Creative Corner

@MasqD "fae click humming"? I think you mighta gotten faes and coatls confused, friend.

(otherwise, cute fae y got there - not in your lair though?)

@argenteamoon

I thought faes clicked...... Guess I need to re-read the Lore.

Why do I do this to myself.

Eri is one I wasn't sure about because he's not really in the story yet? But it wouldn't hurt to have him in ze lair either.

@MasqD it look like he is in the story to meeeeeeeee.

@argenteamoon

`peers over rims of glasses with an eyebrow subtly raised`

waiting on my brother to return the crossroads.

@MasqD I make no promises about being sophisticated :p

@ArgenteaMoon @Adriel @AerinCantator @springwind

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Note from the Editor: This is a shorter chapter; versus my longer ones I try to achieve. I struggled with conveying Petite's feelings as being a new parent, and I hope I did her justice.

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For most of the journey to the island, The two kept to the skies, Petite more than once forgot to make frequent stops for food. Babies, of course, ate way more food than adults, Petitte’s inexperience weighed heavy on her shoulders. This was their third stop today, from the sky the beach looked less than an hour away, and then a long trip over water, at least longer than the tundras appetite.

Petite pondered over how to keep some plants with her for the flight, keeping bits in her satchel would be problematic because the wind would just blow it away even if she could pull it out. She imagined that she could wear some like a necklace and the hatchling could munch on it that way.

She sighed and kicked the dirt, “ What am I gonna do with you? I either forget to keep your needs in mind, or I'm just too paranoid about your wellbeing. How do real mothers handle this?”

The hatchling noticing her distress pushed the foliage she was eating towards Petite.

“You're too innocent, all this changing, and yet you're still the adorable cute fluff I fell in love with.”

The hatchling walked over to her and laid down right next to her arm rubbing her head on her hand. Petite had spent most of the journey playing with names; for the most part, the hatchling had only slept. There was very little the hatchling could do other than sleep a couple thousand feet in the air. Petite liked to think that the little hatchling would stay innocent and sweet like this like Leslie had been.

Petite prepared for the long flight over water packing food in her bag for the moment they landed; she was careful to keep both her food and the hatchling’s separate. In the two weeks that had past she had come to learn that plants were the only food she would eat, keeping them fresh was a trick that would she would have to learn over time. For now, it was evident that keeping plants and meat together was not the best way to store the two foods.

Petite and the hatchling walked their way to the beach it was a long travel time, but Petite’s wings thanked her for it, as far as Petite was concerned they were making a great time. At least by that strange fae’s calculations, she wished she had gotten his name, his distress when speaking to her about his clan had given Petite more than a passing thought about turning back and asking him if he wanted to join her on her journey. Sadly enough the only thing that had stopped her from doing just that was that Petite had no idea where his clan was, to begin with, the only thing she was certain of was that she would meet quite a few strange dragons in this forest.

The duo stopped well before reaching the cliff shoreline of the peninsula, and Petite placed the hatchling on her back and began to climb toward the sky. It would be easier for her to launch herself from the trees, and get the height needed to level herself before being over the water. She could have got the same momentum from running towards the edge of the cliff just the same, the grade of the cliffside or at least how high it was above the waterline was a mystery to her. As she soared over the cliff, she set her sights on the Celestial Star.

It took a little more than a half hour to reach the island, she touched down on the beach and slid into a flop motion. The sand around her was very loose, and her attempt at a smooth landing failed miserably. The hatchling didn't seem to care that her landing was rough, she slid down Petite’s tail with a happy squeak. Petite scooped the young dragon up with her tail and kissed her on the forehead. “You are just too cute!” she set her back down in the sand beside her. Fishing some plants out of her bag she set them in front of the tundra to eat.

Petite took in the sights of the island, the beach by the waterline was not very long before it was abruptly met by the wall of trees in much the same way as the border between Crystalspine and The Strand had been. The flight across the water had not been as exhausting as Petite expected, without rest she was quite eager to explore their new island home, and plot out a nest for them to live.

The map that she had stolen from the beastclan scout contained vast information on a contiguous part of The Strand but had little information that this island even existed. The map would be of great use to them once the hatchling learned how to defend herself as if on cue to her thoughts, she felt her bump into her leg. Looking down Petite saw that she had started to amuse herself by rolling around in the skystar warmed sand.

“Do you want to hang out on the beach, or do you want to go on an adventure, little one?”

A Huge block of text; It is so late where I am tho. I will try to edit the chunky-ness.

@MasqD Oh no I found this one relatively easy to read! probably because it's short. I think it's less than my brain limit for text on a screen, so I didn't reach the point where I scroll down from where I am and go "what, more words???"

either way TUNDRA HATCHLING SO CUTE!

Had to toss in some small chapters. XD

@ArgenteaMoon @Adriel @AerinCantator @springwind

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Note from the Editor: So I guess I didn't post this yesterday. D: I had like 12 tabs open, and I thought I ended up posting this, and it wasn't until like I got to work that I thought about it. I had edited the whole thing but failed actually to update it on my main thread. D:

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Petite gave her a warm smile and motioned the two directions they could take, one that would lead them deep into the forest or over to a spot of the beach that was much larger with what looked like big seashells, and some small and wandering crustaceans. The hatchling hopped up from where she was lying and walked towards the forest; Petite followed walking side by side with her. One of the things that made the island unique was the wildlife that lived here. Petite had only visited the Southern Icefields on two separate occasions, and both had been when her first clan was training her. They taught her how to fly long distances and about many other territories, information that was vital for keeping young dragons alive.

