Okay. I am writing a story, and I want some more feedback on it. Here you go!
Foreword
This is an add-on to the series Wings of Fire, so some characters are my own, but most aren’t. So, credit to the author of the series, Tui T. Sutherland.
Chapter 1
“Royal,” Royal’s mother, Palewings called. Palewings is a hybrid of a NightWing, SeaWing, and an IceWing. “Royal if you aren’t down here this second you’ll be late for your first day of school!”
“Coming mom! Just hold on one second-” Royal replied, tripping on her way down the stairs. Royal, on the other talon, is a hybrid of all of the tribes of Pyrrhia. And an animus, so she was very, very valuable.
“And that’s why we don’t use the stairs, dear, we fly down,” Palewings growled with mock anger.
“But Mama,” Royal whined. “I can’t open my wings on the way down! My wings are too big!”
Palewings shook her head as she passed a rabbit over to Royal. I hope she’s okay at school…. My little mouse... As Royal gulped it down, she walked towards the door. “You ready mom? Also, I’m not a mouse.”
“Royal, I told you! Don’t let anyone know about your NightWing power,” replied her mother, nudging Royal’s father, Firestorm, who is a hybrid of the tribes SandWing, RainWing, MudWing, and SkyWing.
“Are you coming, Firestorm,” Palewings asked, nudging him again.
“Wha-? Oh um yeah, I’m coming,” Firestorm said groggily, climbing slowly to his feet. The three of them walked out the door.
The three of them flew to Jade Mountain Academy, and Royal started getting nervous. Royal slowly started to use her RainWing camouflage, to disappear into thin air. I hope they don’t notice I’m gone… Royal thought worriedly. She was so nervous, because she was sure that she would be the only hybrid/animus there, and she was really really shy.
“Royal aren’t you- where’d Royal go,” asked Firestorm worriedly.
“I-I don’t know...” Palewings replied flying closer to Firestorm but then bumping into Royal.
“Here I am. I’m sorry for disappearing. I-I’m just super nervous that I’ll be the only hybrid… and maybe the only animus, but I’m not sure,” Royal said, reappearing.
“It’s okay Royal. But I know for a fact that you aren’t the only animus. Don’t worry,” Palewings replied comfortingly. I hope this is a good idea for her…. I don’t know whether we should let her go….
“Okay mama,” replied Royal, putting her head on her mother’s shoulder.
Chapter 2
As Royal and her parents landed at Jade Mountain Academy, Royal heard a cacophony of voices in her head.
Is school gonna be fun? Or boring?
I wonder what’s for lunch?
Oh, I’m so so so nervous!
Royal shrank down behind her father and cowered from fear. After a while of walking, Royal was lulled into a kind of stupor from her father’s swinging tail.
“Royal, honey, come up here and say ‘Hello’ to your professor,” Palewings said when they had stopped walking.
Royal tensed as she stepped out from behind her father, and saw Tsunami. “H-hello,” Royal stammered startled by her large size. “MynamesRoyalandIlikefruit,” Royal mumbled looking down at her claws and turning a bright shade of red on her wings and ear-tips.
Tsunami grimaced and replied, “Well, my name’s Tsunami, and I like seafood.” She snarled quietly and led them into the winglet that Royal would be staying in. “The Diamond winglet is the winglet where Royal will be and she will be here with other-” Crossbreeds that shouldn’t exist. Well, except for Sunny, but a crossbreed of all the tribes? That’s crazy! Tsunami’s mind finished for her.
“Tsunami! What did we talk about?!” cried Sunny, thwacking Tsunami with her harmless tail.
“I-it’s okay,” Royal replied timidly. “I-I don’t mind… but I do prefer the word hybrid, not crossbreed.” As soon as Royal said that she wished she could disappear and not come back forever.
“Okay,” growled Tsunami with a look of surprise and confusion. It’s almost like she read my mind…. “Let me start again. The Diamond Winglet is the winglet with all hybrids in it. Is that better?”
“Much,” declared Sunny with a smile that seemed to make the whole world brighter. “Royal, do you wanna say ‘Goodbye’ to your parents then follow me to go meet some of the other professors and the dragonets in your winglet?”
