Chapter Ten: Remembrance

Crystal stretched out her wings and flapped them a few times to loosen her muscles as paws sounded in the hall. It was early, the sun only beginning on rise on the far end of the island. Folding her wings gently against her side, Crystal stepped away from the door and waited for it to open. The steps grew louder, and then passed. Crystal sighed, small flecks of ice escaping with her breath. It had just been another servant, probably a Cleaner or a Cook. Turning away from the door, Crystal set her head in the window and looked down into the jungle. Some wild cats were bounding together, scaring several parrots who flew upwards in a small rainbow.

Crystal yawned, and then tilted her head downwards. There were four floors below her, each floor with twenty rooms, and the opposite wall of the castle was also dedicated to servant quarters. If Crystal was remembering correctly, about the time of the Cleansing there would be roughly two hundred and forty servants in the castle. 

Chapter Nine: Memories

Ember’s talons scraped stone as he slid off his bed. He’d been awake long enough to hear the soft clicking of the daily messenger, dropping off the letters addressed to him from the town and village, as well as in the castle. The pile was somewhat large, as it usually was, since all the dragons assigned to council were required to write a summary or their report for the daily meetings the night before. 

Making his way to his desk, Ember lifted a paw to shuffle through the papers. Reports from all the council dragons, in their varying styles of writing, were all there, as well as a few reports from Flame Village. At the bottom of the pile, a few papers up from the last, there was a shimmering white paper with thick, blocky writing like Crystal had used to write her name. Ember brushed the other papers aside, and carefully lifted it up, flipping it around to see the sender. Wynter’s Grove, Block forty-three, no name or dome number. 

Ice dragons lived in Domes, round houses made from their own ice and snow, and each Dome was crammed onto a Block with roughly fourteen other domes, depending on the size of the families in each dome.