from that point on.
"Lion, right?" The secretary noted, looking down at a lengthy scroll. She was enormous, at least three times as large, and entirely sandy colored. There was something else in her eyes. The playful, trickster look of a SandWing.
Lion snapped herself to attention. "Yes. Not the big cat. Like the fish."
"Got it. You're very distinct in color." The strange IceWing winked. "That's a good thing. I'm like that myself. You've been assigned to part-time guard."
The news hit Lion like a blast of frostbreath. "What?"
"Queen Cumulus announced at the beginning of the year that she'd be reassigning IceWings to guards when troop numbers fell under a certain percent. She's pulling from the Fourth and Fifth Circles. So, sorry?"
"I can't go to war," Lion shook her head in disbelief. "I'm a caretaker! I take care of old IceWings for a living! They can't take care of themselves!"
The secretary placed her talons on Lion's shoulders. "You're not going to war. At least, for now. You're actually one of the lucky ones: Most of the dragons behind you in the line are going to war. My scroll says you'll still be caretaking, except now you will be taking care of the prisoners. So it's similar, but now you need to know how to wield a spear. Nightfall will be in charge of the seniors."
"Is that supposed to make me feel better? I was hoping growing up would be the only years I would need to fight." She was so angry she felt her spines standing upright.
"Fighting doesn't end in dragonethood. You have to keep fighting throughout your life. But hey, you have me as your commander. The mighty Ecru! Ask anyone in the barracks here and they'll tell you I'm the best one." Ecru set down her scroll. "Go into the back and tell Whiskers to show you the basics on spear-handling. You'll recognize him by the barbels."
Lion did just that. Along rows of whaleskin mats and small groups of dueling IceWings was a peculiar gray individual managing two dragonets at once on his hind legs. She watched in interest as he smacked the larger of the two with the blunt end, sending him off the edge of the mat. With one target down, the IceWing zeroed in on the remaining opponent, trading hits evenly until his spiky tail tripped the young dragonet out of the arena.
The dragonet got up as quickly as he fell. "No fair! We're only supposed to use the spears!"
"We're training to go into battle, Guppy. No SandWing is going to stick to one weapon," the IceWing roughly said. His stormy gray eyes caught the sight of Lion. "Newcomer, eh? Know anything about spear combat?"
Lion backed up. "Uh, no sir. I'm Lion. Ecru told me to go looking for you."
He came back down on all fours and turned his muscular body toward her. "Then you know that my name is Whiskers. For these flesh bits on my snout. I teach the art of the spear. Know the spear, love the spear."
"Love the blue blood that gushes from you from the spear." Guppy muttered sarcastically. "Whiskers is going to make you bleed."
"Not yet. Basics first. Go fetch a set of light armor from the wall for Lion Guppy. A 4 size should do it."
The IceWings spent the next hour sparring on the mats. In that time several conclusions were made. The first was from Whiskers himself. He explained over lessons how he had hatched in the high alpines of Over-the-Gray-Moor where his first name was Whalemeat.
"Why Whalemeat?" she had asked.
"As with any great family, they place emphasis on combat. Their tradition is to name any hatchling an embarrassing name to force them to redeem themselves for a better name. Whalemeat was my given name, but they renamed me to Whiskers because my cousins kept confusing me with my older brother Whaleskin." He shook his head. "He's much darker I am. Not sure how they did. But I kept Whiskers as a souvenir."
The second concerned her armor. Lion didn't like the sensation of metal on her shoulders at all time. She noticed the two other students weren't very eager to put on armor either, at least from what she could tell. Only some of the sparring IceWings in the long room wore armor, with some donning metal from head to talon.
The third was the most obvious. She wasn't built for this kind of art. When Whiskers sent her spear scuttling for the fifth time in ten minutes, she buried her snout in exasperation. "I can't do this."
"Lion. Look at me."
The IceWing raised her head. Whiskers gazed right into Lion's eyes sympathetically. "You have to try. No dragon is perfect immediately. We all have to start somewhere." He held out her spear to Lion like a scroll. "Take it and try again."
Lion had just readied her spear for another round when Ecru soared through the doorway and landed beside them. This time she had a chestplate.
"Whiskers, I've been informed of a new hybrid coming into the kingdom and must inspect the crew's cargo. Can you take care of anything that happens in the meantime?"
He rose up. "Got it. Sorry Lion, I have business to take care of."
"Wait." Ecru looked at Lion. "You said you have experience in caretaking, correct?"
"Three years of it, yes." Lion wasn't sure where the IceWing was going with the fact.
Whiskers shot Ecru an expression Lion couldn't quite decipher. Ecru nodded at him before going back to her. "We might need your help with the cargo. Our workers have a tendency to damage or break items so having you would be a great help. Follow me."
And without knowing it, Lion was about to enter the next phase in her life.
== The Cargo ==
"I want you to watch from here until I give the signal to move in. It might be a little dangerous and I wouldn't want you to get hurt." They had arrived to a large hill overlooking the sea not three minutes away from the palace. In fact, moon globes from the gift of light floated lazily in the setting sun.
