"This place is so cool!" Lavender said in awe as she walked the bustling streets of the Sky Kingdom. She'd never seen to many SkyWing's in one place! So many different shades of reds, oranges and there were even some dark shades of pink here and there.

"It's all shiny things here." Salamander chuckled as they walked together.

"You better not steal anything!" She hissed, earning a laugh from the other hybrid.

"No promises sweets."

"No promises sweets." She mocked her, trying to mimic Salamander's smooth voice that was deeper than her own.

"Are you mocking me now?"

"What does it look like I'm doing? Are you to obsessed with treasure that you've replaced your eyes with jewels and plugged your ears with earrings?"

"That doesn't sound to bad of an idea."

Lavender didn't respond as she spotted a stand that caught her eye. There was a SkyWing running it and they were selling all kinds of bright coloured jewelry. Necklaces with gold or silver chains with bright coloured jewels ranging from any colour you could think of. The jewels all were shaped to be unique and special, each one different from the next. Salamander must've noticed her staring at the stand since she had stopped walking.

"You wanna go check it out?" Her voice pulled the smaller purple hybrid from her trace as she shook her head as her frills twitched.

"Sure, but no touching anything!" Lavender didn't even wait for a response before she made her way towards the stand. Everything was beautiful.

She looked in awe at the crafted jewellery. Her frills twitched happily as she looked some of them over, running one of her talons gently over a blue carved sapphire that was shaped to look like a dolphin with a golden rim and chains. She could feel Salamander's gaze on her as the other hybrid walked over.

Lavender reached over to look at another piece of jewelry, this one looked to be the most simple out of all of them. It was a simple silver chain necklace with a silver pendent that had a pink jewel embedded into it. The pendent was circular in shape, along with the jewel. In others eyes, it might've looked plain compared to all the other jewellery, but to Lavender, it looked beautiful.

"You like that one?"

"Huh?" Lavender was pulled out of her trance and looked over towards Salamander who was looking at her from the corner of her eye. She had a small smile on her face as her lager talons reached out to touch the jewelry, gently brushing one claw over the pink jewel and over Lavender's smaller talons.

"Do you like my voice so much that you can't think of a response?"

"No! Shut up you over grown winged lizard!" She exclaimed as she playfully slapped her wing on the other hybrids head, making her laugh.

Lavender watched as Salamander looked towards the SkyWing who ran the stand. "Do you take trades?"

The SkyWing looked to think for a moment. Lavender took the chance to look the other dragon over. The female SkyWing had pale orange scales, paler than Funnel's. She had dark orange eyes that looked to be made from the lit of a fire. Her horns were a dark russet, almost a dark brown in colour. She had some small golden bud earrings in her ears that looked to glitter and shine like the sun.

"I'd be willing to see what you have to trade," she hummed as she lightly tapped her chin with one claw. "Are you wanting to offer for that necklace?"

"Yes, it'll be for her." Salamander confirmed as she started to dig through the pouch that was strapped onto her right thigh.

The SkyWing merchant looked towards Lavender, she could feel her gaze look her up and down. "She your family or something kid?"

"No, she's just a friend."

"Oh? I'm just a friend? I thought you would've thought more of me Lavi." Salamander chuckled, earning a pout from the smaller hybrid.

"Ah, a loving relationship I see." The SkyWing smiled.

"We're n-not together." Lavender quickly tried to defend, but was hushed by the SkyWing who gave her a smile.

"I can see love when I see it, don't let it escape your talons before it flys to far to reach." The SkyWing's wings twitched calmly. "I remember when I met my husband, I didn't think I'd ever grow to love such an arrogant dragon who's got to thick of a skull, yet, I love him." She sighed as she looked at the golden ring that wrapped around one of her talons.

"Aha! I knew I still had theses!" Salamander pulled out two necklaces, Lavender recognized them immediately. Those were the two necklaces Salamander stole that day when I found her in the alley, when we were chased to the outskirts of the Sand Kingdom.

