Edmund's arrival to their cave had worried Ooze. That was the third hatchling to arrive after they had settled only a few weeks ago, so what if there were more? He had taken Pearl and Dusty with him to search for any more wanderers, while Hampert and Edmund had stayed behind with the familiars.
While they were away, Hampert had decided to do a little cleaning around the cave. No one liked to do it, but everything was beginning to collect grime, so while the others were gone, he did his best to tidy up.
Their home had been expanded from the little crevice it was when Lume and Ooze had first found it. The main chamber had several half-carved divots that served as storage and nests for the smaller residents. There were two rooms that came off of the main one, which were both currently being excavated further. The deeper of the rooms was where they stored their food, and the other was where Ooze and Pearl slept. Hampert was fine with waiting until their construction was further, and Dusty had found her own crack to sleep in until she had a room of her own. Now, Hampert was wriggling his way into that crack to make sure nothing was getting too disgusting down there. He trusted Dusty to keep her space clean, but it didn't hurt to make sure.
Once he was through, Ham noticed the place she had settles was surprisingly roomy. Or, it would be for her, at least. Currently, Dusty was about a third of his size, but even he could move around without too much issue. A quick glance around revealed what he had expected, that her room was perfectly clean, but Hampert noticed something he didn't expect to see. A pile of papers, who knew where she got them from, with some sort of drawings on them.
It only took a second for Hampert to decide to snoop. He loved to see Dusty's art, so this opportunity was too much to pass up. The first few scribbles were nice, mostly simple portraits of the other dragons in a style a young hatchling would draw in. But they improved very quickly. Highly detailed ink drawings of everyone in the clan, even a half-finished portrait of Edmund and a sketch of his elk friend. Ham was amazed, these were so good! He smiled, ready to go back to cleaning the rest of the cave before he noticed another small pile of papers off to the side.
These were... different than the others. They told a story. Dusty's story. The Wind clan she had come from wasn't large, but it wasn't tiny, either. Her parents, a Wildclaw mother and Coatl father, had hatched many, many hatchlings before Dusty and her brothers. The three of them had fun together, but it didn't last long. Soon after they were hatched, her parents tried to send them away. According to the drawings, Hampert noticed, Dusty actually talked and laughed and sang with her family. But after this, she became silent. She cried, refusing to leave and trying to stay with her family, but they wouldn't let her. Dusty's brothers, realizing there was no point in fighting it left, leaving her alone. But she still wouldn't leave, so her parents pushed her out of the nest. The skies had been her friend before this, and Dusty had several drawings of her flying around with her brothers, but from that near-crash, the sky was something to be afraid of.
Hampert looked around, suddenly extremely self-conscious about what he had done. Those were private, and he shouldn't have looked. But there were still a few drawings left, and he needed to know the whole story.
From that fall, she had started to wander. She found Gras soon after she had entered Earth territory, and even if he hadn't approached her, she still knew he was watching out for her. Her journey was mostly uneventful, until she met another dragon. A Bogsneak with bright purple on his wings. He took her in, introduced her to his friends, and let her feel safe. Dusty missed her brothers, but she felt more wanted here than she ever had felt there. To her, this place was family, and she knew they would never force her to leave.
Quickly putting everything back where he found it, Hampert wriggled out of Dusty's room, careful to not disturb anything else before he could escape. She would be back soon, and he didn't want her to know he had gone through her things. But he smiled as he did, happy that what he had done had been such a positive thing for the lost little Wildclaw he had met in the desert.