Lion watched Ecru swoop downwards to meet 5 IceWings tightly surrounding an object of importance. She squinted in an attempt to actually see what they were guarding, but to no avail. They were deep in conversation over presumably the object. Finally, one of the IceWings, a grayish individual with an interesting cyan sheen, unveiled the precious treasure they were so eager about.
Lion was expecting a shiny pile of diamonds or perhaps an all gold trinket. She was definitely not expecting a twitchy blue dragonet a year or so old with fascinated blue eyes and tiger stripes on his tail. His complete lack of wings made her jump. She was so distracted trying to process the dragon that she nearly missed the signal Ecru made for her to come down.
"IceWings, this is Lion. She'll be helping you with the dragonet," Ecru introduced them to Lion. She turned to the IceWing. "This is Cleavage, Glaucous, and Coontail."
Cleavage, the largest IceWing, glanced at her to acknowledge her existence and continued their conversation. "We haven't gotten his name yet Ecru."
The dragonet exclaimed. "I'm Mooseblight!"
Ecru sighed with satisfaction, a little startled. "Well, there we have it. Mooseblight. A part IceWing...thing. Say, I don't recognize his other half."
"His mother was bizarre. A brown dragon with a long, kind of SeaWing body, but she had spines in place of wings. She had blue horns. Completely unlike any tribe we've seen."
Mooseblight snapped at Cleavage. "Hey, her name is Mildeaa. She's a SpurWing." He perked up as if remembering something important. "You said you were bringing me on a vacation. I'm freezing! I want Mildeaa back!"
Cleavage locked eyes with Ecru and shrugged. "It was the only way."
"The only way to what?" The dragonet growled at Ecru.
"This is the vacation," Ecru quickly caught on, "Ever been to the Ice Kingdom before?"
"No and I don't like this cold! I want to be warm!" Mooseblight protested.
"Ah, not one for the snow I see. Well, if you'd just follow me, me and my friends can get you acquainted with some hot chocolate."
He tilted his head. "I don't know what hot chocolate is."
"Drink. Very sweet, will warm you up." Glaucous explained.
He lit up. "Yes! I want it!"
"Let's get you acquainted then..." The sandy IceWing took him by the shoulder as they walked to the palace.
The walk in itself wasn't particularly interesting to Lion. She'd flown all around the palace before for various errands. But the same couldn't be said for Mooseblight. He was fascinated with the grand rising structure of the indestructible palace and kept asking her questions about various objects. Why her, she didn't know.
"What are these glowy things?" He asked after a moon globe bumped into his snout.
"We call them moon globes. They come from this ice tree one of our dragons made hundreds of years ago."
"Cool! Can I keep one?"
Lion looked at Ecru for an answer.
"Take one." Ecru said.
By the time they were actually inside the palace, Lion was exhausted with Mooseblight. He would have his hot chocolate, and she would be able to rest for a few moments. But instead of heading down to the kitchens on the ground floor, they took a turn to a stairway she'd never seen before in an occluded corner of the place. The hallway was dark, only lit by flaming torches. She didn't like it.
Finally, Ecru stopped in front of a door. It was curiously small, with a slat at the bottom, and completely made of steel. Nothing like the doors Lion had seen. The large IceWing took out a set of keys, grumbling as she tried to figure out which was the right one. After a minute, she took out a large skeletal key and unlocked the door.
"The kitchen is in there. You're big enough to ask the chefs yourself, right?" she asked
"Mildeaa says I'm tough! I am!" And Mooseblight bounded into the room. The instant he was inside, Ecru slammed the door shut.
"Very smooth," Cleavage groaned in exhaustion.
Lion glanced at the door. "This isn't the kitchen. We completely skipped it."
The IceWings suddenly looked uncomfortable. Cleavage looked at Ecru. "You didn't tell her, did you?"
"Her job before reassignment was to took care of old dragons. I didn't need to tell her."
He choked. "A reassignment?!" He buried his head in his talons. "Oh no. You took a newbie and brought her along on a mission by the queen's most secretive task force! Ecru! Do you know how bad that is?"
"What's going on?" Lion narrowed her eyes at Ecru.
The dragon sighed. "These IceWings aren't your normal messengers, Lion. These are my most elite group of Hybrid Hunters whose goal is to...well, you can probably figure it out. Mooseblight wasn't led to the palace for hot chocolate. He was led to be imprisoned in the queen's dungeons."
"For how long?" She asked.
They all had a sudden interest in their reflections in the metal floor.
"How long?!" She pressed.
"For as long as Queen Cumulus says. Forever."
Lion froze. They had tricked her. She wasn't babysitting, she was helping kidnappers. Kidnapprs who were willing to search far and wide for cute deformations to shroud in bars and darkness for the rest of their lives. Cute innocent dragons...like Mooseblight.
"You're all terrible dragons. How could you take the futures of other dragons just because one of their parents was weird?" She glowered at the door with determination. "We have to let him out."
"I sure hope you're not planning that," rasped a luxurious voice in the hallway.
== Vigil ==
"Queen Cumulus!" Glaucous yelped.
