Chapter 18
T he biggest Moonplume I’ve ever seen keeps swooping through the sky, screeching. I think it’s a female because the wispy tip of her tail is extra long and sleek like Mahmi’s Moonplume, Náthae.
I think she’s searching for this egg. Mourning it.
Hunting us.
I think that because she’s silver like this egg, and I’ve never seen another Moonplume that’s such a metallic shade of gray.
We could hide in the hatching hut, but we can’t hide here. Not properly. I’m worried she’ll find us soon, then kill us for raiding her nest.
I keep begging the egg to rock so I can pack all the ice around it that I’ve chipped off a nearby pillar over the cycles. Once the hatchling breaks free, I can take it inside the snow hut where it’ll be safe with Haedeon until I work out what we’re going to do next. How we’re going to get back to Arithia.
It seems impossible right now.
Haedeon’s not getting any better, and it’s not just the Moonplume that seems to be hunting us. I can hear a pack of doomquills somewhere nearby, like they can smell death in the air. They make the most horrible rattling sounds that jingle the silence and scare my heart, though I’m not scared for myself.
I’m scared for this beautiful egg sitting in the snow in front of our makeshift hatching hut. It’s like a little silver sun, throwing so much light. I use the light to write while I sit here, holding Haedeon’s dragonscale dagger in my other hand.
I’ve never held one before. Never wanted to. But if the doomquills get brave enough to attack, I’ll have to protect the egg. And Haedeon.
But I don’t like the thought of killing things. I don’t want to kill anything.
I really hope they don’t get too close.