“Okay,” replied Royal. “Mom, Dad, I’ll see you over break, okay? And don’t worry, I’ll be careful.”
“Alright. Bye honey!” said Palewings. “I love you.”
“Love you kiddo.” Firestorm smiled
“Love you too,” Royal replied, following Sunny out of the room. AHHHH I'M SO SCARED I JUST WANNA GO HOME!! Royal thought, turning a pale shade of green.
“So, first we are going to meet the rest of the winglet,” said Sunny matter-of-factly. “Their names are Phoenix, Aurora, Turquoise, Merlin, Milena, and Steam. Phoenix, Aurora, and Milena are girls, as I bet you had figured out already and Turquoise, Merlin, and Steam are the boys.”
“Okay. And yes, I did figure out that those three are girls,” replied Royal laughing. As she laughed she turned back to her normal colors, which was a shade of royal purple, teal, and midnight blue.
As they continued walking Royal soon relaxed and was getting kind of excited to meet the rest of her winglet. She was looking around at the decorations and realized they were made to look like the other tribes’ territories. Royal had lived as a castaway for most of her life, but she was excited to see the other decorations. Royal backed up from walking next to Sunny, and to her excitement, she could spread her wings fully in the corridor. Royal smiled and bounded up to Sunny.
“What are you so happy about?” asked Sunny, bumping Royal’s hip. I wonder…. This is weird….
“Well, it’s just that at home, my wings can’t spread fully in most of the hallways, but here I can!” she replied happily.
A strange-looking scarlet-colored dragon with smoke coming off her wings walked passed, and almost rammed into Royal. Royal could feel the heat radiating off the dragon.
“Watch it!” the strange dragon growled.
“W-who was that?” asked Royal fearfully, turning an ugly pale beige as she dodged around Peril. Royal decided to look into her mind but was shoved out with a burst of flames. Woah. Royal thought.
“Oh, that’s just Peril. Don’t mind her. She was born with too much fire and was raised by the old SkyWing queen, Scarlet, who died recently…. But you probably don’t know who that is yet…. You’ll learn about her this year.” Sunny growled. “But never-mind that, because we’re here! This is the library, and the other dragonets in your winglet should be here.” Sunny pushed the door open with her wing and led Royal inside.
Chapter 3
As Royal and Sunny walked into the library it slowly got silent, and the last thing said was “I WONDER WHEN THE LAST DRAGONET WILL GET HERE?” which was yelled out by a bright blue-green dragonet that looked to be about a year or two older than Royal.
“Sunny!” cried Starflight with relief. “You’re here! And you’ve got the other dragonet with you?”
“Yes, yes Starflight you can relax now.” Sunny replied smiling.
“Who is that?” a voice piped up from the back of the room. “I can’t see! Move over Phoenix!”
“Ow! Watch it, Aurora! That was my tail!” another deeper voice growled.
Sunny laughed lightly at the bickering students then pointed to each one in turn. “The bright blue-green one is Turquoise, the gold, black, and silver one is Merlin, and the gray one is Steam. Phoenix is the sandy-colored one, Milena is the one with the purple, teal, and red, kinda like you but with red instead of blue. Aurora is the little one with the pink, light baby blue, light purple, and green.”
“Yep! That’s me!!!” called Aurora from the back of the room, fluttering her wings to get above the crowd.
“Alright,” said Starflight “I had better get going, so I can get the rest of the library done…. Tidied up I mean…. Before the rest of the students get here….”
Phoenix walked passed Steam and stomped on his tail as she passed. Steam howled and then lunged at her. “OW PHOENIX, WHAT WAS THAT FOR???”
“WHY ARE YOU YELLING AT ME,” Phoenix cried back, as the two of them tussled all over the floor. The rest of the dragonets, Sunny and Starflight rose into the air so they wouldn’t get smashed by the tussling dragons. “I BARELY TOUCHED YOU!”
“YOU STOMPED ON MY TAIL AS HARD AS YOU COULD!”
“NO, I DIDN’T!”|
“YES!”
“NO!”
“YES!”
“NO!!!!”
“ALRIGHT!” cried Royal with as much authority as she could muster. “STOP FIGHTING NOW!”