She was a large purplish IceWing. Bigger than all minus Ecru, whom she looked like a dwarf next to, but bigger nonetheless for her aura of power and danger. Her icy blue eyes scanned them in the torchlight. Lion had a feeling all of her weak points were being identified at once. The others must've thought the same. They all took a step back.
"Excellent work as always, Hunters," she hissed as she paced forwards menacingly. Tail spikes screeched against the metal as her tail dragged on the floor.
"Correct, Your Majesty," Ecru replied quickly to fill in the deafening silence.
Glaucous raised his talons. "Does that mean I ca-"
"Silence!" She snapped right at him. "We will not discuss your heinous act here. Ecru, mind you, WHY IS THERE A COMMONER AMONG MY HUNTERS?!"
"It was just a precaution, my quee-"
"You shall not repeat this act again, hybrid! Or I will lock you and your brother up in these dungeons, where you both should've belonged!" She froze Lion with her deadly eyes. "You. Lion. I do not want to hear of any more liberation ideas for my hybrids in any form."
Faint pounding was evident from the inside of the door.
Queen Cumulus growled. "Ecru, the waiting room. Hunters, your post. Lion, the barracks. No other soul should hear about this."
~
Clink! Clink!
"Now Lion," spoke Whiskers as their spears grinded against each other, "when your spear is against another, never let go. That is the quickest way to get an eye poked out. Instead, force th-"
Something distracted him. Lion used the opportunity to divert his spear, sending it flying and startling a sparring pair of dragonets. He held his talons to signal a pause as he walked off the mat to meet a gray-green IceWing. "Verdigris! My, I haven't seen you in-"
"Yeah yeah knock it off whale blubber. I've come to deliver a message on the behalf of Queen Cumulus to a certain Lion of the Fourth Circle IceWings. I was led here by front desk."
"That's her." Whiskers quickly pointed at Lion.
The IceWing turned toward the pale trainee. "She told me to get this done first on my shift. I'll be blunt, when she asks for that it's a good sign the recipient's head is going to end up on a bloody icicle. Not to scare you or anything." Lion was handed an envelope as cold as ice.
"Verdigris, when you have th-" Whiskers started.
"Pass it through my brother and I'll see if I care enough to think about anything that comes from your sorry tuchus. Later."
She left in a huff. Whiskers dropped his head.
Lion opened the envelope:
To Lion of the IceWings
Your presence is requested immediately after my royal messenger Verdigris gets this delivered to you. You are to come to the council room.
The guards know who you are and will let you in without problems.
From, Queen Cumulus of the IceWings
Now what? She thought. Lion hadn't done a thing since the Mooseblight encounter three months prior. "Whiskers, I have to leave."
He frowned. "Ah, what a shame. I guess I'll have a few rounds with Guppy now that you must go."
Guppy, who had been sitting out on a bench, perked up in fear.
Whiskers chuckled. "Go."
Lion took off in a rush of freezing air, rising higher until the full icy palace came into view. She dove into the courtyard, took a couple turns, and at last she was in a great room.
She had never been in the council room before. It was meant for the elite, like her own First and Second Circle parents, the wise dragons who knew every in and out of the tundra, and of course for the queen herself. She was up against the wall, glaring at Ecru below her, which would've looked silly if her body wasn't posed to attack at a snowflake' notice. Around 30 other adults were present. All but Queen Cumulus stared at her the instant Lion opened the heavy doors encrusted in twinkling tiny diamonds.
"So the cavalry arrives," Queen Cumulus spat.
"She'd be an excellent guard!" Ecru pleaded.
"Wait, what's even happening here?" Lion raised her wings.
Ecru looked at her straight in the eyes. "Yesterday, when the locksmiths were upgrading the security of the prisoners, Mooseblight woke up suddenly from his anesthesia and attacked the locksmiths trying to get out of his cell. It took a wing of guards to put him back. Today, two of those locksmiths died from their injuries."
"A small dragonet did that?" Lion gawked.
She slowly nodded, holding up a bandaged forearm. "I was there myself helping them out. Months without food and barely any water in the bitter cold would drive anyone mad. He is not gentle."
"Which is exactly why he must be executed!" The queen roared. "He is one of Aeolis's children! We have no use for him except for tearing up my valuable guards!"
"My queen, if you were locked up in a tiny cage the instant you hatched, would you be alright as an adult? Mentally? Physically? Emotionally?"
She bluffed but held her tongue.
The sandy IceWing looked down, seemingly anxious. "He...he had a soft spot for you. He trusted you enough to ask questions about the kingdom. I know it's a lot to ask and you're still learning how to fight, but would you be willing to supervise Mooseblight? Full time?"
Lion raised her brow. "Supervise? How?"
"Watching him. Feeding him. Taking care of him. Not much unlike what you originally did and will do once your training is finished."
A huge IceWing on the far side of the room suddenly opened his wings. Lion couldn't believe she hadn't recognized him before: Cornmeal, one of the elders she sometimes stopped by. And now that he and Ecru were in the same room, it was hard to ignore the similarities: Pale sandy scales, shiny SandWing eyes, and far more menacingly, a curled tail that ended in a scorpion point. They were siblings.
"Ecru, this is dangerous! Lion is a good dragon...I don't want her to be hurt." He frantically looked at her.
