#but he’s enough of a RainWing to be here

[linuxealcipher]

I definitely didn’t post this to the wrong blog originally

A little doddle of the RainWing group!

[eyesanddragons]

Albatross, Animus Dragons and Preventable Tragedies

(Also Known as: This tragedy was not inevitable, let's talk about responsibility)

(CWs: Murder, Abuse)

So, Legends Darkstalker as a book has a lot of thoughts about fate and inevitability. Clearsight and Darkstalker try and fail to create an ideal future for the both of them, Fathom is scared that he can't prevent his animus magic from destroying is soul, and the readers know how all of this is going to end since Legends Darkstalker is a prequel to Arc 2.

In the midst of all this talk about inevitability and fate we have...Albatross. Someone who we've known about since Arc 1 and know how his story ends. He causes the Royal Seawing Massacre, his magic allegedly "driving him insane." What's interesting about Albatross is that when you really look at his life, this historical version of it falls short in many ways. The retelling of his life leave out important context, and notably, scrub any idea that someone or multiple someones might have caused him to act like this.

It's Albatross' fault in the end, it's his fault for losing control, his fault for being "insane."

But if we take an actual look at the story in Legends Darkstalker you find that this really isn't the case.

Albatross found out he was an animus in a very...unpleasant way. He enchanted a shell to bite the claws off his sister, Sapphire. This event was deeply traumatic and would stick with Albatross for his entire life. You might be wondering why Albatross didn't fix Sapphire's claws considering his powers and I'll get to one of the reasons in a bit since it's very important to what I'm trying to say, but @/kinkajouwof breaks it down over here.

In short, most likely the reason why Albatross didn't fix it at the start is due to uncertainty if he really Could do it and because Albatross and Sapphire were terrified.

The reason more important to my point though is that Lagoon Actively Benefited from this fear. When Lagoon became Queen she would hold this action over Albatross whenever he was unwilling to do things to guilt him into following what she wanted him to do.

"This is a waste of time, Lagoon," he said. "Nobody ever tested me, but we figured out quickly enough what I could do. If any of them have a shred of power, surely they would of known by now. Or it will become obvious, sooner or later." "I'd prefer sooner," the queen said silkily. "If we find another animus in the tribe, that would make us twice as powerful, which would be quite useful given how the Mudwings and Rainwings have been behaving lately. And the earlier we find her, the sooner you can start to train her, and the sooner I can start to use her." "Besides," she added in a lower voice, so Fathom had to strain to hear her, "I think we would all prefer to discover our next animus in a less...dramatic fashion than you were discovered. Don't you?" Albatross flinched, just slightly. He cast a skeptical eye across the young. "My power is more than enough for whatever you need. I've given you everything you've asked for, haven't I? And I don't want an apprentice."

Afterwards Lagoon commands Albatross to start the test but you can see what I mean. Lagoon actively threatens Albatross and Exploits Him, and wants to find Other Animus Dragons to Exploit. He is not just a Subject to Lagoon, he is an Object to Lagoon. Non-sexual objectification.

She plans to do the same thing to another animus, Lagoon's rule was built on Exploiting the powers of the people she could Control. She wants to find them young so she could mold them into the tools she wanted them to be earlier. She wants to condition them to treat themselves as objects Now.

This treatment comes to a head during the banquet. Where Lagoon once again holds what happened to Sapphire over his head, while also threatening to Replace Him.

"Here is our first animus," Queen Lagoon said to the Skywings, who seemed to have figured that out themselves, judging by the looks of terror on their faces. "My brother, Albatross. We were just talking this morning about what his next project should be. I'm thinking big this time. Something that makes me invulnerable, perhaps. Or something that kills any dragon who might be a threat to me." Beyond Albatross, over the couches, Splash stiffened, and Fathom saw her crush one of the hibiscus blossoms between her claws. He glanced around and saw his father put a wing around Manta, who had gone pale. "Yes," Albatross said. "Although you recall I wasn't exactly enthused about any of those ideas." "Then it's lucky you're not my only animus dragon," Queen Lagoon said coldly. Fathom felt a shiver all the way down to the tip of his tail. If she asked him to do a spell like that, would he? Would he obey his queen and put his own mother in danger? Or disobey her, and perhaps put everyone he cared about in even worse danger? What would she do to Indigo If I ever said no to her? Albatross stopped right in front of the queen, snout-to-snout with her. Fathom couldn't read his face. He looked as though he'd been carved from stone, any emotions chipped away. "Do you think you're done?" Queen Lagoon said to him softly. "Do you think you'll ever be done atoning for what you did to Sapphire? It's not going to end Albatross. You'll always be mine."

This is a bit of a blunder on Lagoon's part since Albatross Kills her! She's revealed that she is Never going to let him go, that no matter how hard he works he's never going to escape. No matter what he does he will be an Object to her. Fight, Flight or Freeze, stay here and be worked to death killing hundreds of people or Escape Now.

And Albatross...chose Fight.

Note that Albatross literally says right here that he doesn't Want to make Lagoon Invulnerable, he doesn't Want to give her the power to kill people.

When he starts killing other people it's not because he became ax-crazy. He killed the Queen, no matter how horrible and cruel she was their all going to defend her...and they've never thought about him. They've never cared for him. To them he was also an Object.

So...he kills them too.

Now I'm not saying He should of killed all those people, murder is bad actually. But this is a Consequence of Lagoon and the rest of Seawing society's actions. This is the direct, real, bloody consequence of treating a person like an object designed to serve their every whim.

This wasn't something he was doomed to be, this is something that has a tangible cause and effect. The system and the way it treated him is What Caused This.

