The grass crackled beneath Zoltar’s talons as he touched down, folding his wings in close to his sides. Voltron and Oren landed in front of him.
“You should go on from here,” Voltron said, pointing his snout in the direction of Viper Rock, “We’ll continue on paw. The Ice Talon is pacing around down there and I don’t want him to see us, not until you’ve managed to talk some sense into him. The last thing I need is for him to get spooked by a Wind Talon and Lightning Talon trailing you.”
Zoltar nodded, glancing over his shoulder at the distant crag. Even from the air he hadn’t been able to make out Shriken. How had Voltron manage to see that much from this distance?
“Remember Shadow Talon, I’ll be keeping an eye on you the whole time, so don’t try anything.” Voltron growled, an edge of warning in his voice, “We’ll meet up with you before midday. Make sure the Ice Talon is prepared for us by then.”
“Yes sir,” Zoltar said, dipping his head respectfully as he backed away. He glanced up at the sky. The sun was almost at its highest point. He had to hurry.
Spreading his wings, he let the warm air rising from the earth catch them and lift him into the sky.
Once air borne he banked east, leaving the two dragons below to slip into the roll waves of grass.
Even though the constant movement of the blades broke up the outline of Voltron, Zoltar could still just make out the shape of the Lightning Talon stalking through the dry stems. Oren on the other paw wasn’t quite so stealthy as he walked along behind, his head and wings constantly popping up above the carpet of gold.
Zoltar shook his head, slightly amused at the younger dragon. He didn’t linger on the thought long though as he was still painfully aware of Voltron’s eyes watching his every move.
He could only hope that Shriken would react calmly to his arrival. Skies above only knew what would happen if he acted aggressively towards Voltron and Oren.
It wasn’t long before he caught sight of Shriken, the faint shimmer of his silvery blue scales giving away his position. As he neared, Zoltar could see the Ice Talon anxiously pacing from one end of Viper Rock to the other, constantly glancing in the direction of the Ice Talon Kingdom as he walked.
Voltron had been right to stay hidden for the meantime. Shriken looked ready to bolt for the sky at a moment’s notice.
Slowing down, Zoltar purposefully made his wings beats long and arching, trying to catch the suns glare as much as possible so as to warn Shriken of his approach.
He knew the second Shriken saw him as the Ice Talons entire body went ridged, his wings raised in preparation to flee. After a moment though, he recognized him and seemed to relax.
Circling in a wide arch as he prepared to land, Zoltar noticed that Shriken was scouring the sky around him.
‘He’s looking for Felistia,’ he realized, with a sudden wave of anxiety. How would the Ice Talon react to him coming alone?
A snarl imitated from below and Shriken waved a wing at him, motioning for him to land.
Dipping into a shallow swoop, Zoltar skidded in to land a few paw steps from him.
Almost immediately, Shriken grabbed his wing with his front talons and tugged him towards a fissure in the rock face.
“Where is Felistia?” he growled once they were hidden inside, “What happened?”
Zoltar blinked at him for a second, before hurrying to explain, “The Wind Talons, they are keeping her prisoner, at least until she’s proven that she can be trusted. That’s why I’m here. I’m supposed to find out about this Wings of Freedom movement and how it’s going. Lezeeru…the Queen wants to use them somehow. Voltron will explain…”
“Wait you, brought Wind Talons,” Shriken cut him off.
“I had to. They wouldn’t let me go on my own. They just want to talk.” Zoltar started.
“Never mind about that. We don’t have time it right now,” Shriken said, urgency ringing in his voice, “Shiler knows you are with the Wind Talons. Her guards found your tracks beyond the border. I don’t know everything, but somehow she figured out that you’d taken the Diamond to the Wind Talons. She’s declared all-out war.”
Zoltar stared blankly at him, trying to take in everything he’d said. Shriken didn’t give him time to think through it all though.
“She’ll have her army ready in two days. She wants to wipe out the Wind Talons for good this time. I’ve done my best to get the Wings of Freedom together, but there just isn’t enough time. We’re not enough to stop her on our own.”
Suddenly Shriken seemed very small as he looked hopefully at Zoltar, as though he would somehow come up with a plan to fix this whole mess.
Just then, the crunch of talons against coarse dirt alerted Zoltar to the arrival of Voltron and Oren. Shriken was up in an instant, the desperation from before replaced by bared teeth and a warning growl.
“Wait,” Zoltar jumped in front of Shriken before he could barrel through the cave entrance, “It’s just the Wind Talons I was telling you about.”
Shriken paused, gave Zoltar a long, hard stare before pushing past him and out into the sunlight.
Zoltar rushed after him, but paused at the cave’s entrance.
Shriken was practically pushing the two surprised Wind Talons towards the overhang, hissing, “You can’t be just standing around in the open. Shiler’s patrols are going well beyond the Ice Kingdom’s borders. If Ice Talons saw you out here, you’d be slaughtered.”
Voltron broke away from him for a moment, opening his mouth to protest.
“Lighting Talon or no Lighting Talon,” Shriken added, before Voltron could say anything.
A scowl crossed the old Lightning Talons face, but he didn’t argue as he followed Oren and Shriken into the dimly lit hollow.
Zoltar couldn’t help, but notice the terrified expression that had come over Oren’s snout as he slunk past.