"He won't hurt her. I'm sure of it."
"This is positively lucrative," Queen Cumulus affirmed as she leaned back in her seat, "But fine, I shall be a willing queen and compromise over the council. If Lion decides to be a full-time caretaker of the hybrid, he shall live. Not in pleasure, mind you, but he shall not be subjected to the regular tortures if it helps control his temper. Otherwise, the monster dies tomorrow morning in the courtyard."
Lion wanted to protest, but it was hard to do when one dragon was desperate and the other pained. She took a shaky breath. "I accept it. I will take care of Mooseblight."
Queen Cumulus rose up. "Very well. Commander, I want you to lead Lion to Mooseblight now and make it clear to that horrid prisoner who his new guard is." She had no expression as she regarded Lion. "We shall see soon enough if you regret the task."
"Yes, Your Majesty," Ecru nodded as she took Lion by the talons. "Come on."
There was no conversation as they ambled across the council room, out into the palace grounds, through the clumps of high-ranking IceWings huddled in the palace, or down the eerie stairway and resulting hallway that echoed every scuffle and scrape of talons on the smooth floor. It was just as ominous as the time before. Lion's heart was pulsing as frantically as the dancing flames of the torches throwing dark shadows of the intruders across the ground.
Ecru had no problems finding the skeletal key this time around, gleaming in the torchlight as she placed it into the lock. She glanced nervously at Lion. "Are you ready for this?"
"No. But I have to do this."
She turned the lock and slowly, painfully slowly, opened the heavy door as little as she could for either of them to fit. Lion nearly revolted at the scent of sweating scales and ancient metal before she was even in the dark tiny room. There was nothing but a small lump of dragon on the floor. Only his chains—dozens of them, she noticed, from snout to every separate talon on his legs―indicated the poor shape of the dragonet. He was composed more of chains than body fat. Skin and scales stuck tightly to his cramped bones. Mooseblight sat on the floor, head lowered, eyes tuning out the insanity of everything in the room.
He was larger than before. But not by much.
"Mooseblight," Ecru started.
The dragonet opened his eyes. His expression was unreadable thanks to the muzzle over his snout.
"Do you remember Lion? The pale yellow IceWing?"
He sat there. In the pitiful light, blue bleeding scratches lined his neck and shoulders. He wasn't ignorant. He was in pain.
The commander looked at Lion. "Speak."
"I-I-I'm the dragon that taught you what a moon globe was." She spied a lonely globe floating in a corner of the room: He had let it go and couldn't reach it with the chains securing him in the center of the room. Lion seized it and placed it in front of him, willing it to glow with a touch. His features were showered in its pale bright light. "I will be your caretaker now."
She couldn't tell if Mooseblight liked that or detested it. His blue eyes were intent on following the moon globe as it slowly floated up to the ceiling. Seeing how terrible he looked and the pure penetrating darkness of the room, he probably did. It was his only source of light and hope in the situation.
He groaned—in suffering, in enjoyment, in wonder, she didn't know. His eyelids slunk over his eyes, a slow tide over his fractured gaze, and his neck fell to the cell floor in slow motion. The dragonet was so still Lion thought he had died, but she saw his rib-lined stomach rise and fall as he breathed.
"His energy is up," Ecru whispered. "He can't stay up for more than a few moments at a time. We should leave and let him nap."
"This is awful!" She hissed. "He is a living skeleton! He should at least be able to talk!"
"Queen Cumulus won't let that happen in the slightest. Mooseblight gets extremely bitey when approached and yowls all night. She had him muzzled after the incident yesterday and said he should only ever be unmuzzled for his feedings and to drink water." The commander glanced at the door. "There is a whole routine Queen Cumulus has set up for specifically guarding him. You will learn it tomorrow, but we need to leave now before he gets any ideas."
~
Lion sat in the torchlight stink of the hallway.
She was busy making out her reflection. No matter how much she put up her guard posture or rolled her shoulders back or let frostbreath steam up from her nostrils, there was still a scared yellow striped IceWing keeping timid brown eyes and sagging spines. She ran her claws along the shaft of her spear, Siberia, to keep them distracted. They were growing too long again, pinching into her own scales whenever he made a fist motion. If she lived this encounter, cutting them would be her form of celebration.
It was time to feed Mooseblight. After what Ecru told her the month before, the brutality of the dragonet, she was not excited for this at all, even if he was heavily sedated through his dripping water supply beforehand. It was going to be dangerous, deadly work. She reached for the key on a ring around her neck, unlocked the door, and pushed it open, touching her moon globe to light it in the process.
There he was, asleep as peacefully as he could be on the ground. The jagged scratches on the sides of his neck were still as prominent as ever, albeit no longer bleeding. She realized with a sickening lurch that they would never heal properly.
Here came the hard part.
She extended Siberia forwards towards a couple of tiny slats in his muzzle. A week after her dedication to Mooseblight, she had been gifted the spear specifically for this purpose of opening the device. The muzzle's peculiar pattern matched the forks in the spear and would only match it. It was a key in a spear that if she ever lost, Mooseblight would shrivel to bones as a result.
