What Next?

Chapter 3 Winter is Coming

    The snow didn't fall hard at first, but we all knew that by sunrise, there would be an inch stuck to the ground at least.

"Okay, whoever wants to can kill me now before Mother Nature does it." I said and brought out my dagger from its sheath.

  Before Scruffnut reached for it, Bottonlout grabbed it out of my hand and growled, "Nobody's dying. Not tonight."

"Tell that to the snow." Salmonfoot said. "Freya's soaking wet, I'm skinnier than a stick, if anyone's going to die it's going to be either her or me."
  Everyone just looked to him with an extremely annoyed look. We didn't have anything against him, but in any situation he went to the worst possible conclusion.

  I just rolled my eyes at his thought. "We're almost fifteen, I'm sure we've all spent one winter night outside."

  "We're sixteen." Buffnut pointed out. Once he said those words the only thing that could be heard was the crackle of the fire, and the steady wind, dropping in tenperature.

"Seriously?" Comet asked in disbeleif. "I mean, you guys always act like -"

"Like what?" Scruffnut urged him to go on.

"Uh, nevermind."

"Past that point, a dragon's flame pouch is in its stomach. If you just lay on it and it starts to get cold, their instinct is to warm themselves up, in turn keeping us warm." I explained with the help of Stormcloud who rolled over onto her stomach, inviting me to lay on it.

  "Clever girl." Comet said.

"What? Did you think the daughter of the chief of the Isle of Dragons was an air head?" I said and crawled onto Stormcloud's stomach.
  Everyone followed my actions and clung to their dragons. Nothing was said, we just nuzzled up to the warmth that emitted from our dragons. As the wind kicked up and stung against my face, Stormcloud wrapped her wings around me and tucked her face in the tunnel she created.
  I couldn't see anything beyond her dark gray scales and her glowing lilac eyes. The wind outside began to grow vicious. It howled and whipped loud enough for Stormcloud to wrapped all four legs around my body. I could tell she was getting wary, because her eyes kept flicking outside and back.

"What's the matter, girl?" I asked in a sweet voice. All she gave me in reply was a low growl. It wasn't to me, but something outside. Suddenly, a roar, unlike ones I've heard,  exploded in my ears.
Stormcloud's low growl turned into a sharp snarl. I tore through, the dragon's protective shield and burst into the open. The wind hit me like a whip and my face began to freeze. My breathing grew heavy as I made my way for the other dragons that had their wings around the riders.
"Comet! Bottonlout! Salmonfoot!Scruffnut, Buffnut! Scythe! Get your asses out here!" I called to each one of them and within seconds we were all standing in a circle.

"Any particular reason you called us out here?" Comet shouted at me over the high winds.

"I know I'm not the only one who heard that roar. " I shouted above wind.

"What roar?" Bottonlout asked.
  For the second time, the roar pierced my ears.
"That one!" Everyone gave me a suspicious look. "You can't hear it can you?"

"Maybe the SeaShocker venom is still in her." Scruffnut said.

"Yeah, maybe she's going insane!" Buffnut added.

"I'm so jealous!"

"I'm not going insane!" I shouted at them. I desperately looked from some indication of my sanity. "Look at the dragons. They're terrified!"

Comet looked back to Tigerlilly who was crouched back, with a lashing tail and back to me. "She's got a point. I don't know why we can't hear what the dragons are, but better safe then sorry."