Talons of Power

by Tui T. Sutherland

  Queen Coral’s sons were rarely invited to royal functions, as there were simply too many of them. But when Turtle, Octopus, and Cerulean were all one year old, their father managed to get them invited to their first grand ball. Turtle’s brothers were excited; Turtle was mostly nervous. Would he say the right things? Would he remember all the rules about when to eat (and more important, when not to eat)?

  Gill had sent matching earrings for all the princes to wear: each one a heavy gold ring with a pearl hanging from it. Octopus and Cerulean clipped theirs on easily, but Turtle could not figure his out. He’d never worn an earring before. His claws felt too big and awkward to work the catch open far enough and the earrings kept slipping out of his grasp and floating slowly down to the seaweed-carpeted floor of his room.

  Octopus and Cerulean laughed at him as he scrabbled in the seaweed, which had swallowed one of the earrings completely. It’s not that hard! Octopus teased, his phosphorescent scales flashing. By all the whales, Turtle, do you have tentacles for talons?

  They turned to swim out of the room. See you there! Cerulean called mockingly.

  If you ever make it! Octopus agreed, and they cackled their way down the hall.

  Grimly, Turtle glared at the remaining earring, pinched between his claws.

  “AAAAAARRRRRGH! Earring,” he snarled, shaking it, “get on my ear right now and stay there.”

  The earring moved, shimmying in Turtle’s grasp.

  Startled, he let go, and the earring confidently made a beeline straight for Turtle’s ear. A moment later, he felt a nudging pinch, and when he looked in the mirror — there it was, hanging from his ear exactly where it was supposed to be.

  Did I do that?

  He felt terrified and elated at the same time. If he did that, there was only one explanation.

  He’d heard the stories about Albatross, the ancient animus SeaWing — although that particular story didn’t end very well. There were fewer stories about other animus SeaWings, like Fathom, who were much more cautious with their powers.

  Despite the horror stories, a part of Turtle had always wondered what it would be like to be an animus, with all that power in his claws.

  He had to test it out — to find out if it was real. One of the walls of their room was made of coral, and he’d noticed a small piece that was nearly broken off. He swam over and carefully snapped it free, then clasped it between his talons.

  I enchant this piece of coral to help me find whatever I’m looking for.

  He peeked at the coral, but it looked exactly the same. Hmmm. My other earring, he flashed at it in Aquatic. He caught himself wondering whether coral could speak Aquatic just as the little red tree twitched and twisted in his claws. It tugged him down to the seaweed carpet, where it poked through the flapping overlapping strands until it bumped against his missing earring.

  That might have been the most glorious moment of Turtle’s life. (It was certainly all downhill from there, if you asked him.)

  He was an animus! His brothers couldn’t laugh at him now! His mother and father would have to pay attention to him! He’d be the star of the whole palace!

  That was kind of a frightening thought, actually. Everyone looking at him? Everyone wanting him to perform? Everyone waiting for him to mess up?

  But the truth was, only one thing stopped him from swimming straight into the ball and announcing his discovery to everyone.

  Stories. Turtle knew how stories worked. He knew that a dragon with strange powers could be a hero or a villain, and a lot depended on how everyone found out what he or she could do. The best heroes were the ones who took everyone by surprise in their hour of need. Just when all hope was lost, the unexpected hero would swoop in and save the day! And if Turtle revealed his power that way, when it was really needed, then no one would be scared of him. He’d clearly be a hero.

  Drama, excitement, and the chance to do something wonderful when no one saw it coming — that’s what Turtle wanted in his story.

  So he hid his power, waiting for the perfect moment of revelation. The tribes were all at war; surely it would come soon.

  But then it came, when his father needed him, and he didn’t recognize it, and then it was gone.

  In the rainforest, far from home, Turtle sighed and turned the coral over in his claws. The last time he’d used it was the day Gill sent him searching for Snapper. Turtle had had to be very surreptitious, since Octopus and Cerulean insisted on following him around and giggling over how incompetent he was. At first he thought he’d been very clever to think of using the coral — but it hadn’t worked. Something was wrong with it. It kept trying to lead him out of the Deep Palace, which was why he was uselessly prowling the gardens when Gill found him.