The forks clicked as she twisted the spear one way, then again on the other side. The muzzle drooped from its latch, revealing his icy cold snout. Lips smacked together as he rose his head. Drowsy eyes scanned her. His nostrils flared.
"It's you," he rasped, standing upright. He seemed alarmed to hear his own voice.
"I've come to feed you. It's...it's not much I'm afraid. I didn't make the rules." She held out a baby seal, already rotting based on the scent emanating from it. Mooseblight stared at it otherwise. His life depended on it. The calories would last him to the next feeding in nearly a month.
He rattled his chains a little. "Why...Why do they hate me?"
She hesitated. Should she tell this one year-old dragonet the truth?
...
No, she couldn't. It would torment him for the rest of his stay. But if she was lucky, he wouldn't die here from old age.
Maybe.
Lion gazed around at the room considering the possibility. It wasn't large enough to fit even Queen Cumulus. What would happen when he was thirty or forty and still in the cell, his horns grazing the ceiling, non-spiky tail being forced to turn in on itself because the wall wouldn't allow it to extend to full length? Would he be moved to a larger cell? Or would he, she feared, be crammed in by the unfriendly walls? She imagined his neck, although not long in the slightest, bending down, staring at the steel ground corroded with age. It would drive her insane: She couldn't imagine staying in this asylum for a day, much less the rest of her life.
Simply put, it was a horrible way to die. No friends, no comfort, always on the brink of starvation, and barely any room to think or grow in.
Help him. Discreetly.
It was a single thought brought in by the breeze, landing on her mental windowsill for a second before it was lifted off again into the world. And it got her thinking. Alright, she couldn't outright free him. Siberia was a key for a single brace, not the 28 different sets chains (yes, she had asked) keeping him at the center of the room. Everyone would know it was her anyway and she'd take his place in the horrid room. But maybe, just maybe, she could make his time a little less bad.
Lion snapped her attention back to his questioning gaze. He looked urgent for some reason, until she remembered she was still holding his seal. She pushed it in front of him. He began eating eagerly.
"What happened to your moon globe?" She asked. There was no globe floating off in a corner this time. It was just the dragonet, his chains, and specks of dried blue blood from his earlier wounds.
He finished chewing, the scent of decay strong in the air. "They didn't like my light. They took it away."
Of course they had. Due to the queen's verdict, Mooseblight couldn't be tortured in the normal ways, but there were other ways she could make his time feel torturous.
"We need to get you light, don't you think? Was it better with the light?"
He closed his eyes. Stress marks appeared under his casque. "My scary dreams were less scary."
Lion immediately flushed. Somehow she didn't consider the effects on his sleep: He was living a nightmare in two worlds. She quickly stood up. "I'll try to get some light back for you, okay?"
"Okay," he sighed wistfully.
And so she tried. When she met with the other guards for lunch break, she would raise the issue of allowing light. But not one of them seemed to care—To them, darkness suited every prisoner.
Even betrayed dragonets a year old?
Every three weeks she came into his cell for his feeding. Every single feeding he got worse. The look in his eyes was more desperate, more wild, more fractured like an pecarious icicle getting ready to drop.
And the icicle did drop.
Lion could still remember that day when the prison manager had seized her talons during her lunch break. Her claws and snout were just about stained in blood from the cod she had been tearing into, making her abrupt appearance into the council room quite awkward.
"Queen Cumulus," she tried to say. The fish meat in her mouth muffled the words into "Kweef Kmumuf".
"Your prisoner escaped, Lion." The queen's voice was steely angry.
Lion swallowed and quickly licked the blood and oil off her talons. "I was on my lunch break! I can go reca-"
Cumulus flicked her tail. "No need. Ecru has dealt with the monster."
She tensed and felt her wings drop. Her voice was nearly a whisper. "He's dead?"
The queen shrugged. "I have not the foggiest idea. Good riddance if he is-"
Lion bolted from the room.
Her heart was pounding. She had to know if he was still alive. She couldn't have let him down like that. And if he wasn't...
Bloody talons filled her mind's eye. And not decorative red blood from cod...
She shook her head. Revenge could take a backseat. The IceWing bursted into that annoyingly reflective hallway and out into his open cell door.
A barb nearly silenced her.
She gulped. A tan snout looked at her. "Shh."
Her eyes took in the darkness of the room. Ecru took up much of it, a wall of pure dragon in the way. There, far in the back, was Mooseblight. Unchained.
"Did you kill him?" Lion's swelling anger couldn't be contained.
"He's knocked out for now. Go fetch the locksmiths."
Unless you gave him a coma, he isn't going to be out for long. If he wakes up-"
Ecru growled. "I can take care of the dragonet. Now go!"
Lion did that, reluctantly. They arrived to a still-unconscious Mooseblight and tied him up again with Ecru monitoring the whole thing, poised the whole time to attack.
She hated it. He wasn't a criminal. Maybe he had killed a couple dragons, but she had heard worse from other guards. It was her mission to get him better treatment.
Months flew by. Three times a week she had sessions with Whiskers, sometimes in pure darkness at wee hours in the morning. Her initial flimsiness evolved into deadly precision, a fact she didn't notice until one night when she disarmed Whiskers and held Siberia an inch from his heart.