Except, none of the Seawings who survived Want to face that. They don't Want to accept responsibility for that. Why should they accept the responsibility and guilt of having lead one of their own to believe that murder was the only way to escape a truly horrific and abusive situation...when they have a perfectly convenient scapegoat. Remember...Albatross is an object. Lagoon died, not because she perpetuating a horrible abusive situation that her society allowed her to do due to the absolute power she was given, but because she handled Albatross Improperly. Animus magic is just a dangerous thing, and the people who can use it are dangerous tools. This isn't Their Fault for treating a person like an object, it's the fault of improper usage of a tool.

It's a more convenient story for everyone...except for Fathom who proceeds to be treated horribly and drown himself in guilt and shame for being Dangerous.

Seawing Society caused something horrible and instead of trying to fix it, turned their backs and pretended they did nothing wrong. When we see Anemone their doing the Exact Same Thing to her. She is an object, a weapon of war, and she will be treated as such. Anemone believes she's doomed to become evil and almost Kills her family out of the belief that she is doomed to become a mass murderer.

Albatross' Massacre was preventable, and that's what makes it tragic.

[flamebringer0]

[Image ID: Sketches of an original character, numbered from one to ten. He is a Nightwing, a kind of dragon from the Wings of Fire series. Each sketch depicts him posed differently. In the first sketch, he is using his forelegs to hold a spear while using his back legs and wings to walk. In the second, he is looking at his tail through his forelegs. In the third, he is sitting on a deck chair. In the fourth, he is standing normally and displaying the undersides of his wings. In the fifth, he is flying. In the sixth, he is standing on his back legs and looks uncomfortable, like he's about to fall over. In the seventh, he is standing on his forelegs and looks even more uncomfortable. In the eighth, he is laying on his stomach, looking away from the camera. In the ninth, he is standing with his forelegs braced against some kind of barrier, looking over the top of it. In the tenth, he is sitting on his haunches looking away from the camera. /.End ID]

Sketching random poses for practice.

Part [1] [2]

Some commentary:

1. Dragons in WOF are often described as moving around while holding objects like spears and scrolls. This usually looks weird to me in the graphic novels, where they mostly end up doing a strange three-legged walk that I imagine would get tiring after a while. There's also a part in The Lost Heir where Anemone apparently walks around with a lance jammed in her armpit... foreleg-pit... whatever. My headcanon is that this three-legged walk doesn't really happen, and instead the way to walk while holding something is to either hold it with your wing, or (as shown here) walk with your wings and hold it with your forefeet. I think this idea might sound weird and therefore not occur to people because they think that the wing is so thin that it must be too flimsy to walk on, but I feel that if it's strong enough to carry a dragon in flight it must be strong enough for this. Maybe. It makes sense to me anyway.

2. Originally this was sort of inspired by the pose at 0:34 in this video (cw for violence). I wasn't really satisfied with how my attempt looked so I changed the head to be doing something else. I still like that pose though and I might try it again.

3. This was inspired by Spyro sleeping on the deck chair in the remake of Spyro 2. I don't know if they have deck chairs in Pyrrhia. My friend told me the chair is about to get impaled and i guess he's correct. Maybe it's made of a very thick fabric.

4. This is how dragons T-pose.

5. What do dragons do with their legs in flight? This question bedevils me. When I was creating my Minecraft skin (this) I changed how the legs are posed during the flight animation several times, and I'm still not sure it really looks right.

6. Before I got into WOF I mostly only drew anthro characters, so something I want to understand better is how to draw a character standing on two legs without making it look like they have a human skeleton. My headcanon is that dragons can learn to stand and even walk like this, but most don't. You can tell an expert from an amateur because an expert will stand all the way up onto their toes, whereas an amateur will keep their heels on the ground. I think the main students of this technique are circus performers. If you do this in public you will be stared at. The only tribe where a lot of dragons can do it is Rainwings, because they think it's funny. The only major non-Rainwing character who can do it is Qibli.

7. Standing on your forelegs isn't really considered harder than standing on your hind legs, but it is considered a more advanced technique because you're much more likely to snap your neck if you fall over.

8. It's really hard for me to draw a tail curling away from the camera like this. I don't exactly understand what I'm doing wrong. The scales look weirdly skewed to me, like a Playstation game where the polygons are touching the edge of the screen. This happens regularly but I haven't figured out what to do about it.

9. Standing on two legs is a lot easier if you brace the other two up against the wall.

10. Wings look silly here. Wings are the hardest part of these sketches to make look naturalistic I think, probably because I conceptualise dragon bodies as like ... a dog with wings, as opposed to a bat with forelegs. Hopefully if I keep doing this I will be able to develop a holistic understanding of the anatomy of a body plan that does not exist. That's my ambition, anyway.

[wofdesignhub]

I’m gonna draw a dragon again soon so quick rant

You know one thing I REALLY hate in wings of fire? There’s a tiny, little inconsistency throughout the books. And that’s the sizes of scavengers to the dragons. Because I’m just gonna say it here: the “canonical” size comparison such as the picture below makes NO SENSE considering how everything else is just conveniently a decent size for a dragon. And trust me, we WILL get to it being “canonical”

A mango can fit a dragons palm when it should clearly be tiny as the actual love I have for this book series. What about cows? How come they’re described to be massive enough to feed a whole dragon? They should be like a candy bar to those things! And don’t get me started on how completely unrealistic it is for a sloth to be big enough to wrap itself around a rainwing’s neck. Like that must be some pretty massive sloths around that should ABSOLUTELY be massive compared to a scavenger.

Also the funny part about that pic I showed you? Yeah well scrap that cuz that’s also pretty inaccurate. We were to believe in the VERY EARLY books that scavengers are like hamsters to dragons. Literally the size of their right toe. Also also the fact that Smolder is like 50 years old AND also also also the fact that dragons keep growing as they age, then that just tells us that these scavenger are way, WAY bigger to these dragons. Especially if Flower here is the size of his FOREARM!

“Oh, but the islands are more suited for dragons! Of course everything will be big!” You cry out! Yet it is implied that scavengers were the dominant race BEFORE The Scorching, and even if that was a whole lotta years ago, then that must’ve been the FASTEST evolution process in the south coast yet.

