"Okay. Just, follow my lead."

They tramped through the undergrowth of a great pine forest that overlooked the canyons of the Night Kingdom. Eclipse followed Crescent closely, while staring quizzically at his birth chart.

"This is ridiculous. I don't see how it's going to help with my gifting." She snorted, rolling the scroll and shoving it into Crescent's talons.

Crescent blinked, and hurriedly rerolled his scroll as neatly as he could. "It's just something special. I feel more connected to the eggs when I have their charts." Like, for instance. The twins we're gifting? They'll be born under the Virgo constellation. It's very interesting"

"How is it interesting again?" Eclipse asked, brushing past the branches of a fir tree. The branch flicked back and smacked Crescent in the nose. He reeled and rubbed his snout, before fucking under the branch to follow Eclipse.

They overlooked the Night Kingdom from the cliffs. The moons shone overhead, with the First Kingdom full.

"They're down there. In the communal nests." Crescent said

"How can you tell?"

"I just, feel it."

Eclipse gave him a pointed look. "You're weird, you know that?"

"At least I can give a proper gift" he scoffed

Crescent opened his wings and lifted into the sky before Eclipse could even snort at him. He felt the moonlight on his scales and shifted them so his body was nothing against the night sky. He could hear Eclipse's wingbeats behind him.

The two of them, silent and invisible, spiralled down towards the communal nests. They were perched in niches and carved holes in the sides of rocky spires that rose like petrified trees in the center of the canyon. Swathed in moonlight, many eggs due to hatch soon stood silent. But not to Crescent. He could see their little bodies and tiny smiles. He could almost hear them calling out to him "pick me, pick me!!" They cried.

Not tonight babies. I am not here for you, Crescent thought. His wings caught wind and pulled him loftily out of his dive. He heard the princess's wingbeats behind him. The two circled one spire of rock once, and landed to perch on the lip of the nest embedded into the rockface.

One huge egg took over the nest. Perhaps it wasn't the parents' first egg? There were no black dragons around, he and Eclipse were the only two in the nest.

"Wow.. it really is big." Eclipse said. She reached forward to touch it. Her body was just a ripple in the air, a trick of the light.

"Don't touch them yet." Crescent said. "It's a special moment. Just touching an egg can muck up the whole thing."

He could barely see her eyes, but Crescent felt the dirty look Eclipse shot him from a mile away.

"Trust me on this. You want to do it right, yeah?"

Eclipse shifted. "Yeah.." came the sound of her voice.

"Wait for the moonlight to actually hit them
See?" Crescent gestured to the largest full moon, it glided across the sky smoothly and otherworldly, as if it was an alive thing, and not the home crescent has lived on for his whole life.

The light glided into the nest, bathing black eggs with pale light, until they both were awash in it.

"Okay, now. Touch it, give the twins your blessing."

Eclipse's hand reached for the eggs, her fingers turned a silvery pale in the moonlight, her claws barely grazed the eggshell. Crescent reached out and stopped her again, closing his fingers around her wrist.

"What is it this time." Eclipse growled, annoyed.  Crescent gulped, and stepped back, he let the tingling feeling of invisibility wash away from the scales on his face, until just that part of him was visible. Eclipse did the same, matching his bewildered expression.

"It's just. It's not just touching them. You're blessing them. Caress it, like it was your own egg, you know? I usually ask the moons to give them strength and power. I find it helps."

"How will I know when they are ready?" Eclipse said. She drew her talon back to her chest now, as if she were afraid to touch them.

"They turn silver. The prettiest you've ever seen." Crescent smiled. Eclipse's mouth drew up to smile as well, but she caught herself, and quickly, her face was lost to invisibility.

The egg shifted, the tiniest bit, as Eclipse rested her fingertips against the shell. Then, like branching arms of frost that crawled across a windowpane, little spiderwebs of silver branched across the eggshell. Her talons faded out of nothing and back into tangibility. They moved to cup the egg, gently and tenderly. The whole nest thrummed with power.

Far off in the distance, Crescent heard the echoing sound of wingbeats making their way up out of the canyon. The egg's parents. He spread his wings and let them shimmer further into nothing, shielding Eclipse and the egg from view. The moonlight still trickled into the nest. It seemed to pool in Eclipse's talons and spill all over the egg like a brilliant glowing fingerpaint.

Eclipse seemed to be whispering to herself, something soft and sweet. Crescent found she was actually speaking to the dragonets inside the egg. The spiderwebs branched further, and turned the whole egg a brilliant silvery-white.

"Good job." Crescent said. His chest swelled with pride, but the wingbeats drew closer. "We have to go now, or else their parents will bowl right into us."

"I think they know someone is here." Eclipse whispered. The two crawled out of the nest, just as two black dragons swooped inside. The MoonWings stayed unseen, clinging to rock faces outside the nest. Crescent and Eclipse leaned as close as they could to the entrance, listening intently.

"Oh, moons!! Mother look, look how beautiful!" cried a black dragon. He looked young, almost too young to be a father

"Do you hear them, Mindful?" Asked the matronly dragon beside him. She was much older, too old to be a new mother. "Do you hear your babies?"