Both of them stood there, breathing heavily.
"I'm sorry," Lion spoke as she retracted the spear.
"No, that was a feat. Very few IceWings can hold me at heart point like that. If you were an enemy, I would have died right there." Whiskers came back on four legs, grinning.
Something about that irritated her. She threw down Siberia. "I don't want to kill. It's not right."
He wiped his brow. "Better that you learn how in case your prisoner tries something."
She snapped at the IceWing. "He wouldn't."
He shrugged. "Alright, if you say so. I just want you to know that no one is ever who they seem."
And in one flap of wings, Whiskers was gone.
== Progress ==
Lion's days were a monotonous thing. Since Mooseblight's first escape attempt, she had to stay by his door more often. After his second attempt a year later, she wasn't allowed to leave for her lunch break: A servant brought food to her. When he escaped a third time four months after that, Fir was brought in. Lion first met her on her lunch break as a breathless white IceWing shouting "I'm here, I'm here!"
She had paused chewing for a second, scanning the wiry IceWing. She was small, probably about 6 years old. Her snout was narrow and more greatly resembled a kite than the typical IceWing diamond head. Blue eyes eagerly looked up at her.
"Who are you?" Lion asked, perplexed.
"They call me Fir!" Fir bent into a guard stance for a moment before bounding upwards. "You must be Lion, the Watchtower! I've heard so much about y-"
"Wait wait wait." She held out out her talons. "You're going too fast. The Watchtower?"
Fir smiled. "That's what they call you around here. Isn't it a cool nickname? I wish I had a cool nickname! I hope I get one by helping you here."
Every single sentence made Lion more confused. "A helper?"
The dragonet nodded. "Queen Cumulus told me I do a good job of taking care of old IceWings, so she moved me up to work with you!"
Click. Everything suddenly fit together.
"I get it. Queen Cumulus brought you in to secure Mooseblight better, to make sure there were no holes at all throughout the day and night." There was another observation Lion had made, one about how annoying she was, but she decided to keep that one to herself.
"Yes." Her blue eyes darted towards Siberia. "Woah! Your spear looks wicked cool!"
"Siberia, yes." Lion brought it forwards for the dragonet to examine. Its tip, formerly shiny and stainless, was now marred in blue from her session last night with Whiskers. They had long switched to actually drawing blood from each other. Normally she cleaned the spear before she had to show up for work, but she had apparently forgotten this time around.
"Ooo, did you use it to strike at Mooseblight? I bet he was all scared by that sharp blade!" she continued.
Lion grumbled. "No. And don't you get that idea."
The tan IceWing remained quiet for the rest of the morning.
~
Not all was bad with Fir however.
She was impressively active. While Lion had a difficult time keeping her eyes open in the dark hours of the job, Fir could jibber jabber all night about her life. It was surprisingly comforting to hear another life at those hours, besides Mooseblight's occasional interjections.
Lion never forgot about his suffering, and she knew she was running out of time before he would one day end up dead. By the third year he began trying to escape constantly, fighting raw tooth and claw with anyone in the way to achieve freedom. Mooseblight was so dangerous in his attempts that even Whiskers brought it once in a session:
"That prisoner makes a better warrior than any IceWing could ever be. We would win the war with the SandWings in just a month if we had the might of that hybrid."
"The Hybrid" soon became more of a name than his real name was. Less and less guards wanted anything to do with him, until it was just her who knew he had some heart in him—even Fir wrinkled her snout at him; she didn't like him much. Lion felt, no, had the responsibility to take care of him. He needed light. He needed more food. They had to stop dehydrating him to near death. Simple things that should've been simple but were instead momentous mountains that didn't budge no matter what she tried. The best thing she could do for him was to get Fir to go on and on about IceWing guard drama so that he wouldn't be bored.
Or as she thought.
She didn't know if she had anything to do with it, but deep in her fourth year in the job Verdigris came up to the two IceWings. "The prison warden says you and Fir need to head out to the barracks. They've been renovating the prison and this part is next on their plans."
Anxiety seized her heart. "What about Mooseblight?"
The messenger snorted. "Shoot if I know. I will ask the warden for you."
There was never a reply from him. Or anyone else. In fact, it seemed like everyone was avoiding her during her patrols in the dungeons (she was moved there in the meantime) and lunchtime. She knew something was fishy, and it wasn't the cod she had for lunch every day.
"Maybe they killed him and are waiting for the longest possible time to let you know," Fir suggested when Lion had asked her.
"They wouldn't waste my spear talent on guarding nobodies. I would be guarding another high risk prisoner if that was so. Like Alabaster." Lion replied as she placed her specially-fitted helmet on.
"You're right." Fir rubbed a blue stray streak on her shoulder. "They should send you to help the war. You would be a commander in seconds."
She shook her head. "Me and Queen Cumulus agreed that I would guard Mooseblight specifically. I can't guard him and fight SandWings at the same time."
A year later, she had her answer. In the form of reassignment, to no other than Mooseblight the hybrid.
He and other dangerous dragons were relocated to the opposite side of the palace in a building sunk halfway through the ground. There was, for once in forever, natural light. Through slits, but light nonetheless.
