King of The Dragons (Wings of Fire X Monster Hunter)

Part 3: Chapter 26 & 27

(3rd Pov Clay)

Clay could only open and close his mouth silently. Glory rolled her eyes and jumped in.
"Are you Cattail?" she asked "Asha's sister?"
The dappled dragon and ducked her head. "Yes," she said. "Who are you?"
Glory poked Clay hard with one of her talons. He blurted, "I'm Clay. I think I'm your son."

Cattail stared at him. Her eyes were brown like his, but with a ring of yellow around the black slit of a pupil. He waited, his heart pounding. He'd imagined this moment a thousand times. In The Missing Princess, this was when the joy and feasting began.

"So?" Cattail said.
Clay guessed she hadn't heard him right. "I think you're my mother." he said.
"Those would seem connected," said Cattail. "And?"
"You don't understand," Glory said. "This is the dragonet you lost six years ago."

Cattail's claws slowly stirred the mud underneath her. "I haven't lost any dragonets." She didn't look confused or worried or pleased. Mostly she looked like she was putting up with this conversation until they let her go back to sleep.
Clay had no idea what to say.

"Listen," Glory said. "Maybe we got this wrong. Clay hatched from a blood-red-egg that was taken from somewhere around here six years ago by a dragon named Asha. He's come back looking for-"
"Oh, that egg," Cattail said with a yawn. "Asha got all excited about that. Don't know why; the village has a red egg every few years or so. But I didn't lose it."

"What happened to it?" Clay managed to ask.
"We sold it to the Talons of Peace," Cattail said. She gave them a look that was suddenly sharp and furtive. "Does this mean they want the cows back? Because they can't have them. I know we were supposed to breed them, but we ate them, so too bad."
"You sold me?" Clay cried. He felt like long claws were slashing through his chest.

"Why not?" Cattail asked. "There were six other eggs in the hatching. They didn't need you." She pulled a stray duck feather out from between her talons. "Asha didn't tell you any of this?"
"Asha's dead," Glory said. "She dies trying to keep Clay's egg safe."

"Dead?" Now Cattail finally looked upset. "I told her not to leave us! Our bigwings will be furious." She flicked her tongue out and in with a growl. "I guess it serves her right, choosing the Talons over us."

"She was trying to help fulfill the prophecy," Glory snapped. "At least the Talons care about somethings besides themselves." Clay would have laughed if he hadn't felt so crushed. That was the nicest thing Glory had ever said about the Talons of Peace.

"That's Asha, all right," Cattail said. "She was always softhearted and mushy about crazy things. She loved mooning around little dragonets, telling the story of that prophecy. She left a lot of blithering, obsessed dreemy-eyed behind in this village, let me tell you; they still won't shut up about destiny and peace and all that."

Dragons did not cry easily, and Clay had never shed tears in his whole life, no matter how much Kestrel had hurt him with words or claws. But now, suddenly, he had a glimpse of what their life could have been like if Asha had lived. She would have been one more dragon under the mountain to take care of them - but this one kind and affectionate, idealistic and hopeful. A guardian who would have given them faith in the prophecy and themselves. A counterbalance for Kestrel's harshness.

He had never spent much time thinking about Asha, the dragon who brought in his egg, but now his chest ached with sadness that she was dead and he had never known her. He realized that he was dangerously close to tears, and he could just imagine how his mother would react to that.
"What about my father?" Clay asked, steeling his voice. "Didn't he try to stop you from selling me?"

Cattail threw her head back and laughed, a high croaking sound like a thousand bullfrogs yelling at once. "You really don't know anything about MudWings, do you?" she said when she could catch her breath again. "I don't even know who your father was. And he certainly doesn't care. We have a breeding night once a month and then everyone goes back to their own sleephouses. No, dear, there's no father here for you."