And it STILL gets worse! Scavengers, even after being concluded to be the size of hamsters to dragons, Tui is constantly and very much maliciously switching the sizes of these scavengers to fit the plot because she has never figured out what she ever wants. Winter keeps Bandit in what’s implied to be some.. hamster cage? Okay, so he must be pretty damn tiny, which makes some amount of sense considering he’s probably a… teenager… I mean, okay, sure, whatever, I’ll let it slide- wait! But so is Winter! Winter is bigger than Qibli, sure, but neither of them are any bigger than other fully grown dragons! Winter is a teenage dragonet! So how small is Bandit?? How small is he compared to a- and let me emphasize- a FULL GROWN DRAGON!!!?? What!!!

And by the way, have you SEEN the actual cover of Dragonslayer??? Look at that and TELL me how completely unrealistic it is if we are to believe scavengers are the size of a dragon’s forearm

Also also also ALSO in book 14 Daffodil is shown tossing and catching Bumblebee who had just hatched and this is just unnatural and biologically confusing to think about. HOW is Daffodil bigger than a newborn dragonet? And this makes even LESS SENSE when you realize that it’s been implied that a newborn dragonet is the same size as a regular sized scavenger ACCORDING to the fact that it’s really easy to pick up a baby dragonet by the hand COMPARED to the size of Flower to Smolder’s hand in the picture??? HOW? Tell me how, Tui!! How is this possible!! And don’t you dare tell me that “oh! Pantalan dragons are smaller than Pyrian!” Because that is just ludicrous to me. I will LAUGH at you if you tell me otherwise because that is just a cheap way to excuse any of this. There has NEVER been any quote of Luna or any other Silkwing, Hivewing, or Leafwing being significantly shorter than a Pyrian dragon. 

I should really cut to the chase but I’ve… never liked Tui’s writing. I don’t like that she avoids criticism of her writing. She has great ideas and is so creative in the world of WOF but for most works she’s either rushing it or coming up with something on the spot. And neither are good if they’re not thought out well enough! All of the endings to the arcs are bad and poorly thought out. The logic in how specific stuff works is just terrible. Arc 3 is just a NOTHING arc full of NOTHING characters (except maybe Snowfall and some of the Leafwings they’re… fine). I’m sorry but as much as I “pretend” to like WOF, and I REALLY mean it when I say “pretend”, but this book makes me get an aneurysm the more I really look deep into it. I am beyond terrified of looking into the guidebook because I KNOW there will be inaccuracies, confusion, and Tui slamming down whatever ideas she has without a second thought. I already know she put the weird and unnecessary mudwing mating rituals!!

Anyways, drawing that stupid blue and yellow rainwing later, I don’t want to go and look for her name now, goodnight everyone, don’t talk to me

[bobus]

ok ive been busy with schoolwork but heres a few more doodles lmao

here's mac, and of COURSE he had to be a ranwing/nightwing hybrid; aka the most self absorbed motherfucker in the world. im not settled on his design because he looks lowkey bald rn, but the general idea i had was that hes basically just some asshole with an animus touched object (earrings and lantern) that give him magic similar enough to his lmk shadow powers. he definently tries his best to make his scales stay dark and edgy all the time even when the emotive tendencies of rainwing scales make him randomly explode into bright colours when someone trips over and eats shit in front of him. he was still killed by wukong and revived by lbd because that gives me an actual motive and potential plot for his character and development beyond being a piece of shit (lovingly). and yes i do enjoy drawing the scar eye that's why i only drew his head from that side :]

and because they're my favourite character of course i had to do mayor, so heres a go at a chief design lmao. i'm still churning possible mayor designs in my brain but ill prolly have it done soon so heres a shitty doodle of an possible one for now, but i do have kind of a story planned out ? they were a general of the ice kingdoms army during a war and were incredible at it for a few decades, though eventually they met their match from a rivalling parties leader who outsmarted them and ambushed their troop mid flight when returning from a scuffle elsewhere. most of the chiefs men died from falling to the ground after having their wing membranes slashed or being skewered by the dragons that dove down into them. chief themself was fatally wounded but managed to crash down somewhere on the outskirts of the ice kingdom where they were found by lbd as they died. cool forehead star scar yippee !! also somewhat happy with how the armour turned out so yay.

[raptorwithamarker]

sigh. the demons got me. luckily i dont have enough time to draw so heres this.

bdubs is a rainwing i know so original. his tragic backstory is hes cool and chillin in the jungle. I'm sure he sells terrariums or grows fruit or makes paintings. Despite the lack of color I can assure you he flashes red a lot, and any other colors layer like dappled light. I made the wings similar to a bats, and similar to nightwings in that aspect. The coloring is really nebulous of course, but I want to emphasize the dappling and darker sections next time. Time constraints and all that.

[amethyst257]

Really thinking about Planes characters as WoF dragons, so I'm just going to dump the information I have here

Skipper:

SeaWing

He had a MudWing-like relationship with the SeaWings he trained. He was like their bigwings

He lost parts of his wings to the point where he couldn't fly. Although he quickly got prosthetics made, he never used them until he saved Dusty from Ripslinger

He's like Dusty's dad

Dusty:

MudWing. Tiny MudWing

Either he just hatched alone or his siblings left. He doesn't know, but he's grown up mostly on his own (I'm too lazy to make ocs for this au /hj)

Despite being a full-grown MudWing, he's small enough to comfortably sit on Skipper's back

He has made Skipper so much happier

He keeps a pouch around his neck with a bunch of random things inside

Chug:

MudWing

Dottie:

RainWing

Healer

Sparky:

SeaWing

Healer

Ripslinger:

LeafWing/SkyWing hybrid

Ned & Zed:

LeafWings

Bravo & Echo:

SeaWings

They have a MudWing-like relationship with the other jws. Flysenhower is like their bigwings

And, because I suddenly got motivation for them, a few Cabbie and smokejumpers headcanons

Cabbie:

MudWing bigwings. His scales were once a brighter shade of orange/red, but have dulled out to a gray as he aged. He still has a few bright red markings, though

Lost his siblings

Has adopted/become a second bigwings to the smokejumpers

Big MudWing. He can easily carry a smokejumper or two

He usually ends up becoming a pillow for the smokejumpers

Smokejumpers:

MudWing siblings

Dynamite is their bigwings, but Cabbie became a second bigwings

They pile up next to Cabbie when they sleep

[summerf0x]

I think it’s weird how the monarchy is never really punished in Wings Of Fire.