“Okay then,” said Merlin, sidling up to Royal. “No one has ever stood up to Phoenix. If I were you, I would run as fast as you can.”
“No,” replied Royal. “Someone needs to stand up to her for once. And I guess if y’all aren’t brave enough to do it, then I will.”
Phoenix stalked up to Royal and curled her tail up to strike. “What did you ssssay?” Phoenix hissed, and in a split second she had stabbed her tail down at Royal’s heart, but she dodged quickly.
“I said stop fighting, and leave us alone, or be friends with us. Your choice.” Royal raised her Sandwing barb tail and bared her venomous fangs.
“Royal….” Sunny said warningly “Don’t do this, or you’ll have to leave. And we’ll have to tell your parents….” Please please don’t do this Royal…. You're a great dragonet…. Please don’t do it….
Royal’s scales burned bright red and she whispered so that Phoenix couldn’t hear, “Don’t worry. I’m not going to do anything. Even if she comes at me. I won’t fight.”
Phoenix slowly lost the fierce look on her face and turned away. Royal looked into Phoenix's mind but found only a dull hum. Weird. Thought Royal to herself. “I-I’m sorry…. It’s just…. at home I always have to fight to eat and…. I just I thought I kinda needed to show my authority. Again, I’m sorry.”
“Hey, it’s okay. If you want, I’ll be your friend.” Steam said, gently brushing wings with Phoenix.
“A-alright,” she replied. “Thanks.”
“Well. That's taken care of now. Thank you, Royal…. I think….” said Sunny slightly confused by what had just happened.
“No problem,” Royal replied and then she tensed up because she felt a presence next to her. “W-what’s that?”
“What’s wha- TURQUOISE!” cried Milena angrily as she rammed into the invisible Turquoise, who had stepped up next to Royal. “You scared Royal!’’
Royal wondered why she hadn’t realized that Turquoise was there. I can’t hear any of my winglet…. Maybe I’ll hear my clawmates….
Chapter 4
As Royal went back to her sleeping cave, she found that she could hear her clawmates. Her clawmates names were found on the scroll that also had a map of the school.
“Hey there!” said a small midnight-blue SeaWing said, looking up at Royal with bright eyes. “You must be Royal, right?”
“Yes, I am. And you must be…. Delta?” asked Royal quietly.
“Yep!! And that big SkyWing is Sunfire, and that MudWing over there is Puddle. They're okay, but I bet we’ll be great friends!” As long as this dragonet isn’t boring like the rest of them…. Oh well. Happy thoughts… HAPPY THOUGHTS! Thought Delta loudly.
Royal giggled quietly but quickly went silent, because Sunfire was looking at her confusedly.
“So,” said Sunfire casually. “You’re that new hybrid, right? I wonder why the teachers let you come.”
“Hey! Leave her be, Sunfire! She didn’t do anything to you.” cried Delta angrily.
“Leave her be Sunfire!” replied Sunfire mockingly “Try me, stupid little dragon.”
“You guys, stop fighting,” said Puddle. Royal jumped when Puddle spoke. “It’s not needed.”
“Whatever,” said Sunfire as she stalked out of the cave. Stupid dragonets….
Royal slipped passed Delta and Puddle, then went to lay down on a nice-looking ledge, covered with blankets. She laid down and closed her eyes, but the voices in her head kept going, louder than ever. She groaned quietly and turned over. Then she fell into a dream.
…
“RUN ROYAL!” cried Royal’s mother, shoving her out the door. “GO! HE’S COMIN-”
Royal looked back just in time to see her mother get pulled back, and hurled into a big tree. There was a sickening ‘crack’ then silence. “NO!” cried Royal running over to her mother and putting her wings over her, sobbing. “No ... not you too…First dad then you…” Royal flung her arms over her head and leaped into the sky. She looked down and saw a huge white dragon zooming towards her. He caught up to her with three beats of his huge wings.
“Wait!” he called up to her, zooming in front of her. “I’m not gonna hurt you!”
“But…. you killed my mother,” Royal yelled back, stopping in midair to watch him.
“No, I- Oh. That was your mother? Sorry about that….” replied the white dragon, looking down at the still figure of Royal’s mother.