Check.
"How is your accommodations?" She asked him right after he had been situated in his mandatory forty restraints in the new cells. He was missing the ones for his jaws, a rare occasion as part of her request to speak to him, although the locksmiths weren't pleased with it and fidgeted nervously at the corner of the cell.
"Lovely," he answered sarcastically.
"I will see you at feeding time." With one wave of her tail the locksmiths got right back to work as if they were eager to shut him up.
His servings also changed. They were larger and more frequent. She noted a canister of water strapped to the side of his muzzle and connected to the ceiling through a cord, so he could now drink when he wanted to.
Double check.
Mooseblight was still as brutal as ever in his escapes, but they were less frequent than before. He gained some weight and seemed more active. Sometimes he'd look straight at her with his blue hypnotizing eyes as if he itched to tell her something.
How she wished he could.
== Out of Time ==
The end began when Lion wasn't there.
Most of the day was spent at the forges actually, since the blacksmiths had to fix a dent in Siberia. When that was done, it was midday, and night was fast approaching by the time she arrived at the palace.
She came into the barracks and was immediately hit by Whiskers rushing up to her. "Thank the Great Ice Dragon you're back! The Hybrid escaped!"
"Again? Where is he?"
"He's storming the palace!" He wiped sweat off his brow. "The first few wings we sent never came back. We have the whole place on lockdown until we can..."
Lion knew what, but she asked anyway. "Until what?"
Whiskers took her talons and took a shaky breath. "Promise me you will not act rashly. He cannot be reasoned with. Mooseblight's mind is dead set on slaughtering anyone in sight...it's worse than any time before. You just need to get up close to him and kill the dragonet."
"Just?"
He looked genuinely upset. "I know you don't like this, but you're the only dragon who can get close to him. He has something for you. But if you fail, I will lose both my friend and the best artist of the spear. The entire kingdom is at stake, Lion."
She noticed the other guards in the barracks had stopped what they were doing and were gazing up at her pleadingly. Like she was some kind of savior. Like the Watchtower they knew her as.
She gripped her spear. "Fine. I'll do it."
"Great!" He nervously laughed. "Don't die!"
~
The palace was empty.
She couldn't believe how much of a mess he had made. Sure, the IceWing knew Mooseblight was a messy killer. He just was. But it seemed as though this time, with blue pools and smears in each room, he didn't care about how much blood he needed to waste or the amount of bones he needed to snap to get through. All IceWings that had tried to stop him, well, clearly didn't.
The smell also made tracking him revolting. Like any IceWing, her sense of smell was fantastic, and decaying flesh lingered in her nostrils. Soon she picked up a fresh scent to a high floor of the palace. Rounding a corner, a familiar figure sat by the window, one half bathed in angelic moonlight and the other in sinister darkness.
Polarizing.
Mooseblight flicked his tail. His gaze went slightly to the side. "Well. You're here."
His manner was so calm it nearly made her forget her objective. She held out Siberia. "I've come to stop you."
"Like everyone else has for the last 4 years? Oh, please." His head faced her directly. "We both know you don't have the heart to do it. That's why you took care of me in the first place, right? Poor Lion couldn't say no to an innocent little kidnapped dragonet."
Her tail lashed in anger. "Stop it. I had to do what was right. It was either I guarded you or your stupid little life would've ended the following morning. Do you not want to live?"
He turned away toward the moons and sighed. "I did. Perhaps I still would you see, but let me explain what happened along the way." He reached for a body she hasn't noticed before, grabbing the IceWing by the neck and holding them outside the window. "For this metaphor, let's pretend like this guard isn't dead and he is still happy to be alive."
"You're sick," she critiqued.
"I think I noticed. But, onto the metaphor, he is happy and hopeful and all up in the air. Then, oh no, he was captured!" Mooseblight's other talons grabbed the IceWing. "Over time he realizes he can't get out and no one wants to listen. His life goes like this." The body fell over the side of the palace. "And he dies. Very tragically. And no one cares because he's a 'stupid' hybrid."
"I tried to help you," Lion huffed.
"Tried? TRIED?" The hybrid abruptly spun around, knocking Siberia away. "You didn't try anything! All you did was watch me suffer and stop me from getting a life. All you did was be part of the problem!"
She stood there, furious. Then something hit her. "Why were you waiting for me?"
It was his time to stop. Based on his darting eyes, he didn't have an clear answer.
Lion had him. "You know the palace is empty. You could've walked out at any time. Instead you stuck yourself all the way up here where any IceWing on Pyrrhia could see you. Why?"
He snarled and pressed her roughly against the wall. "BECAUSE I DON'T KNOW! Okay?? A weird annoying tingy feeling is in my heart and I think it's love and I hate it, I hate it, all it causes me is pain! I hate this pain because it feels so much worse than starving to death slowly. I hate being in pain! All the things I do to feel right are wrong in the end! Why am I so terrible?"
Mooseblight looked back at the window. "You should let me die Lion. What do I do for you? What do I do for this kingdom besides murder? I killed my friend Silvana, I killed all those IceWings, I killed all these IceWings. I am nothing."