"I do! Oh they sound so sweet. There are really two in there, aren't they?" Mindful practically leaped in excitement.

"Don't be shy. Sit with your sons. Sing to them. They want to hear their daddy."

The two dragons sat beside the egg, and the father protectively circled them with his wings. He started to hum.

"No no, Mindful. With your head. They cannot hear your voice."

"They're mindreaders too?"

"That's what Jagged said."

The egg cracked, and splintered down the side. The shell broke apart into several silvery shards that shimmered like stars, and two pitch-black dragons tumbled out. Eclipse gasped, softly, but barely audible from where she sat.

"Mother, oh by the moons, they're so beautiful..." MIndful said. His voice cracked, adn Crescent saw teardrops platter onto the larger dragonet's head. "Jagged would have loved them. She would have loved... so much..."

Mindful's mother put a wing over her son's back sympathetically. "She did love them, darling. She loved them every time she saw them in her dreams."

"I wish, she could see them. Her babies, they are so beautiful. Look at their perfect little snouts!"

"She did see them. Don't cry for her. She knew what would happen if she carried your egg, and she understood the consequences. She did it all for them, and for you."

Crescent saw two starry scales in the corner of each dragonet's eyes, and he leaned over to nudge Eclipse in the shoulder, as if to say "you did that". She smiled ever so faintly, through the tears in her eyes as she watched the dragonets play in their father's talons.

"Look at their pretty pretty scales..." mindful doted lovingly.

"You be sure to thank the moons every night you hold these two." the older dragon said. She stood and folded her wrinkly wings across her back. "let's go home, i get so nervous all the way up here."

"Go home then, mom. I want to stay with them longer. I want to name them... Fated" He pointed to the largest dragonet, "and Prosperity. "He pointed to the smaller, who was clambering over his tail and bumbling about.

"Jagged would have loved them.." Mindful's mother said. "I know this is where she laid last. But don't forget that these two are your future."

"I know.: Mindful said. "Don't dwell in the past."

The older dragoness dared to chuckle. "I think I hear the moons speaking. Make sure to thank them."

"Yeah.. I will."

With that, one black dragon flew out of the nests, and spiralled away back down to the city below. It was all bustling in the night there, as nocturnal nightwings flitted like broken shadows through patches of moonlight.

"I think we're done here." Crescent whispered. "You did well."

Eclipse was hesitant to leave, but she peeled herself away from the rock and followed Crescent back into the woods farther west of the Night Kingdom. They landed heavily in the bushes, and emerged with their scales shining newly in the grey darkness once again.

"So, what did you think?"

Eclipse looked lovingly at her talons. "what were their names again?" she asked, "Fated and Prosperity?"

Crescent nodded. "See, I told you the birth charts help."

"I could feel them moving when i touched the egg. It was, amazing." Eclpise smiled. She spun around with her wings spread and laid down in the grass. "I gave them mindreading powers! That was the first time, that's ever worked!"

"And he gave his thanks to the moons. Always a good sign." Crescent nodded. He shook out his wings and his tails all wound around his talons.

"I have to tell mother. She'll be ecstatic."

"Frankly, I'm surprised how quickly you picked it up." Crescent said. "The Queen made it seem like it was some big deal that you didn't know how to gift."

"I mean, it kind of was. You just made it easier to understand. But I'm sure my mother dumped me on you for a night to get me out of her horns."

Crescent stood up in a clearing and bathed himself in the moonlight. "Well, what were you bothering her about?"

I want to challenge her for the throne." Eclipse said simply. Crescent was so takne abakc that he stumbled over his own tails.

"Challenge her? But, Princess-"

"Eclipse.." she corrected.

"You're so young!"

"Yes, and my mother is positively ancient." eclipse snarled. "Ancient and stupid."

"I think she's a great queen."

"Because you lived in the First Kingdom. Everyone in the First Kingdom thinks she's great because they're pampered, and can't be bothered to check in on how the lower classes feel!" Eclipse shouted. She seemed enraged, like it was such an obvious thing that no one else could see and it was driving her insane.

Crescent took another step back as Eclipse bristled. "My mother cares more about some stupid NightWing tribe and their babies than our own kind. MoonWing dragonets in the Third Kingdom are burned in the sun every month. There aren't enough shelters for them. And none of my other braindead sheep sisters will stand up to her."

Crescent was hardly one to think about the plight of the Third Kingdom, but Eclipse's words struck a chord with him. "They're really burning?"

"A lot of them, yes."

"Well, gifting is important too." Crescent tried to argue, but Eclipse just snarled at him again.

"How?"

"NightWing worship gives us our power. Our moons' powers. "

Eclipse turned her back to Crescent and spread her wings. "Still. These are our tribe's children. Come on, let's go home. Then I can challenge that old starfart for real."

Eclipse lifted off into the sky, and Crescent followed swiftly after. The Night Kingdom and Pyyrhia disappeared from view, into swirling starscapes that blotted the atmosphere. Then they were home in space again, but Crescent felt like maybe it felt a bit less like home