Chapter Text
Jambu hadn’t been planning on finding the half-dead dragon in the rainforest and he definitely hadn’t been planning on bringing her back to the healers.
He had just been scouting out territory for his gliding class the next day when he’d spotted an unusual flash of white that stood out against the green floor of the rainforest. He could’ve just let it go—Jambu really didn’t care about much in the forest other than finding mangos for Pineapple—but his curiosity got the better of him.
Jambu wrapped his tail around a branch, flipping himself up, then down, and dove towards the white shape.
It could’ve just been animal bones. He knew of a jaguar that liked to perch in this general area and it was likely that the bones were leftover from one of its catches. Jambu felt his stomach churn at the thought of eating a poor old sloth.
But no.
The thing that lay in the grass in front of Jambu as he landed was definitely not the bones of an animal.
No no no, that was a dragon.
A spiky, barely-breathing, half-dead in the foliage dragon.
Jambu stared at the unconscious dragon for a long time. He’d never seen a dragon from another tribe. He knew they existed but he didn’t have much of an idea of what they looked like, but this was definitely a dragon, even if she was the color of clouds and had glistening spikes on her neck and all down her back, forming a fern-shape on her tail.
As his eyes trailed back up to her face—he froze. One sky blue eye was half open, lazily looking Jambu up and down. She didn’t attack him. She didn’t spit and snarl at him.
Only a pained groan escaped her before her eye slid shut again.
Hesitantly, Jambu inched closer, his scales instinctively changing to the color of the ground to hide him in case the dragon woke up. As he moved closer, though, he realized it was pretty unlikely that the strange dragon would fully wake up.
There was a deep cut along her throat, stretching from her left shoulder to the right underside of her jaw. Had someone tried to kill her? Was that why she’d come here, to the rainforest?
However she’d gotten the injury, it looked like it was still bleeding sluggishly and the dragon was getting paler by the minute.
Jambu shouldn’t have brought her to the healers.
Really, he shouldn’t’ve.
Jambu wasn’t the sharpest thorn on the bush but he knew it probably wasn’t the smartest move to bring a strange dragon to his home.
However . . . she looked . . . really hurt. There had been a look in her eyes, even without them fully opening, that told Jambu something bad had happened to her. He could tell even without her scales changing color.
Besides, it wasn’t like she could do much, not with this injury. And Jambu and the other RainWings could watch over her with the sleeping darts in case she turned out to be dangerous.
So, no, Jambu wasn’t the smartest thorn on the bush, but he was a compassionate dragon at heart.
Which was how he ended up saving the dragon and bringing her to the village. Jambu managed to pull her onto his back, although he had to drop her when he realized just how cold her scales were. Jambu had never felt anything so cold. The rainforest got a little colder at night but not like this. It felt almost like her scales exuded the cold.
Gritting his teeth and ignoring the shivers that ran through his scales, Jambu pulled her onto her back. Despite the added weight—and the cold!—Jambu reached the village and landed right outside the healer’s hut.
The dragon was getting heavier and heavier as Jambu stumbled towards the hut and he let out a bird call—a macaw bird call, to be precise, and the dragon with that same name poked his head out of the hut, scanning the village until he spotted Jambu and the dragon laying on his back.
“Woah,” the healer breathed, stepping out of the hut. “What is that?
“Help would be nice,” Jambu muttered, staggering a step forward.
Macaw blinked but jumped forward, pulling the injured dragon onto his back to share the weight between them. Together, the two dragons got the dragon into the sheltered hut and onto a bed of moss and leaves, where Macaw stared at the dragon with a mixture of curiosity, awe, and shock for just a moment before he leapt into action, grabbing wooden jars full of herbs and other supplies.
“What even is she?” Macaw asked, pulling out a clump of dry moss to soak up the blood staining the dragon’s neck.
“I don’t know, I found her near the big cacao tree, the one I use for flight lessons?” Jambu said. He stepped away to let the healer work and watched as the bright yellow dragon spread a thick paste over the new dragon’s neck.
“You found her like this?” Macaw said as he motioned to the blood-soaked moss.
Jambu nodded somberly. A wave of deep blue and gray passed over his normally bright pink scales.
“Think the monster got to her?” Macaw wondered.
Jambu frowned, tucking his wings close to his body. “Maybe she is the monster.”
Macaw’s yellow talons hesitated for a moment before reaching for a thick leaf that he began to wrap around the dragon’s neck. A heavy, tense silence fell between the two of them.