The go-to solution is always just “replace the old evil queen with a new, not evil queen!” The sandwing sisters? Replace them with Thorn. Scarlet? Replace her with Ruby. The rainwing queens and Battlewinner? Replace them with Glory. Aside from a couple comments about how the rainwing’s contests being a nonviolent way to determine the queen while also giving everyone regardless of status a chance to rule, there isn’t much criticism of the monarchy when the New Better Queen rolls in.

The first arc is practically a powerpoint presentation on how bad it is; the three sandwing sisters tear apart the continent because Blister and Blaze couldn’t win in a duel so they drag everyone else into their mess. The correct thing here is getting Thorn to become the queen, who stops the war and does literally nothing about the Scorpion Den despite living there for mostly all her life.

Queen Scarlet openly supports and profits from this system. She runs a gladiatorial arena filled with P.O.Ws and makes them fight each other for the amusement of her court and Burn. The solution to these events which presumably would leave a lasting scar on the skywing kingdom is just get Ruby to replace her. Ruby chooses to stay out of the war, turn the arena into a hospital, and work on expanding relations with the other kingdoms. This is fine in theory, but it does nothing to stop a new queen from doing the exact same things that Scarlet did. Hell, in her brief coup Scarlet does this:

Queen Coral, while not a major supporter of the war, still allies with Blister and kills or dismisses multiple of her own subjects intentionally as a punishment for those who fail her (Webs’s wife, Snail, Herring’s brother, Tortoise). Tsunami’s gradual disillusionment with the royal lifestyle reaches its peak when her mother orders her to get thrown in jail, but the buildup to that is Whirlpool’s existence and Tortoise getting her teeth ripped out in front of her. We never loop back to this, just get a couple comments about how she’s better now that Blister’s gone. As much of a throwaway line as it was, Coral still enforced classism and neglected her other children, but as far as the series is concerned, she’s a new person.

The Rainwing court suffers from and entirely different problem (Kestril’s abuse towards Glory is because she’s a “lazy rainwing” and this turns out to be true? how is that the direction you go in?) but still falls in the same pitfalls as the others. Glory becomes the queen and she is clearly more fit for this job than those awful, vain, common rainwings from before. It also turns out that she’s Grandeur’s relative, who was still around when there was an actual rainwing royal family, so she’s even more fit for the job!

The nightwings are more similar to the other monarchies. Instead of looking at how their isolation caused them to develop a system circled around lies and their own supremacy and how it could be dismantled, the two guys at fault (Battlewinner and Morrowseer) get exploded and now Glory’s their queen, who despite being six (or however old that is in human years), has enough sense to rule over two entirely different groups of dragons that she has rarely interacted with aside from a few days.

The icewings are given the most criticism in-universe because they’ve got a monarchy and class devision! Winter sees how the icewings in the upper circles only treat their children as extensions of themselves in order to further their own goals and how those in the lower circles are forced to live without luxuries he gets just because of where they were born. The solution to this is to make the new queen have magic empathy visions and just destroy the class devision wall and racism crown. Sure, some older dragons give mean looks, but everyone else claps!

Mudwings. Uh. I really wish I could say something here but Tui hasn’t given us much to go off of. Moorhen is just being bullied by Burn into joining her side?

I’m not really going into the arc 3 queens because I honestly forgot what happened with a lot of them, but Wasp’s defeat is salt in the wound. You have a whole oppressed group of people with fire powers and two of our main characters who directly oppose Wasp are part of that group, and the way she gets taken down is… venom-blasted by a rainwing who has no significant connections to her and then locked up in a throwaway line.

I don’t know. Maybe I’m looking too deep into a kids book about dragons, but I feel like there’s something better that could have been done.

[sunnymoon-sunshine]

Some inch-resting things I clocked while reading the new Wings of Fire guidebook. No super mind blowing analysis but here are some spoilers for things I found fun

The tribes that moved to Pantala years ago are BeetleWings, RainWings, SeaWings and LeafWings. Makes sense!

HiveWings have the ability to shoot some form of RainWing venom from their tails

SkyWings barely had nuclear families but had really cute wedding ceremonies :)

The real villain of the MudWing succession crisis were the abusive sisters we picked up along the way.

NightWings created the first written language!

The SkyWings have their own method of weeding out animus dragons.

There’s very particular wording in the book that states that “there haven’t been any male rulers since before the Scorching” which suggests that there HAVE been men on the throne in some far off distant past, but that the Scorching (aka The Fury of the Mothers) changed the succession rules.

Speaking of succession rules, it looks like the Pantalan tribes specifically pick their successors! Whenever the Pyrrhian tribes started doing mother daughter combat for throne started after the splitting off of those tribes, I bet. Somewhere 4,000-3,000 years ago at most.

Several mentions of the three moons. In the Tales of the NightWings, there was a NightWings who didn’t receive his power until he had a vision of a hurricane and two full moons. Additionally, Cricket specifies that Clearsight had the tribes move inland to seek shelter during a night of three full moons because of “bad vibes” - I wonder if that was to ensure that her descendants didn’t accidentally pick up old NightWings powers? Or it’s a coincidence.

IceWings have a pretty unique religion! It’s mentioned, but never delved into much - but enough fodder to play with, I think.