She silently watched as Salamander handed the two necklaces over to the SkyWing. Lavender wanted to speak up and tell Salamander not to trade them away, to go back and give them back to the poor MudWing she'd stolen them from, but, her tongue felt tied. That MudWing is probably long gone within the Mud Kingdom, if we were to go try and find them to return them, we'd probably never find them amongst all the other muddy coloured dragons, she thought with a flick of her tail.

The SkyWing merchant looked the two necklaces over, taking mental note of every detail and looking at each jewel within them. The pale coloured SkyWing let out a hum as she handed back one of the necklaces and held up the other.

"I'd be willing to trade for this one." She declared with a nod.

"Deal." The two dragons shook talons before the merchant handed over the pink jewelled necklace to Salamander.

"Thank you! Um."

"Embers."

"What?" Lavender looked at the merchant who have a her a smile.

"My name, it's Embers. Now, off you two youngins go and don't forget what I said." Hat last comment was pointed directly at Lavender, who nodded before the two started to make their way down the bustling street of warm coloured scales.

"You know," she started, catching Salamander's attention. "You didn't need to trade to get that necklace for me. I could live without it you know."

"Yeah, but I know you can't live without me, so, why not get you something so that you'll always be able to remember me a think wow, Salamander was such an amazing dragon! Oh, I love her sooooo much! She's my hero!"

"I regret ever letting you follow me." She kept walking, listening to Salamander's laughter as she ran to catch up with her.

"Who said you let me come along? I could've just followed you."

"You're such a stalker."

"A gorgeous and intelligent stalker, thank you very much. Now, how about we put this jewel where it belongs?" Lavender stopped as Salamander lightly grabbed her wrist to stop her. The larger hybrid held up the necklace and gently moved it over her head and down her neck, before letting it go and settle in place on Lavender's chest.

The only necklaces Lavender had ever wore, were her mothers, and even then that was rare since Orchid hardly had any and she'd always be wearing one since they were from Strongwings and she always wanted to wear a gift he'd given her, to show she appreciated them. But this necklace, this one was hers and felt different.

"Thank you." Lavender smiled softly as she clutched the pendant hanging from the silver chain.

"You're welcome, Princess."

"Will you ever call me by my real name?"

"Nah."

"Fine then, I'll just give you a nickname as well." She declared as they kept walking.

"Oh? And what would my glorious nickel be?"

"Flying Lizard."

"That's an awful nickname."

"Annnddd you've got an awful face."

She could help but giggle as she heard Salamander make an playful offended noise. "I'll have you know I've got a lovely face! Since dragons like drawing it so much! But they can never get my snout right."

"Uhuh." Lavender listened before something else reached her ears. They pearled up and she looked around until the spotted the source.

It was music, and it was coming from a small group of SkyWing's who were playing different kinds of instruments, filling the air with music that made you want to dance along, which, some SkyWings were doing. She could see dragonets singing at the top of heir longs while dancing, there were older dragonets and even some adults joining in. Everything felt cheerful here in the Sky Kingdom, it was nothing like Lavender expected. She thought all SkyWings would've been grumpy know-it-all's, but, she was wrong, they were like every other dragon.

"Do you like to dance?" Salamander suddenly asked, also watching the dragons dance and some singing along to the music that filled the air.

"I've never really danced before."

"What about singing?"

"Not since I was a little dragonet." She huffed.

"Well then, let's chance that now."

"What do y-" Lavender was tugged by her wrist by Salamander as she lead the pair towards he dancing and singing. "I'm not a good dancer nor singer!"

"Lies, and I know a lie when I hear one princess, now come on!"

"Because all you do is lie?"

"No, I can be truthful."

"Ha! I'll believe it when I see it!" Lavender snorted, earning a chuckle from Salamander.