“The Queen has increased security since you escaped. She’s got patrols along the borders day and night now and she even posted guards inside the villages. I’m sure she knows an Ice Talon helped you and Felistia escape,” Shriken continued, sitting with his spiked tail curled over his talons, “I don’t think she suspects me, but even still I only just managed to get out here without being seen. We can’t take any chances by staying out in the open.”
He cast a meaningful look at Voltron and Oren, “Did you see anyone else while you were out there?”
Voltron shook his head, “No, just you.”
“Good,” Shriken seemed to relax and exhaled lightly, “Look, I need to get back before anyone notices that I’m gone. It’s been almost day since I left and as you know, the Queen has eyes on just about everyone.”
“Wait,” Voltron interrupted, “We only just got here. You need to give us a little more than that.”
“Zoltar will tell you what you need to know,” Shriken said, getting to his paws, “The Wings of Freedom will move out with the Queen’s army to avoid suspicion, but once we’re on the battle field you’ll have our full support. Look for the cobalt talon slash symbol on our chest armor. That way you’ll be able to tell friend from foe.”
With small dip of his head to Zoltar, the Ice Talon walked to the cave entrance. He paused, looking back, “Good luck to you all. I’ll see you in two days…I hope.”
“Safe travels,” Zoltar said, as he watched Shriken, “I’ll let Felistia know you’re safe.”
Shriken smiled, before spreading his glittery silver wings and springing into the early afternoon sky.
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
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125,005 Literary Works • 672,795 Reviews
Hi! Plume here, with a review!!
I think I reviewed the chapter that came before this one, but it was a while ago, so forgive me if my memory is a little bad. I really enjoyed this installment of your story! I thought it was really well written and I found myself really engrossed as it went along.
One thing I really loved was your imagery. It was absolutely stunning, if I say so myself. You do it just enough so that the reader can visualize everything perfectly, but not so much that your crucial plot points get lost in the purple prose. It's a very delicate balance and is often hard to get right, so great job on that!!
I also thought your dialogue was good. There's a lot of it in this chapter, which I think is a good thing. It really helps improve pacing and carries your story along.
Specifics
Airborne is one word, I think. And roll should be rolling, since roll isn't an adjective.
You need an apostrophe in "sun's," since you're talking about the glare of the sun. It's possessive, which means you need the apostrophe.
That comma seems a little oddly placed. I think it would be better if you structured the sentence like "Wait, you brought Wind Talons?" It would better convey the speech patterns and the incredulity.
Same here. Your comma is unnecessary and just provides an awkward break in the sentence.
I also have some thoughts about the way you structure your dialogue. For example, let's just take this line.
Most of it is fine, and the thing I'm going to point out is extremely nitpicky, but you do it a lot so I figured I'd just offer. I think your second comma would be better served as a period. There's no reason for it to be a comma. Usually, when you break dialogue with a comma, it's because you're breaking a sentence of dialogue up with an action or dialogue tag. For example, like so:
But you've got two sentences. "Safe travels" is a complete thought, as is "I'll let Felistia know you're safe." It might even be grammatically incorrect to put the comma where you're putting it, as you've got several clauses all tied up in one sentence. The rules get a bit foggier with dialogue though, so I'm not sure if it's actually incorrect. Regardless, I'd suggest doing it like this and replacing the comma with a period:
You also do this in other places to, so again, I just thought I'd point it out. It's really nitpicky, and I don't blame you if you don't take this into account.
Overall: this was a really great read. Your imagery is stunning and I love your dialogue. The pacing is stupendous. I can't wait to read more!!
Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),
Hi! I'm back for another review!!
First Impression: Well another pretty good chapter. Just the one thing I might have a slight doubt about for this one but for the most part I think its pretty solid and there are no holes that I can see. Hopefully I didn't forget anything either.
Anyway let's get right to it,
Ooh looks like they have arrived at their destination.
More logical thinking by these two. I love that they think of all of that stuff in advance instead of being rash and rushing in without a second thought.
Oooh Voltron has supersight...okay probably not but I thought it was funny.
That's a lovely description for Zoltar taking off and love the subtle differences you're showing in the skill levels of Voltron and Oren. It just does a wonderful job showing us the two different amounts of experience.
I think I have a pretty good idea of what would happen in such a situation.
That seems pretty realistic for the situation he is in. I like that.
Smart move by Zoltar.
Uh oh...now we get back to that potential issue.
I love that explanation. Its just so short and to the point. Its perfect for the occasion and I'm loving how mature everyone is in this story. There's just too many stories where people
dragonsjust make the stupidest decisions to drive the plot and there's none of that here which is amazing.That can't be good.
Well that was nice of his for him to warn them immediately. Another very smart move.
Looks like things are really about to escalate fast now.
So...how exactly do they plan on not getting caught before the battle even begins? Armor changes after flying out? Are they all going to run off from the kingdom before the battle begins?
And...so we wait...
Aaaaand that's it for this one.
Overall: Overall it was a great chapter as always and I'm sure you have a perfectly good answer to that one issue I had. And yeah that's about all I got to say. Going to wait patiently for more chapters.
As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.
Stay Safe
Harry
Thank you again for another review. I always look forward to them.
Good point about the armor. I'll have to fix that when I get to editing or come up with a way to make it work. I'm almost halfway through the next chapter. 