The Hives were organized into specific areas of study and research, such as Botany Hive, Animal Husbandry Hive, Arts and Humanities Hive, Medicine Hive, and more!

The RainWings became peaceful probably two generations after Darkstalker, or at least one generation. Mostly due to bad things happening. They became a primarily oral storytelling tribe!

There’s a branch of around 30 NightWings settled in the Old Night Kingdom! And it sounds like they’re finally getting to heal from the island.

Missing pieces from the animus IceWing collection, the intrigue!

Cliff has a dad and probably had no idea that his dad is a nursery daycare man who has been taking care of him this whole time in secret so Ruby could keep his dad safe but now Ruby feels safe enough to get married QQ

RainWings had a whole assassin program way back in the Darkstalker days. No wonder he found them so uninspiring (even though I adore those funky guys).

There was specifically a mention in Tales of the NightWings that there was an empath, much like Fatespeaker is. I wonder if they had any other empaths during the volcano era.

The horror of your brother including the letter you sent him about being with eggs getting included in his encyclopedia. Girl has a free pass for one throttling.

The SeaWings might be moving back to the Island Palace >:)

There’s more in there but that’s all I could think of thank u for reading <3

[drippywing]

So here's the deal with my wofamily au:

>Hvitur lost the Skywing egg but survived Burn because he had Asha follow him discretely. She managed to blind Burn long enough to set him free. Asha has a lot of scars now.

>Asha does not betray the talons of peace because the others convinced her to stay and raise the dragonets.

>Webs still stole a Rainwing egg because he is Webs

>Dune and Kestrel are more gruff/stern rather than straight up abusive

>The cave system is large and expansive, each of the dragonets have a cave, aside from Tsunami and Clay, they share a space.

> Any post I make about this AU can be anytime from the hatching day to their release at age 7 (or is it 8?)

[some-pers0n]

Dragon Business

Fandom: WoF

Characters: Glory, Deathrbringer

CW: None, really (unless you consider Glorybringer/Deathbringer to be a content warning)

Summary: Oh, great! Out of all of the dragons for Glory to ambush, she just so happened to pick the most annoying dragon on this entire blasted continent.

Word Count: 1.8k

A/N: I know I am God's strongest Glorybringer hater, but I wanted to try and rewrite this scene in THK. Add some more cheesy banter and gently tweak it a little bit. I'll first and foremost add that now Deathbringer is Glory's age. Not older or anything. Same age. I also tried to keep Glory as in character as one possibly can with this scene (very hard, she's very OOC).

Glory took a deep breath, letting it sink in what she was about to do, then pounced. She landed beside the NightWing. "If you value your life, leave this kingdom."

"Moons above-" He recoiled. Even when startled, he jumped with finesse and grace. Compared to Starflight, this dragonet seemed to have some skills when it came to being stealthy. "Where did you come from?"

"I'm not here to answer questions," she snapped. "You strayed too close to the Ice Kingdom."

"By all means, this is still technically the Sand Kingdom," he rebutted. "Look, that big wall over there? I'm not behind it. Still here. Shouldn't you of all dragons know that?"

Glory's eye twitched, but her menacing expression never faltered. "You're close enough. Besides, when Blaze wins the war, it'll be ours. So, you're stepping on soon-to-be IceWing territory."

"Wow, bit cocky aren't you frost-face?" He grinned confidently. "Or maybe you're dealing with losing the war in a different way than most."

"I'm the cocky one?" she scoffed, pointing the spear right at him. "You have a lot of guts to say that to the one with the spear."

"Oh please, I'm not scared of your frostbreath, much less your little spear here..." He ran his talon along the tip of the spear.

For a moment, panic shot through Glory. It was only now that she just realized she was talking to a NightWing. This dragon could've been reading her mind this entire time. He could've found out she was a RainWing. He may know she was just doing this to scare him off and was playing around. That'd explain his demeanour. It would be idiotic to be this bold.

But, she pressed on. She repressed those thoughts to the best of her ability. She was an IceWing. She should be thinking IceWing thoughts, like how this NightWing was in her tribe's territory.

"What are you doing here? Rather suspicious of you to be spying on Princess Blaze's fortress. Long ways from...wherever you come from, isn't it?"

"Just a little bit of sightseeing, that's all."

"There's nothing here to really look at though."

"Mhh, I'd beg to differ. You're quite the sight yourself." He shot her a look, one that she was unfamiliar with. Never in her life did she see a dragon stare at her in that way. Glory was used to glares and scowls, but also the kind and thoughtful eyes of her fellow Dragonets of Destiny.

This was different. It showed spirit and tenacity, but also respect and genuine meaning. It was playful and bubbly. The more she thought about it, the more confused she was. A feeling rose within her, one that was just as perplexing as this dragon before her.

She shook her head. "Answer the question, or I'm afraid I'll have to bring you to Queen Glacier."

"Afraid? Why would you be afraid? Are you perhaps enjoying our little conversation?"

"N- no?!" she barked at him. "What? Do you want to be locked up in some dungeon until you rot away?"

"Not particularly, no. Doesn't sound all too pleasant. It's already pretty chilly just being here." He dramatically shivered.

"So then tell me why you're here. You give me a quick answer and we can both go on with our lives. What a bargain, mh?"

"Except it's about whether I live or you taking a couple minutes out of your night to drag me to my death. Doesn't sound all too balanced."

"Do you want to die? Yes or no?" she said bluntly.

"Not really, no."

"Then answer the question. Why are you here?"

The NightWing shrugged. "Fine. I'm here to meet someone. Well...maybe a few someones."

"And who would these 'someones' be, exactly?" Glory asked.

"Can't say. It's a bit secretive. NightWing business and all."

"I didn't know NightWings had 'business'," she said. "I was led to believe your entire tribe just sat around in the dark, whispering and conspiring with one another about the current events, doing nothing to warn the other tribes and stop them. Very time-consuming, I'm sure."