"If you think you're so awful, just copy what I do and you'll be fine." The other hybrid said as she started to dance along with the SkyWing's but her gaze stuck to Lavender, and soon, the smaller hybrid followed suit and the two were dancing along with some of the SkyWings.

"See! I told you I bet you could dance!" Salamander smiled as the two danced, stepping around each other and flapping their wings.

"I'm not a good dancer!" Lavender hissed in a hushed tone, thing to cover up her smile and her laughter as the two hybrids danced together, and soon enough, they started to sing along with the SkyWing's.

The time of day seemed to slip away as they had fun dancing, singing and exploring the kingdom. Soon, the sun was starting to set, turning the sky a beautiful scarlet that glowed brightly. A few stars here and there were peeking through and were twinkling playfully in the sky. The village had started to clear as parents took their dragonets home to get them to bed or went home themselves to set along side the sun, while a few dragons stayed out in the streets, chatting quietly and walking together. Lavender and Salamander were walking down one of the streets, walking side by side.

"Today was fun, was it not?" The taller hybrid asked with a small smile on her face as they walked together.

"Yeah! It was so much fun!" Lavender had a skip in her step as there was a large smile on her face. "The dancing! The singing! Everything! I never knew the Sky Kingdom was this amazing and colourful! I though SandWing's were the only really musical tribe on Pyrrhia!"

"The SkyWing's can be rather musical too, ever since Queen Flicker was given the throne, she's made the tribe what it used to be. Instead of what Queen Amber and Princess Ruby wanted it to."

"Those two were like a pair of squabbling parrots." Lavender snorted.

Salamander laughed. "You're not wrong about that! Princess Ruby was louder though at squabbling."

Lavender chuckled, her frills fanning happily at the sides of her face.

"Y'know, once seen your frills doing that a lot today."

"Doing what?"

"Fanning, twitching, y'know. What does it mean? Does it mean you're enjoying yourself?"

"Kinda? They normally do that when I'm happy, but also if I'm mad, but when I'm mad they do more of a rattle rather than fanning and twitching." Lavender explained as her frills twitched slightly as she demonstrated, showing Salamander what her frills would normally do depending on her mood. Salamander watched with a curious glint in her emerald green eyes.

"So that's ho-" Lavender stopped talking as her ears perked up, hearing something. Salamander must've heard it to.

The street they were on was vacant, no dragons in sight other than Lavender and Salamander, who were both now completely silent. Moving along with the soft breeze that slowly blew through the village was the sound of someone taking, or, what sounded like failed attempts at whispering.

"Let's go investigate." Lavender decided in a hushed tone.

"You're going to get into some serious trouble if you keep doing all this investigating shenanigans." Salamander commented as the two started to silently make their way between some large SkyWing buildings made of pearly white stone, much like the palace. They were like stone huts, which Lavender had never really seen before until today.

"Oh shush, I'm already in serious trouble because of you!"

"Because you got nosy, admit it, you couldn't resist searching for me."

"Oh shut up."

The to grew silent as they came close to what looked like a an alleyway between white stone huts. What is up with dragons talking in creepy alleyways? She thought with a scowl as she listened closely, listening to the talking dragons.

"Is this everyone?" Snarled an aggressive female voice, one that sounded familiar.

"Yes, this is everyone who wished to come." Voiced up another familiar voice, but this one was masculine.

There was a grunt before the female spoke again as Lavender peeked around the corner to see a group of NightWings, at least twenty of them, all circled around a pair of dragons Lavender knew all to well off of their appearances. How could she forget those two?

"Good, let's all get moving. If we leave now, will make it to the Rainforest within two days." Grunted a female NightWing with an all to familiar shade of red-ish brown scales and bright golden yellow eyes that glowed menacingly in the dark.

It was Charming and Animosity.

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Another chapter done! I'm shocked I got this one done so quickly, but I'm glad I did because everything's starting to get the plot really rolling.

- MindlessTyper