Already in just a few hours they had spent on the island Petite had spotted a snowshoe rabbit; it looked small to her, like a baby. Fauna of the ice flight wasn't always stocked well on the meaty side, but most of the rabbits she had eaten usually were. Nature in itself was ornate and beautiful, Petite liked the way it existed, always at peace with itself clam, inciting almost she didn't even need a magical forest to understand how powerful it was.

She and Petite began to look around for an open patch of trees, where she could build a base for the nest, Petites idea for the nest was to use her knowledge on what she had studied from the other nests, while the hatchling had been asleep. The most important part would be to build the base of the sky nest. The newness of their surroundings had started to feel like a safety for Petite, less like she was running, a real adventure. The trees around them looked quite similar to what they had spent the last week looking. However, it was visibly apparent that the foliage of the trees was lighter here, due to the colder dry climate. After about 10 minutes of walking the hatchling had decided to make a game out of their travels by hiding behind trees waiting for Petite to find her.

Of course, it was quite easy to find the little dragon, the hatchling was not very good at remembering that she had a back end, and it was often unhid by the trees she chose to hid behind. It still helped to pass the time as Petite pushed and shoved on trees checking to see how strong they were. It took almost an hour to find a reliable set of trees for her to begin building. Once she found the perfect spot, Petite took out the silver ivy she had been carrying in her bag and draped it over some of the branches in a strange and unnatural way. A large part of building the nest would be gathering, with it being midday now they would still have to sleep on the ground a few more nights.

Petite picked the hatchling up and set her down in her usual spot, between her wings, it would be easier to find thick, sturdy pieces of wood without the young dragon underfoot, playing hide and seek. The rainstorm had made it very easy to find large branches and in some cases whole trees. The downed trees of the forest were where Petite began, dragging all manner of rain-sodden, sun dried, and some that were slightly rubbery and easily bent. When Petite had succeeded in creating a large enough pile up of decently sized branches and broken odds and ends, she began dragging them upward to build the base of their new home.

Her idea was to lay the tougher branches in such a way that bending the softer ones between them in a woven fashion would hold the larger full ones like a floor. The actual weaving was, in theory, a fantastic idea, but in practice not so much. Petite struggled to lay the pieces in order first in the air where she could manipulate placements and size. After struggling with that she quickly decided to use the earth as a third hand, this succeeded for the first three to four branches but was met with the same opposition as she had in the tree, anything after that initial four would snap the branches. The hatchling continued to sit on her shoulders and watched enamoured by Petites project. A few times Petite's frustration with her project became audible, in the form of low growls and heavy sighs. After about ten tries to get any shape larger than her foot, she gave up slamming down the project, Petite began to look around for more ideas.

Looking upward at the naturally linked tree branches, Petite wondered if she could simply weave the branches between what was already there instead of trying to make a floor to lay on top of it. It would take a bit of thinking on her part but nothing unmanageable; Petite pondered over this plan, looking back at the project for a moment, before turning switching her attention into the tall trees again. Beautiful as they were, this was not the Shrieking Wilds, and she was not a nature dragon. The Strand itself lacked the essential part that made Nature Nests work, vines.

Above head were magical maples; a barrage of branches that would have to do; she only hoped that with enough of them layered together it would hold them. Even so, it wouldn't be long before the young tundra was big enough they could work on a ground nest together, or even a better sky nest.

There was, of course, the idea of making just a safe place for the hatchling up in the trees with walls, and Petite could stay on the ground. It would be significantly easier to plan on Petite's part, even just making the little girl a place to hide would go to miles towards keeping the young tundra safe.

“Shall we try it then, Little one?” Petite liked to include her, even if she understand what was going on yet.

The hatchling’s responses of understanding came from her actions, she had already learned so much, like whenever Petite stretched her wings in meant for her to hang on tightly because they were going to take off. Petite was finally getting the hang of climbing trees; something she had almost specifically avoided back when Anonymity was her home. Her life then and now were perfect opposites, day and night.

Reaching the ideal height for pulling branches and dropping them down Petite began her work. Breaking and tearing at the upper parts of the trees were easily broken limbs were plentiful. After she got a decent entanglement of branches going, she would climb down and get a long strand of silver ivy to band those sections together. This process took what felt like an eternity to Petite. The skystar overhead was starting to move past the mid-day mark closer to night time; even the moon was growing brighter. In a few hours, they would have to sleep on the ground again. Petite pushed herself to work faster. Close as it was to evening and she only had two large pallets bundled, if you could call them that. Together they looked quite shoddy, which wasn't so much a lack of trying but rather a lack of skill in binding.

She climbed down to the ground grabbing her larger branches that had been discarded earlier and began lifting them upward into the mass of nest she was creating. Petite hoped that these larger limbs would help close some of the gaps in her bottom layer. If she could just get enough together to make a solid floor, then she could just cover in in leaves to make it soft. Some of the tree limbs splintered off at the ends. Trying to manoeuvre those without either shattering them or eating a mouthful battles and worms, was a project in and of itself.

Petite didn't think of herself as really a picky eater, but considering Imperial dragons could eat just about anything. She was a considerably picky; this last week had proven that to her as she spat out more beetles. Petite returned to the tree tops to create more bundles of sticks, looking downward at her pathetic attempt at a nest. Sighing she returned to her work, no matter what she would have a nest for the hatchling to sleep in tonight. However daunting the workload was, Petite kept telling herself quietly to remain positive.

The work overall became easier the more she did, things like which branches would break off easy and which ones she would have to struggle and bite at to rip free. By avoiding those, she saved quite a bit of time, as well as going and gathering multiple branches from the surrounding forest and piling them nearby so she didn't have to search around for them when she got to a spot to where she could use them.