The other dragon snickered. "Is that what you think of us? The NightWings? Where's your sense of fear? That tone of respect for our grand powers? Honestly, do you really believe that I'm not this heroic prophet that history will repeat the name of for eons to come?" He raised his wings to the moons, but his eyes held only sarcastic teasing.

"No. Not really," Glory said harshly.

"Oh. That's a shame then." He folded his wings back in.

"If your tribe was so 'grand', you'd do something about the war, would you not? Instead of spewing some dumb prophecy, couldn't you, oh I don't know, tell the tribes which princess would be the best? Or simply which one is going to win?"

"Do you not have faith in the prophecy?" he snorted. "That'd explain why you're so grumpy."

"I'm not grumpy. I'm trying to do my job here," she growled. "I'm the one with the freezing death breath over here anyways. Watch your tongue if you want to live."

"Three moons, you just love to flaunt how you can breathe snow, don't you?" He titled his head. "Either way, prophecies don't work that way. We can't just get a straight answer. It has to be through the most convoluted and contrived way possible."

"And that would explain why you can't seem to give me a short answer for why you're here."

"That's my line!" he said.

"And now it's mine." Glory smirked back. "Still, that's a lot of blood on your tribe's talons. Could've ended the war YEARS ago had it not been for your little prophecy. Now every dragon on this blasted continent is hoping that five dragonets who've lived in a cave their whole lives are ready enough to say which one of these terrible candidates is good enough to rule as queen." She spat, her voice becoming more strained.

"Holy mother of lava," he said. "Sounds like you've been keeping that in you for a while."

Glory bobbed her head a bit. "Yeah, pretty much."

"You feel sorry for them though, that's a surprise."

"Who?"

"The dragonets. I've been all across Pyrrhia and I've seen a lot of reactions to the prophecy. Some are hopeful that it's going to bring peace. Others believe it's nonsense and an excuse to drag out the war for longer than it needs to. Yet, I often see dragons show sympathy for them. It is a lot for a dragon my age, I'd say."

"Mh-hm. Imagine like...just barely being an adult and having to do that. You've been living under a rock for quite literally your entire life up to this point and you're expected to...know everything."

He laughed, but then quieted down. "Yeah..." He looked thoughtful for a moment before then yawning. "Speaking of those dragonets, you've seen them around?"

She paused. "No, why?"

"Rumor has it they're coming to visit Princess Blaze. I would've thought they'd be here already." He looked over at her. "You didn't hear of them being captured, have you?"

"No. Not a word." She tried her absolute hardest to think like an IceWing. This dragon could be probing around in her mind as she spoke. Pretty obviously too, as he was ogling right at her. She thought of blizzards and fields of ice, something rather difficult considering she never once seen either.

"Right..." he eventually said. "Well, I suppose that's not all too unbelievable. It's quite a journey from the Sea Kingdom, no?"

"How did you know they were there?" Glory asked. "Oh wait, is it because you're all-knowing and have infinite power?"

"Well, that and how the Summer Palace exploded because of Burn wanting to kill them. Word travels fast when it comes to literal palaces burning to the ground in attacks."

"Oh. Right." She bit her lip. "That still doesn't answer my question. You're here to meet a couple 'someones', correct?"

"Mh-hm. Though, they don't seem to be here right now. Guess I've got all night to sit and do nothing." He glanced at her. "Say, you seem like an alright dragon. Well, aside from the whole threatening to murder me repeatedly part, that is. You know any good IceWing taverns I can stop by?"

Glory squinted. "Aren't you a little young for that? Why are you asking me either?"

"I thought you dragons didn't care about age when it came to that."

"No?! We most certainly do." She shook her head. "And besides, you really think I'm going to let you into the Ice Kingdom? A NightWing who won't even give me a simple answer? Come on..."

"I mean, you got to give me some points. Besides, what if I buy you a drink? It's all good then, right?"

"Ah yes, I'm sure Queen Glacier will be completely understanding then. She hates when other dragons are in her kingdom except when it's about buying her fellow guards a drink."

The NightWing giggled. "You do have a point there." He sighed. "Well then, sad to hear that's a bit of a bust. Can't say it wasn't worth a try." He spread his wings once more.

"Wh- where are you going?" she inquired.

"Oh, just somewhere."

"You're going somewhere to meet your someones, mh?"

"Pretty much, yes," he answered. "But, if you ever get bored, you could probably find me. Been a pleasure talking with you, RainWing."

Glory froze up. "What? What are you saying?"

"Did you really think I couldn't see through your disguise?" he asked. "Come on. I'm pretty sure not too many IceWings have that weird looking of horns and spikes. You're too lean, too smooth. You don't give off a cold feeling either. It's quite warm if I do say."

She couldn't help but feel her scales shift in colour at this revelation. She tried her hardest to keep them that pale white, but it was obvious that she was slipping. "And you didn't say a word?"

"Nope."

"And you didn't question why I'm here?"

"Not really, no." He shrugged. "I'm here for a reason and you're probably here for another reason as well. I didn't think I needed to know anyways."

She was dumbfounded. It made sense, of course. It was a stupid idea to begin with. It's mind-boggling how she even thought that her disguise was even remotely close to what an IceWing actually looked like. But, still. This NightWing talked to her and treated her like...a normal dragon. No talking down to her. No treating her like she's some brainless lizard.

It was new. It was nice.

"Oh, and I didn't get your name," he said as he took a step back. "I'd love to know."

"Afraid I can't, it's RainWing business." She mocked him.

He grinned back. "Well, will you tell yours if I say mine?"

"Nope. Not interested in knowing."

"Well, fine. I'll still say my name then since that seems to bother you." He smiled at her. "You can call me Deathbringer."

With that, he took to the skies, becoming one with the night.

