I N C A N D E S C E
***

Incandesce curled up on the warm, sandy pit inside her cave. Three moons, did she hope some clumsy dragonet wouldn't stumble in and kick up dust in her face. The room was built for three, but that didn't mean she couldn't hope. 

But of course she couldn't.  Sometime after she arrived a pale dragon stormed into the room and curled up on a rocky ledge protruding from the wall, fuming. 

Another dragon, a sparkling violet splotched with dark crimson, strode in. A hammock that hung across the entire cave ceiling swung back and forth as she swarmed up the wall and rolled into it.

"Oooh, guests!" she squealed. 

Both the pale dragon and Incandesce snorted. 

The clearly-evident RainWing stuck her neck out of the hammock and laughed.

"I'm Lush! What's your guys' names? And tribes, that seems pretty interesting too! I'm a RainWing."

Albino-ledge-dragon rolled over and snorted a spurt of flame. 

"Will you shut up if we tell you?" she asked. Lush pouted.

"I take that as a yes. I'm Princess Dove of the SkyWings. Okay, now you, sleepyface." Dove chuckled, sweeping a tailful of pebbles at Incandesce. They bounced off of her scales, burning hot.

Immediately, she jumped to her claws. 

"What the moons, birdbrain-or, sorry, princess birdbrain?" Incandesce yelled. Lush curled into her hammock, folding her wings in on her. 

"Listen here, sandface. I didn't ask-"

"Oh, I'm sure you didn't ask to have-oh, shocking!-two dragons that have to listen to your grouchyness every night, Princess. No, well, I didn't ask to have some freak SkyWing 'princess' to be my clawmate, let alone some featherbrained RainWing with catmint up her snout. So you shut your royal trap about having some lowborn, peasant, moons-forsaken SandWing as a clawmate." Incandesce spat.

"By all the claw-shaped moons, can you two calm down?" Lush asked. "Wowzers, you two went from zero to one hundred real quick!"

"Shut up!" Dove hissed at the RainWing dangling out of her hammock.

"Ugh." Incandesce said shortly, and whirled out of the cave and down the tunnel.

-----------------

Incandesce cowered in a shadowy corner of their cave. Many things were being hurled at her, mostly carcasses and rocks.

"You useless, no-good waste of space! You can't even do one thing right! I told your father that we couldn't have some sabbath dragonet in here unless she'd actually do something good! You can't even get the right kind of fish!"

Incandesce was being chewed out for getting marlin instead of swordfish, which was, of course, Tarpon's favorite fish. It wasn't even the worse of her beatings.

"But Mama, it's not her fault she's a SandWing!" Shoreline, her little sister, spoke up. Tarpon squeezed her wing around her dragonet.

"Hush and eat your fish, Shoreline. Let Mama do the talking." Tarpon scolded her daughter. She turned to look at Incandesce.

"Now go get swordfish, not marlin." She instructed. Incandesce slunk to her claws.

"B-But, Madame, I don't know what it looks like-"

"THEN GO TO A FORSAKEN LIBRARY FOR ONCE. Can't you read?" Tarpon yelled. Shoreline covered her ears. 

Incandesce growled. 

"Can't you be a better mother? Your one and only, super precious dragonet cries herself to sleep because Mommy can't be kind to the nice SandWing servant that lives with them."

Tarpon narrowed her eyes.

"You listen here, dragonet. Once your father gets home-"

"Once my father gets home, what? What's going to happen once my adopted father gets home? I'll tell you what's going to happen. He's gonna come home and you're going to catch your own moon-saken fish. I'm leaving." Incandesce snarled.

"Of course you're leaving. It happens quite often, doesn't it." Tarpon said, now silkily-smooth.

Incandesce drew her shoulders up and swept out of the cave. There was a shout from behind her.

"No! Incandesce, don't go!" Shoreline called. Incandesce stifled any emotions and leaped into the air. 

She flapped over the beach. Shining blue waves crashed  upon the beach.  Fish darted amongst the ocean. 

This was the untouched side of the ocean. Very few SeaWings inhabited this part.

Incandesce knew from overheard banter from Tarpon that a small island resided off the coast, inhabited with several SeaWings and a couple of SandWings as well, perhaps an IceWing to stake out territory.

But this was not where she wanted to go. She wanted to leave the coast entirely, fall under the radar of Tarpon or anyone she knew. 

There was a town in the SandWing territory. Radiance. Slightly east of the coast, close to the former NightWing kingdom. 

Incandesce decided on a whim and flew over the sandy dunes. No one stopped her. She was big and looked twice her age, surely she was a young adult finding her legacy in her kingdom.

Yet she was still an innocent dragonet, waiting for the worst of things to happen. She was not yet tough, burly Incandesce, tattooed and pierced Incandesce, the large dragon with a ring through her nose.

This young and unshaped dragonet had no idea what was coming.