  He should have enchanted something else, even with Octopus and Cerulean watching. He should have realized that finding Snapper was the great thing he was meant to do; he should have revealed his secret right then and saved the day.

  In fact, he should have used his magic to find the assassin who was killing off the princesses. It was embarrassing and awful that he’d never even thought of that until years later, when Tsunami showed up and figured out who it was.

  But after Turtle’s failure, he didn’t know how to tell anyone he was an animus. He’d lost the plot of his story. He kept imagining his father saying, “But if you had magic the whole time, why didn’t you find Snapper? Why didn’t you save your sisters? What kind of dragon has this power and doesn’t use it to help his family? I’m more disappointed in you than ever.”

  And the longer he hid it, the worse it got. Why didn’t he use his magic to rescue his father from the SkyWings? Why didn’t he use his magic to stop the attack on the Summer Palace?

  Why was he such a useless, wretched excuse for a dragon?

  Turtle realized he was gripping the coral so tightly that it was leaving an imprint in his palm. He unclenched his fist and looked at it. He wasn’t even sure why he’d kept the thing after it failed him. Maybe because it was the first real enchantment he’d ever cast. It reminded him of that brief moment when he’d been so happy and excited about his future.

  Most likely it wouldn’t work now either. But he couldn’t enchant anything new, he didn’t have many other options, and it was worth a try.

  “Queen Glory,” he whispered.

  The coral twitched and hummed softly, then tugged him northward. He spread his wings and flew, paying attention to the signals it gave, turning him this way and that and upward through the forest toward the canopy.

  I could have used this to help Peril find Scarlet, he realized. Or to find my friends in Possibility. Instead he had left it behind at school with his other animus-touched objects. It hadn’t even occurred to him to try using it. He wouldn’t have expected it to work, and he wouldn’t have wanted Peril to notice it.

  But it certainly would have been useful, he thought ruefully. Add that to the list of ways I could have helpfully used my magic and didn’t.

  Soon enough, there was Glory — there, in fact, was the entire RainWing village, tucked into the treetops. As Turtle flew closer, he saw more and more shapes emerge from the leaves: hammocks and walkways, pavilions and dwellings, silver-furred sloths and beautiful dragons of all colors everywhere.

  Queen Glory was on one of the highest pavilions, bathed in sunlight, with her wings spread wide. She was asleep, but Deathbringer sat watchfully beside her, scanning the undergrowth for any threats.

  Threats seemed hard to imagine here, in this peaceful place — but Turtle thought of Darkstalker and his five new superpowered NightWings, only a short flight away, and he shivered.

  The coral tugged him stubbornly toward the platform. Deathbringer saw him coming and sat up with a sharply curious, but not unfriendly, expression.

  “Halt!” he called when Turtle was only a short distance away. “What business do you have with the queen?”

  The animus-touched coral did not like it at all when Turtle stopped and hovered in midair.
It jabbed painfully at his palm, trying to move him forward.

  A bit late, Turtle remembered the coral’s weird habit: It would not stop searching for the thing he wanted to find until he actually touched the object with the coral. It wouldn’t fly away on its own, but every time he picked it up, it would squirm and poke him until it reached its goal. This had been confirmed rather gruesomely when it dragged him through the palace the night after his failure, just so it could bump itself against the side of Snapper’s corpse, in a way that Turtle thought was entirely too smug for a malfunctioning scrap of coral.

  “Um,” Turtle said, clapping his other talon around the one that held the coral. “I’ve been watching Darkstalker since you left the NightWing village, and I thought the queen should know what he’s been up to.”

  “What’s a SeaWing doing in the rainforest in the first place?” Deathbringer asked doubtfully. “Are you here with Darkstalker, like the princess?”

  “No, no,” Turtle said. “I mean — I’m just watching him. Anemone is my sister,” he fumbled, but apparently that was enough of an explanation for Deathbringer.

  “I see,” he said. “Well … I’m reluctant to wake the queen during her suntime. Is it urgent?”

  “Um,” said Turtle. Probably not? If Darkstalker wasn’t going to enchant any more dragons today, did it make any difference?