[corvid-feathers]

I've written the continuation of the story, a picture to accompany it will be at the bottom of the post. Also I don't have a reference for Cowbird yet, i'll post it later

It’s been two days since Leopard found the body, he’s unable to fathom the information he’d seen right in front of him. Queen Treefrog was dead, that was confirmed…but who in the three moons was the rainwing in charge?!? She clearly was similar enough to mimic the Queen in bodyshape, that’s for certain. Yet Leopard had no clue who she was, any rainwing can change their colors. He’s seen them use the ability for theatre productions a million times.

The worst part of nobody else knew, Leopard had seen the body. He’d recognized his Queens face lying in that clearing. None of the other dragons had found it and he had a sinking feeling that something had somehow gotten worse. Nothing seemed to change, the Queen hadn’t made any major changes since before he had investigated.

The rainwings were still their same old pacifist selves, the nightwings were hunting food for both villages as normal. Yet Leopard couldn’t shake the feeling of eyes on him. The impersonator surely couldn’t have seen him, He was in the bushes up until she was out of earshot.

Leopard was so lost in thought he didn’t notice someone had approached until an older rainwing gently tapped his shoulder, startling him so much he made a little squeak as he turned. “Sorry! Didn’t mean to startle!” The rainwing stated, she had a warm smile on her face. “I’m just here to say the Queen wanted to see you, Isn’t that exciting!”

No, oh no. no no no! She must know, why else would she want to see him…wait he needed to calm down. There a hundreds of different reasons to be called upon by the Queen, Leopard’s still in school she might just be changing up his classes. Wouldn’t hurt to ask, he assumed. “Do you know what the meeting’s gonna be about?” He tried his best to fake a smile, it didn’t appear to be working.

“There’s no need to panic, I know meeting a Queen for the first time can be scary.” Good at least she didn’t know why he was nervous. “Anyway Queen Treefrog said she wanted it to be a surprise, but I promise you it's a good thing!” The rainwing seemed excited, whatever this meeting would be about must be innocent enough. Leopard knew typical rainwing citizens to prefer good news anyway.

“Alright, I guess I’ll head to the throne room…” He said, forcing a more convincing smile this time.

“See ya! Oh! Almost forgot my name’s Cowbird!” The cheerful rainwing waved before flying off in the other direction, Leopard kinda admired the carefree nature of her life. He’d seen Cowbird occasionally, always dressed up in fancy cloaks and bathing in the sun. He wished life was that easy for him. 

Once Leopard reached the entrance to the throne room he took a deep breath…he was safe, everything was fine. He was just waltzing right into the sight of a murderer, what could go wrong? He quickly shut down that train of thought, she may have killed the Queen. Nobody would dare harm a dragonet, Leopard was only 6 years old. He entered the room, immediately bowing down like he’d seen others do before.

“Hello Leopard, take a seat. There’s much to discuss!” She says with an aura of excitement. She was a lot taller compared to him, he felt like an ant in comparison. Leopard stopped bowing and sat up, avoiding eye contact as if his life depended on it.

“Hello, your majesty” He struggled to come up with something to say, so simple formalities might lessen the eerie silence.

“I’ve heard your feeling rather paranoid lately, my guards say you’ve been significantly less social” She begins, her smile creeped him out a bit. It was warm and welcoming, but her eyes showed an entirely different mood. They were halfway to a glare for a moment, or perhaps Leopard had imagined it in his panic. “It’s not good for a dragonet’s development to stray from their peers, I worry for your health”

“I’m sorry, I just get startled easily and-” The Queen cut him off surprisingly fast, going onto her next point it seemed.

“I understand, it’s hard to talk to others. Especially since I’ve heard the medics discuss your paranoia.” Oh, Leopard had been telling everyone about his suspicions before he found the body. The medics obviously would’ve told their Queen about it! “I know a new Queen is a big change in your life, before I was crowned my mother was Queen your whole life”

“Yeah, it’s a big change” Play dumb, just keep pretending. There was an awkward silence, Queen Treefrog staring at him for a good few moments.

“Leopard?” She asked, a hint of hostility mixed into her voice.

“....yes?” Leopard replied, failing to hide the nervousness in his voice.

“I’ve arranged for you to take extra battle lessons, I want you to know there’s nothing to be afraid of” She smiled, this time more genuine.

“Ok, that’s-” He was cut off again, the Queen's voice radiating malice.

“Meet me at the river at sunset, we’ll begin our first lesson. You are dismissed” As Leopard left the throne room, something in the back of his mind told him that shouldn't attend that lesson.

[maypl-syrup]

Snake and Horntail, Beetle's parents. 

Beetle and lore under the cut

Snake is a rainwing who ended up on Pantala through circumstances he doesn't fully understand, and I don't feel like figuring out. He tries his best to pass himself off as a Hivewing, disguise not shown here, and has been managing well enough by just going invisible during Wasp's controls. He eventually meets Horntail and the two fall in love and live a mostly normal life, even if she doesn't know he's not a Hivewing. Beetle knows there's something off about him, so he tries his best to serve Wasp so she gives him a pass for not being under her control, it doesn't matter by the end of book 13.

[lordhelpme0-0]

Since you like wings of Fire can I have a request featuring Yuu reading malleus the wings of Fire book series a “bedtime story” because…well…dragons and all?(rest of diasomnia can be part of the request if you want)

When I saw this, I KNEW I had to do it!!!

Diasomnia React to WoF w/ Y/n:

Fandom: Wings of Fire & Twisted Wonderland

TW: Spoilers for WoF yall

Malleus:

When Yuu first introduced the series, Malleus was intrigued to say the least

Let’s just say his favorite was Starflight

I mean- think about it..

Malleus entirely enjoyed the series and wished to know mores

He even asked if there was any gargoyles

“What are these…scavengers..Child of Man?”