“I don’t think it is,” he said finally. “Any RainWing that was fighting would use their venom, not their claws. And this is the only wound she has and it’s too deep for a RainWing to make.”
The claws around Jambu’s heart loosened their grip and he let out a sigh of relief. Good. So he hadn’t brought the kidnapper of 15 RainWings to their home.
Still . . . Jambu didn’t know exactly who he’d brought to the RainWing village.
Who was this dragon, with her mysterious wound and sad, sad eyes?
Two days later, Jambu found himself stopping by the healer’s hut. He hadn’t heard any news about the dragon’s condition, but by now, every dragon in the village knew about the strange, spiky dragon that had been found half-dead in the forest. Jambu had been attacked by the dragonets in the nursery, begging to know what the new dragon was. Jambu had patiently explained that he didn’t know, wondered if that was a new sloth in the tree behind them, and then slipped away while they weren’t looking.
The dragonets and their constant questions were annoying, sure, but they did have a point. Jambu wanted to know who this new dragon was and how she’d gotten to the rainforest.
Quietly, Jambu peered into the healer’s hut, spotting Macaw sprawled out in the sunny corner of the hut, a pleasant smile on his face. In the back left corner, the strange dragon was curled up on a bed of moss, spikes covering her face. Hadn’t her scales been whiter before? They looked bluer now.
Whatever. Jambu probably just hadn’t been paying enough attention earlier.
Anyways, it looked like she was still asleep.
“Oi, Macaw,” Jambu said.
The yellow dragon snorted and lifted his head, blinking sleep out of his eyes. “Jambu? Why’d you wake me up? I was getting my sun-time in.”
Jambu jerked his head at the other dragon. “Has she woken up yet?”
At the mention of the other dragon, all traces of sleep left Macaw’s eyes and he stood, shaking out his wings and following Jambu to the strange dragon’s bed.
“No, not yet,” Macaw said, sitting. “But the wound looks much better. It’ll scar, but she’ll live.”
Jambu nodded along as he spoke. “That’s good then. D’you think she’ll wake up soon, or . . . ?”
Macaw let out a soft hum. “Yeah, she should.”
Jambu glanced between him and the other dragon, wondering if he was about to ask a stupid question. “Uh, were her scales always that color?”
Macaw blinked, frowned, and then squinted at the dragon, peering at her scales. “Noooo . . . ?” he said hesitantly, shrugging. “That’s weird, though. I don’t think any dragons but RainWings can change their scales, can they?”
Jambu could only return the helpless shrug. “I don’t think so? She’s not one of us though, she’s all . . . dunno, spiky?”
The yellow dragon hesitated. “Well . . . I . . . I sorta found something . . . kinda RainWing?”
Jambu raised an eyebrow at him. “Something kinda RainWing? What’s that supposed to mean?”
Macaw lifted a talon and slowly reached for the dragon’s neck, revealing . . . a frill, just like a RainWing. It was hidden in the spikes on her neck and matched the colors of her neck perfectly, as if she was trying to hide it.
“Woah,” Jambu breathed, leaning in to get a closer look.
The dragon shifted, spikes on her tail rattling, and both RainWings flinched and took a step back. Macaw crouched, tilting his head, while Jambu reached for a blowgun and a tranq dart, just in case the dragon attacked them the moment she woke up.
Her tail pulled away from her face and her wings resettled along her back. Pain creased her brow for a moment as the dragon adjusted her head, which probably pulled on the cut on her neck.
“She’s waking up,” Jambu whispered loudly.
“I can see that, Jambu,” Macaw whispered back, smacking the berry-pink dragon with his wing.
Jambu scowled at him before returning his eyes back to the strange dragon just as her eyes opened. Unlike in the woods before, her blue eyes were clearer now, sharpening with every heartbeat as they scanned her surroundings and the dragons in front of her.
“Where—-where am I?” she croaked.
Jambu winced. Her voice sounded horrible. Was that because of the injury on her neck or did other dragon tribes just sound like that?
“You’re . . . in the rainforest,” Macaw said slowly. “Jambu found you. I’m the one that healed you. My name’s Macaw.”
The dragon frowned slowly, lifting her head with another ripple of pain crossing over her face.
“What’s your name?” Jambu asked. His grip was slowly loosening on the blowgun.
The stunning dragon turned to look at him, still frowning softly.
“Prism,” she said, and Jambu realized just how intense and cold her bright blue eyes were.
“My name is Prism.”