  “Deathbringer,” Queen Glory said with a sigh, opening her eyes. “I’m not sure if you’re familiar with the concept of ears and how they work. But most normal dragons would find it very difficult to sleep through your loud interrogations.”

  “I was giving you the opportunity to pretend to sleep through them,” Deathbringer objected. “You’re usually much better at it.”

  “I nearly gave myself away by laughing when you said ‘halt,’ though,” Glory said, stretching and sitting up. “I mean, who says ‘halt,’ seriously?”

  “I thought it sounded dignified and commanding,” said Deathbringer.

  “Indeed. Or like a pretentious NightWing,” Glory observed.

  “I AM a pretentious NightWing. It’s part of my appeal.”

  “All right, hush, you,” said Glory, patting Deathbringer’s talons with her tail. “Come here, SeaWing. What’s your name?”

  “Turtle, Your Majesty,” he said. The coral was kind of going berserk as he landed beside her, and she shot a curious look at his squirming talons. “I’m Tsunami’s brother — one of them. I’m nobody, really.” The messenger. Here to tell someone who can actually save the world. “I just thought you should know that Darkstalker has given a few NightWings special powers.”

  “Special powers?” Deathbringer echoed. “Like what?”

  “Mindreading,” Turtle listed off. “Superstrength. Fighting skills, the power to catch any prey, instant healing — that kind of thing.”

  “Wow,” said Glory. “It’s going to be hard to compete with that.”

  “I wouldn’t leave you, even for a superpower,” Deathbringer said loyally.

  “I think that is your superpower,” Glory said to him. “Extreme heroic idiocy.” She arranged her face to look serious again and turned to Turtle. “Well, if that means all the NightWings decide to go with Darkstalker, I suppose my job around here will get a lot easier.” She looked wistfully out at the rest of the village, where many of the RainWings were asleep in their leaf hammocks and sunlit nests.

  “That’s true,” said Deathbringer. “Much less grumbling and complaining to deal with.”

  “They were kind of growing on me, though,” Glory admitted. “They’re impressively … resilient.”

  “Not to mention obsessed with scrolls and learning and stuff,” said Deathbringer. “All your favorite things.”

  “I did think the NightWings and the RainWings could be good for each other, once they had some mutual respect and trust in place.” Glory lifted her wings up and down in a soft sigh. “Ah, well.”

  “Wait,” said Turtle. “You’re not going to do anything? To stop him?”

  “We have an agreement,” Glory said, surprised. “Why would I stop him?”

  “Um … maybe because he’s turning his tribe into kind of a super army? Doesn’t that worry either of you?”

  “Huh,” said Deathbringer. “I guess you could look at it that way.”

  Isn’t it your job to look at it that way? Turtle thought, frustrated.

  “Maybe if it was anyone else,” Queen Glory agreed. “But I mean, Darkstalker’s such a great dragon. I just trust him — don’t you?”

  “I do,” Deathbringer said, nodding. “I like him.”

  Turtle couldn’t speak. His head felt as if it was full of squirming, flashing electric eels. All his suspicions coalesced into one diamond-bright conviction.

  This was not a normal reaction. Not to Darkstalker, nor to any dragon who came in to steal the tribe you were ruling. None of the dragons who’d spoken to Darkstalker were reacting to him in a normal way.

  Qibli was right, after all. He had been under a spell. That “calm trusting feeling” he’d had about Darkstalker — that was the work of magic. This was why everyone was behaving so weird and unworried.

  Darkstalker had crafted some kind of spell — something that affected every dragon who met him. It made dragons like him and trust him, and perhaps worse. What if it made everyone obey him? Or willing to sacrifice their lives for him?

  If Darkstalker wanted to, he could turn all the dragons of Pyrrhia, one by one, into his own personal puppets … and nobody would be able to stop him, because nobody would even know anything was wrong.

  So … maybe now it’s time to run and hide, Turtle thought. Back to the Kingdom of the Sea; back to the anonymity of his pack of brothers. Back to a world so distant that Darkstalker might never come there; back to the only place that might be safe, at least for a little while.