“Oh! They’re humans, Tsunotarou!”

let’s say he was quite surprised by this choice of words, though he could see the reasonings behind the name

Yuu would absolutely ramble out theories while Malleus will add in with it

They will be in the library, giggling as they read the books

If Malleus was able to be in Yuu world to see the author, expect him to full on have all the merchandise

Malleus will absolutely be fascinated by Darkstalker: The Legend

Will definitely refer to Yuu as Clearsight at random times

Yuu would call Malleus Darkstalker in return

It would be funny and comical as everyone tried to figure why they call eachother such strange names

They will absolutely try to call the other students different names from the series

“Ah, it seems Sunny (Kalim) is bothering Glory (Leona) again Tsunatorou.”

“Indeed Clearsight, here comes Professor Kestral (Trein).”

Let’s say, everyone is confused at these strange nicknames

Even Floyd was tiny bit nervous as he was the one with the suspicious nicknames

“Koebi-chan, why am I called Whirlpool?”

“It is due to you being quite sadistic and slippery Whirlpool.”

Yuu snorted at Malleus random appearance and answer

Let’s say Malleus and Yuu ran quickly from a angry..slippery eel (if you know, you know)

Either way, you both will have fun

Lilia:

Lilia is amused by such silly concepts as he calls it (it be a silly concept when I-)

He enjoys it as mere fairytales, but that what he thought when he read the prophecy of the first arc

He would immediately latch onto the book series

As the cultures, history, and mystery of playing detective got him

Lilia will immediately stamp Queen Scarlet as point of interest

“Fufufu~! I’ve never thought that Queen Scarlet would be this enthusiastic about colosseum battles.”

His favorite would definitely be Blister. A wicked mastermind? Absolutely.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Lilia starts to be huffy over her death

He would list the reasons why she should be queen

He gonna be all over Queen Diamond and Queen Wasp

Yuu will be willing to share some theories as Lilia would just debunk each one

Definitely will create his own tribe at some point (I mean—we all done that at point)

Silver:

Silver will snooze it through

It’s confirmed that Malleus and Yuu will nickname him Coconut (I’m not even joking)

Silver won’t be interested much in the first arc, but he will definitely will be in the second arc

I mean, he gonna be interested there was a strange voice turning out to be Darkstalker, a magic scroll of animus magic, and even more knightly behavior from Qibli and Winter

His favorite gonna be Winter

Cold face (even though it’s their normal face), stiff, and somehow have a connections to animals (humans-), and a possibility of Silver being Auror-

Yeah, you get the point

Though our sleepy boi is always sleeping, he is vigilant

He definitely will be invested enough to put in little facts for theories with Yuu and the others

Expect him to snore at the boring parts of the books

Definitely will read the epilogue of each book for new details

He will not take kindly at Lilia idea of having sleeping darts made for research purposes (Sebek RUN)

Will have a hammock and whenever he naps, Malleus and Lilia will deem it Suntime

Most likely will have a RainWings persona from Lilia accordingly

Sebek

Sebek you can’t just tell profanities at 4:35 a.m cause of some event happen in the books

No Sebek, you can’t throw the Dragonslayer book into the furnace

Sebek will definitely not be happy over the dragonslayer book at all

Sebek is now called Tsunami

He will absolutely hold the nickname dear to him as it was given by Malleus out of amusement

Sebek is gonna yell at Silver to wake up and not be a literal RainWings

NRC is now baffled and confused at these weird and outworldly remarks

Will definitely be kept quiet so he doesn’t yell during theory time

That is now a thing

A/N: I’m so sorry anon! It took so long as I was busy and etc..I hope you enjoyed this!!! Feel free to ask for more ask! ^^

[frozenjokes]

Scar made sure the invading dragons saw him as he strode up the hill, giving the impression he was in no hurry despite his quick pace. Grian scoffed to hide his smile, not that Scar would have seen. Always keeping up appearances, that dragon.

“Yeesh, they’re all geared up. Maybe we should go and conquest all scary-like more often,” before Grian could respond, Scar cut him off, “No, that’s not my style. C’mere I’ve got something cool to show you.”

“Scar, is now really the time to be turning our backs on the enemy,” Grian stressed, but Scar kept walking, dragging himself through their impromptu window entrance. Grian followed with more caution, but not cautious enough to keep the two of them from bumping noses as Scar shot back up to the windowsill.

Grian reeled backwards, stunned, but Scar was far more focused on his own talons.

“Remember these?” Scar clicked the metal claw extenders he had slid onto his hands, “I made something dangerous!”

“Oh no.”

Scar leaned his full weight on the window so he could retrieve another item in his other armored hand.

“Scar! I told you, no explosives in the house!”

“You literally rigged it with dragonflame cacti, I figured that rule was void now. Look! I glued flint to these claws!” Scar clicked his talons again, sending sparks dangerously close to the bomb in his other hand and Grian flying for cover into the sand.

“SCAR!”

“What? It’s fine! Do you want a pair? I know you can breathe fire and everything but this is so much cooler. No offense. Hopefully it works!” The Rainwing continued to fling the dragonflame cactus piece around in his exaggerated motion, its short fuse whipping the windowsill.

Grian slowly removed his talons from over his eyes, only to immediately cover them again. “No. No thanks. Scar, please tell me you at least stored your firestarters separately from the bombs.”

“…”

“…”

“Well-“

“SCAR.”

little fic snippet I liked, you can read the rest here if you’d like!

[mozziu-s]

My darling sweet harmless angel man Mamba has a completed reference finally!! So excited. Isn't he gorgeous?

And a version here with his travelling cloak!

Mamba lives in my own AU of Wings of Fire in which one of the consequences is that the rainforest is currently occupied by NightWings, who have enslaved two thirds of all RainWings to keep as servants or give away as fancy trophies.

RainWing fangs are usually uncomfortably removed to prevent them using their venom on their captors, but Mamba's NightWing housemates decided he wasn't dangerous enough to out through the trouble. He is completely nonvenomous, so there's hardly a point to pulling teeth.

Let me know if you are interested in more about the AU!