“Huh. Well, what’s your name, and can I go now, cause I need to leave. Now…”
“My name’s Blackout and no just wait, I need to warn you about something. Do NOT look into Skyfire’s mind anymore, because she is dangerous, and could notice, then kill you. I wouldn’t like that....”
“Odd name for a white dragon… I gotta go…. Bye!” Royal said quickly then flew away as fast as she could.
…
Royal woke up groaning with pain from her headache. She looked over slowly and saw Puddle helping teach Delta to read. Delta kept letting out little squeaks of happiness every time she got a word right. Royal smiled then tried to climb to her feet but fell over with an almost silent grunt of pain because she had twisted her wing the wrong way. Delta looked up quickly and smiled brightly.
“You’re awake! You know, you were muttering about some weird stuff in your sleep like, ‘Blackout?’ and ‘No, mom!’ It was really weird.” Delta said happily. “Oh well. How was your nap? You looked very relaxed.”
“Uh-huh….” Royal said quietly, confusedly. “Well, I’m gonna go to the library and see if the rest of my winglet is there…”
“Oh. Okay. See you later, Royal!” replied Delta, who continued reading with Puddle.
Hope you like it!!
Nice story!! gotta say, I have also made an OC that is a mixture of all four of the tribes too!!
Love it!
Hey, y'all, it's okay. I asked for feedback, so thanks for it!!! I know it doesn't make sense, I don't get it either tbh.
By the way, I sincerely apologize if this sounds rude. Like I said, I have nothing against the story itself. I simply couldn't stop myself from picking its premise apart, as I am so prone to doing. I only pointed out that it is improbable that it would ever occur, not that the story is bad. But then, a massive dragon-shaped continent populated by sentient dragons is pretty unlikely as well. So don't take it personally.
I have nothing wrong with the story itself, don't get me wrong. I'm just confused by its backstory.
How can there be one dragon who is all seven Pyrrhian tribes? One parent would need to be 25% of four tribes, and the other would need to be 50% another and 25% each of the last two. Besides, we've seen what happened with Peacemaker, Whiteout, and Sunny– not to mention Darkstalker. Even dragons that are half and half don't have all of their parent's tribe's powers.
Sunny didn't have a scorpion tail OR animus powers, mind-reading, prophecy, etc.
Darkstalker and Whiteout, well, Darkstalker had a lot of moon-given NightWing powers as well as his father's animus powers. But the only physical aspect he got from Prince Arctic was a ridge of white scales under his wings, and extra neck spikes behind the crown of his head like an IceWing. So, let's trace back Royal's family tree here.
SeaWing – IceWing SandWing – RainWing MudWing – Skywing
Sea-Ice – NightWing Sand-Rain – Mud-Sky
Night-Sea-Ice (Palewings) – Sand-Rain-Mud-Sky (Firestorm)
Royal (NSISRMS*)
After four generations, there is only a maximum of 12.5% (1/8) of each tribe's bloodline still inside Royal's DNA. In the case of the NightWing (which, judging from the fact that she can read minds, is more of her genotype than the other tribes), it's 25%. Given that her family tree is so scrambled it takes four generations to find any pure tribe blood, it is insanely unlikely that the powers have been preserved that long. A powerful swimmer from SeaWing, IceWing, and MudWing? Sure. Gills? Doubt it, since she also has SandWing and SkyWing in her. Big wings from SkyWing? Sure. But not a prehensile tail from a RainWing as well. Not camouflage scales either – RainWing is only one-eighth of her genetic code mathematically, so even if one-eighth of her could camouflage, you could still tell there was a dragon there when she was hiding.
What I'm saying is that it would be incredibly unlikely (probably impossible, and I could actually calculate the odds given more time) for a dragon with blood from all tribes to have the powers and abilities of all the said tribes. It'd make more sense to me to pick which ones best match your character, and knock off the ones that don't. It's okay for her to have multiple powers – mind-reading, scorpion tail, and powerful flyer from large wings, maybe. But she doesn't need all of them, nor would it be at all likely for her to have all of them.
And don't get me STARTED on how rare (and therefore statistically unlikely) animus powers are.
*NSISRMS = Night, Sea, Ice, Sand, Rain, Mud, Sky
Love it! It is awesome