Night Falls

Chapter 7

Nightwatcher groaned in pain. Every inch of her body ached like nothing she had ever felt before.

Despite the pain, she pushed herself to a sitting position so she could get a better view of her surroundings. She was definitely in an infirmary, she could tell that immediately from the smell and the sight of bandages. Not one with other dragons inside though, it was clear they didn't trust her.

Nightwatcher yawned, stretching out her wings... only to find one missing. She nearly yelped in surprise, spinning around as if she had somehow misplaced it. She looked down at her talons. Her right arm was all bandaged up and the blood had soaked through a bit. Her face hurt too and her vision seemed off.

She looked around to seek help from one of her siblings or friends and it was like all of the events of the past few days suddenly came crashing down on her.

She let out a soft gasp of pain. Duskflight was gone. She had no idea what had happened to Starseeker, Nova, and Eclipse, but she couldn't sense their minds anymore, so she assumed the worst had happened.

Maybe they're just asleep? She hoped that was the case. She stretched out her mind reading, snaking through both sleeping and awake dragons, searching for dreams that matched any of theirs, but mostly Nova's because she tended to have the most recognizable dreams.

She never found anything.

Nightwatcher choked back a sob. They were gone, she knew it in her heart, no matter how much she wished they were alive.

The cave felt small now, even though it was pretty big for just a singular dragon. She slowly made her way to the entrance of the cave. The SeaWings and IceWings hadn't chained her up. Probably because she had no way of getting off the island without swimming now that her wing was destroyed and a lot of the other tribes couldn't swim that well for long enough to get back to the mainland.

Her talons dragged along the floor. It hurt, especially in the area where the venom had got her on her talons, but she really didn't care.

She wasn't paying attention to where she was walking, which was probably why she fell off the edge.

Nightwatcher bit her lip to keep herself from crying out in pain. Wet sand from the nearby water stuck to her scales no matter how much she tried to shake it off.

She felt a tear slide down her face and she didn't try to stop it. Everything about the day just felt like an awful nightmare, except it was all real. There was no being shaken away by Eclipse or Nova worrying about the nightmare or Starseeker telling hilarious tales to make her forget about it.

There was no more of Starseeker and Duskflight obsessing over romance scrolls together, which Nightwatcher had always loved, though she'd never admit it to them. No more listening to Duskflight tease the rest of them over silly crushes. There was no more trying to keep Eclipse from doing something risky. There was more no cooking with Nova. No more playing silly dragonet games together. No more laughing as they soared through the night sky when someone inevitably got lost.

There was a million things she would miss, things she never would've thought to miss. A million things that she had lost because of the stupid war. She hated it, she hated it so, so much.

She forced herself to stand moving to look for the moonlight. She knew she'd never get out, but she didn't really know how to get back up without flying, which she couldn't do now, so...

She moved towards an exit, keeping to the shadows so no one would see her. Then again, SeaWings did have night vision, so it was probably useless.

She almost tripped over the sleeping body of a blue SeaWing. Her heart seemed to jump into her throat. She was pretty sure this was the SeaWing she had seen earlier.

Nightwatcher knew any normal dragon would not wake up someone on the other side. But she was tired of all this death. She leaned down, making sure the SeaWing was breathing and breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the rise and fall of her chest.

"Hello, uh, SeaWing, you okay?" Nightwatcher asked, poking her gently. She knew the SeaWing might be injured, if she was still breathing.

It took a few times, but eventually the SeaWing stirred, blinking the sleep out of her eyes. "What do—" She broke off, staring at Nightwatcher for a few seconds before she scrambled clumsily to her talons, her claws digging into the wet sand. "Stay right there!" 

Nightwatcher highly doubted the SeaWing would do much. The SeaWing looked awful, with claw marks running down her side. She was also covered in salt water and sand, which couldn't have been good for the cuts. "Sorry." She tried to make herself less threatening. "I fell and I don't know how to get back up so I thought I'd try to find someone to help and then I saw you and I wanted to make sure you were okay."

"Sure, good excuse," the SeaWing muttered, shaking the sand off her blue wings. "Come on." She led Nightwatcher to a thin ledge leading up to the cave and up into the cave. The SeaWings eyes flickered to her scars and, though it was dark and probably a trick of her mind, Nightwatcher thought she saw a flicker of concern in the SeaWing's eyes. "Those look pretty bad and the sand in it could get it infected. I'll get a healer for you in the morning. I don't think the your tribe would appreciate you being harmed more than you are."

Nightwatcher stared after the SeaWing as she left. "So should you!" She called after a moment. "I don't know anything about healing, but I wouldn't let those get infected."

The SeaWing's wings shifted slightly, the only sign that she had heard Nightwatcher. 

Nightwatcher curled up on the cold stone floor, but she knew she'd never get back to sleep.