  This was too big for him to handle. He sort of had Qibli — but what if something happened to Qibli, or Darkstalker figured out how to ensnare him again? Turtle could end up as the only dragon in Pyrrhia who saw Darkstalker the way he really was — and then what? Spend the rest of his life as the unbalanced invisible dragon, trying to convince his friends they were bewitched by a sinister magician?

  The mad prophet of doom … not exactly the role I ever saw myself in.

  But the alternative was “coward who sits and waits for the inevitable apocalypse.” If he scurried off back to the ocean, would anyone ever notice what Darkstalker was doing? Would anyone ever be able to stop him?

  So if he couldn’t run away and he couldn’t change anyone’s mind and he couldn’t fight Darkstalker himself … what could he do?

  I need help.

  He touched the cord of his pouch, tied around his neck. Should he write to Qibli? Ask him to come here?

  He could feel his worrying reflex kicking into action. His scales felt hot and clammy at the same time.

  Was he sure that Qibli was free of any Darkstalker spells? What if Darkstalker had enchanted his spell to be irreversible, even by other magic?

  Or what if he’d enchanted Qibli to stay at Jade Mountain, so seeing him in the rainforest would make him suspicious? Everything Qibli did might give Darkstalker a clue that his spell wasn’t working on him anymore. Turtle’s safety would be in danger if Qibli and Darkstalker spent too much time near each other.

  I wish I could get his advice, though. Turtle dropped his talons, frustrated. Too bad the slates don’t work both ways. Thanks to me being a short-sighted idiot again.

  Who else could help him?

  I need someone who hasn’t met Darkstalker yet.

  Someone who’ll believe me. Someone who can actually be the hero.

  His mother? Would Queen Coral believe him if he went to her with this story? Would she be able — or willing — to fight Darkstalker?

  He couldn’t really imagine her trusting him that much. And if she did and brought the SeaWings out to fight Darkstalker, wouldn’t that put Turtle’s entire tribe in danger?


  So perhaps one of the other queens. Glacier, Ruby, Moorhen, or Thorn … would any of them listen to a SeaWing? And wouldn’t they fall under Darkstalker’s spell the moment they met him?

  Not to mention, in order to convince them his story was true, he’d have to tell them everything.

  As in, oh, yes, and I’m an animus everything.

  He shuddered, and his hold on the coral loosened, and it darted forward in a flash and bopped Queen Glory on the side of her tail.

  She turned to stare at him. “What was that?”

  “Nothing! Nothing,” he said. “My talons slipped. Sorry.”

  She raised one eyebrow. “You’re an odd dragon, Turtle.”

  “That’s what my friends tell me,” he said, and his friends rose up in his mind, and a possibility shot through him, shining with hope.

  “Your Majesty,” he said. “May I ask — how is Kinkajou?”

  “I don’t know,” Glory said, her wings drooping. “The healers can’t understand why she hasn’t woken up yet. They don’t know what to do for her. We all thought that once she was back in the rainforest, around the smells and sounds and sun that she grew up with, she’d —”

  “Back in the rainforest?” Turtle interrupted. “She’s here?”

  “Of course.” Queen Glory flicked her tail, knocking loose a shower of yellow blossoms. “I wasn’t going to leave her alone on the other side of the continent. The healers got back with her yesterday.”

  “Can I see her?” Turtle asked. His claws were tingling. Kinkajou hadn’t met Darkstalker. Kinkajou would believe him. He could trust her with his secret.

  And Kinkajou was much more cut out for heroism than he was.

  Glory gave him directions to the healers’ pavilion, not far away, tucked into a little alcove of the rainforest that seemed even more peaceful than the rest of the village. Turtle could smell healing herbs and oranges as he flew to the opening.

  Inside, sunlight poured through the rooms from skylights that had been opened in the roofs. A pair of pale blue healers were asleep in one corner; another was neatly folding cobwebs and moss into bundles on one of the shelves. She looked up as Turtle came in, but seemed only mildly surprised to see a SeaWing in her pavilion. She swept one wing toward the bed where Kinkajou slept, and Turtle nodded, unconsciously flashing his scales in Aquatic, yes, that’s who I’m looking for.