Lion stood up. "You are not nothing, and I won't let you die. Look. I was assigned to stop you. To kill you even. But the truth is, I don't want to do that. I know what they did to you is wrong. And this...two wrongs don't make a right. But, I think I know how to make this right, if you're willing to listen."
He was silent.
"What do you want to do, Mooseblight? Like, truly."
He bowed his head. "I want to find my only remaining parent. Mildeaa. Wherever she is. I think—I hope—she can answer my questions on Aeolis."
"What I'm thinking is that you can take this time to get out of here. Escape south. I will tell them you died to me or in some tragic way from how awful all this was to you. They won't be looking for you."
He broke out in fear. "I don't want to do this alone! I can't! This kingdom is so big and Pyrrhia is so huge too. I want Silvana with me. I wish Ecru hadn't killed her!"
The words cut through her like butter. Ecru was behind this? Lion shook the thought out of her head. "I can't come with you. They'll know I didn't kill you after all and they'd be after me like sharks for helping the greatest criminal in the kingdom. Trust me. When the time comes, our paths shall cross again."
== Interception ==
"Hold the fish. He agreed with you?" The figure growled angrily, knocking Lion out of her narrative track.
She nodded.
He barred his teeth, snout nearly visible from the light. "I don't get it. How are you down here then? This is just a happy ending for a tale of woe! Unless you're lying to me." His talons inched toward the purple blade.
"It doesn't end there," she spoke quickly. "Let me finish."
== Ending it All ==
Lion froze as the familiar scent of fresh IceWing guards smarted in her nostrils. "Mooseblight. They're here."
He roared in frustration. "You LEAD them here?! I thought we had a thing going you and I and-"
"It wasn't my intention! Whiskers sent me to deal with-"
But he wasn't listening. "I can't believe I was so stupid to let myself get carried away by an IceWing. You are the worst dragon I have ever met." Mooseblight perched himself right at the end of the window.
"Mooseblight NOOO!!" He dove out from the ledge just as she reached out. A blink later and she found herself falling, plummeting actually, to the courtyard below.
Mooseblight wasn't beneath her.
She heard his voice above her.
"LION! You-" She could tell by the distortion of his voice that he was falling too now, over her. Frantically, she spread out her wings to float upwards. Abruptly her fall transformed into an upright motion that made all her organs lurch upwards. Phew!
That was, until Mooseblight plunged straight into her back.
There was no stopping the dual screams of terror as his talons dug into her neck to secure himself against the speeding white ground below.
~
"And that's how I died," Lion finished.
"But Mooseblight didn't die," hissed the figure. It wasn't so much of a hiss as it was a sense of awe. "Somehow, he is still alive, out there on the rolling hills of Pyrrhia. Fascinating."
"How do you know that?" she asked. "I didn't see you there."
The air became vicious. Desperate. "I just do, okay? No more questions."
The pale IceWing considered it, taking in the bright light still shining into her eyes. "If he is alive like you say, my guess is that he must have grabbed something at the last moment. Because, even using me as a cushion, there is no way he could've survived that fall from at least 7 stories up. Without a chance. He doesn't have wings."
The figure gazed at her.
"What?" She broke out.
"I need to go up. I need to know where he is. Reunite. And you're coming with me, Spirit, whether or not you like it."
"Why?"
The figure laughed delightfully and threw back his hood, exposing a broken IceWing face. "Because I'm his real father, and boy do we have work to do."
== (Trivia) ==
* The name In Death, Sunshine refers to Lion's ability to think positively in any situation, even in death. It is also the only fanfiction to have a comma or form of punctuation as part of its title.
* Writing took 155 days, or 5 months and 5 days, about 42% of a year to be completed. This makes it the second longest fanfiction between start and end date, behind Ice on the Horizon.
* In Death, Sunshine, like Ice on the Horizon, had several drafted ideas and within those drafts multiple versions of what was supposed to happen. So, a summary of how much it changed:
** The original concept, called Forged in Revenge, was to focus on Mooseblight's search for revenge after the events of Ice on the Horizon.
** I switched it to focus on an unmentioned blacksmith's want for revenge for reasons relating to those events (which will definitely still happen, but just not now) and made the page.
** Before I even wrote any of the actual story (its "draft" on Notes was a few sentences), I switched gears a second time and wanted a story on an IceWing very briefly mentioned in IoTH, Lion, who explores a new world. The name of the page was changed to its current one to fit this concept.
** I tried multiple ways to involve Lion dying to Mooseblight (it was an absolute given) and a kidnapping scene with a powerful deity character, to no avail.
** I contemplated on how Lion should progress in both the fanfiction and the future, including if she should be revived or not.
** Finally, finding the concept to be too hard to write, I completely tore the plot and decided to focus on Lion narrating her interactions with Mooseblight as an explanation to his personality. I contemplated changing the name once I decided it since it wouldn't quite fit with the plot, but decided it still worked fine.
* In its drafting stages, commented sections were sometimes longer than the actual story itself.
Category:Fanfictions
Category:Fanfictions (Fanon)
Category:Content (BronzeRattle)
Category:Fanfictions (Completed)