Return to Jade Mountain

Part 1 ~ Chapter 1

Part 1 ~ A Broken Wing

Solstice had heard the stories of Jade Mountain Academy from his parents. Of course, everyone knew about the stories of their first year of school with all the trouble the Jade Winglet got in. His parents weren't the only dragons Solstice had heard those stories from.

The stories about their other four years weren't as exciting and were much more normal. Solstice didn't mind normal though. He'd prefer to have a normal experience at school rather than a famous one. He could handle danger if he had to, but he didn't think his parents would like that too much.

Growing up in two kingdoms made Solstice feel like he didn't know which tribe he was more like. In the Kingdom of Sand, he would often go around Thorn's Stronghold, seeing all sorts of SandWing officials and royalty.

Then after six months, they would move to their home in the Rainforest Kingdom and Solstice would see the RainWing and NightWing queen along with the NightWing village.

They moved back and forth every six months between their different homes and Solstice never really felt like he fit into either one. Despite having parents who taught him to be a good dragon, Solstice always had urges to do less than good things.

He wasn't a bully by any means, but he always felt sly and more relaxed when he was sneaking around, avoiding authority. He waltzed around laws and was a great liar, at least great enough to keep everything he did from his parents. He knew his parents would feel distraught if they learned about all the stuff he did, which he knew he would feel bad about.

Despite doing bad things all the time that sometimes inconvenience other dragons, he didn't like it when dragons close to him were upset, especially his parents who would have such dramatically sad expressions and doubt themselves if Solstice ever got in trouble.

So instead, Solstice kept to the shadows and was careful about everything he did. Having the ability to read minds helped a lot, but only when he was far away from his mother that she wouldn't be able to hear that he took off his skyfire earring. 

She had forced him to wear skyfire in some compacity and infused the black gem into the largest glass, purple earring in his left ear shaped like a crescent moon. In his right ear, he had purple, glass star-shaped earrings hanging from a silver chain. Solstice also wore purple-tinted aviator glasses to hide his mind-reading scales from other dragons.

It was no secret that the silver scales on the corner of a NightWing's eyes meant a mind reader. Back when Solstice's mother was a dragonet, she was the only NightWing with those powers, but as NightWing eggs started hatching under the moons again, the power returned and the NightWings relearned how to handle them.

Solstice had hatched under two full moons and had both of the power. However, neither was any use to him. He wasn't allowed to use his mind-reading and his foresight didn't do much. He'd sometimes get flashes of visions but they were always little things that felt like they didn't matter. They would happen when Solstice was staring off into space and sometimes he didn't register that he had one until it poofed away.

He had met other NightWing dragonets who have stronger prophetic abilities. He remembered a NightWing he had talked to in the Rainforest Kingdom who could summon a vision if she calmed herself and meditated. Her name was Hopebuilder and she was the daughter of a dragon Solstice's mother knew named Mightyclaws. Solstice didn't know who he was but his father also knew him so he must have been a student at Jade Mountain Academy.

Speaking of Jade Mountain Academy, Solstice wasn't too keen on going there. Don't get him wrong, he didn't have a problem with other tribes. Solstice loved having mischief with other tribes and stood for tribal peace. He just wasn't too into the super-friendly-cuddly-fun-time school experience.