Turtle

"Maybe losing your soul isn't the right way to describe it. [...] Maybe it's more like ... the more you use your power for bad things, the more you feel like you're entitled to use your power for anything. It makes it harder to go back — only forward to more bad things. [...] But ... I think you can go back. I think anyone can choose to do good, or be good, no matter what happened before. I think you just have to try really hard. And that means stopping yourself before you do even worse things."

— Turtle to Anemone about animus magic, Talons of Power

Turtle is a male SeaWing dragonet and the protagonist of Talons of Power. Along with being an animus dragon and a SeaWing prince, he is currently attending Jade Mountain Academy as a member of the Jade Winglet. He has romantic feelings for Kinkajou.

Description

Turtle has unblemished, jewel-toned, dark emerald-green scales with lighter green underscales and hints of gold in his dark green eyes. He is a little plump, with an extra curve to his snout and upper arms, and has large talons. He wears a waterproof pouch around his neck and a golden armband studded with sparkling skyfire rocks — originally six, but now reduced to three. His bioluminescent scales emit a pale green light, and he has a low, rumbly voice. He has a round, anxious face, and he heavily resembles Fathom. He has spirals and shapes like webbed talon prints along his wings that are luminescent and oddly beautiful.

Personality

Turtle is shrewd, nervous, outwardly serene, anxious, wry, curious, friendly, thoughtful, quiet, peculiar, peaceful, fidgety, and does not seem to have any fire to him at all. He is also insecure, once referring to himself as an idiot. Turtle is fearful of everything, and he has called himself boring, uninteresting, unremarkable, and forgettable; descriptions that multiple other dragons have agreed with. Turtle lacks proper communication skills, is often sleepy and mumbly, and he tends to overshare. He is willing to try his best to be helpful, and he has acted bravely in order to protect his friends.

He is very self-conscious about his magic, and he often worries about hurting or even killing other dragons. He was extremely cautious when concealing his powers and took great care to ensure they would not end up being discovered. However, Turtle's soul is almost entirely good, and after the events of Darkness of Dragons, he became less fearful of his animus magic.

According to Winter, it is easy to forget that Turtle is a prince. He almost never behaves like royalty, as though he does not want to be noticed at all. Qibli described him as "easygoing", "used to being invisible", and a worrying expert. According to the SandWing, he is "terrible" at using his animus magic, and it was hard for him to imagine Turtle coming up with a useful spell on his own. Peril described him as puddle-like. Other dragons do not typically have much faith in his ability to protect others.

Biography

The Dragonet Prophecy

The Lost Heir
Turtle was indirectly mentioned when Anemone told Tsunami that she had lots of brothers, but she could not play with them because Coral believed they play too rough.

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The Jade Mountain Prophecy

Moon Rising

When Moon first saw Turtle, she was confused because she could not read his mind. The only reception she received from his brain was described as a quiet hum. When Turtle smiled at her outside of Jade Mountain Academy, she saw a vision of a sunny beach, with him pinning Anemone down as she writhed in pain. This made her believe that Turtle was evil in some way. When the vision ended, Anemone, Turtle, Queen Coral, and Tsunami had disappeared into Jade Mountain Academy. Moon took this vision as a sinister attempt to murder Anemone that would happen sometime in the future and kept a wary eye on Turtle afterward. After the tumult of an explosion in Jade Mountain Academy that lead to Moon revealing that she was a mind-reader and prophet, Turtle was the only one who stayed with her, taking Moon to an underground lake in the caverns of Jade Mountain, and helping her wash off her seed pod wound on her shoulder in the explosion of the dragonflame cactus. Turtle mentioned that Moon probably knew his secret already, and Moon told Turtle that she could not hear his thoughts, to which Turtle laughed. Moon pleadingly asked Turtle to lead her to her clawmate's room. On their way, they passed the history cave and heard voices that they realized belonged to Tsunami and Sunny. After listening to half of Tsunami and Sunny's argument, Turtle decided to reveal himself and told Tsunami and Sunny about the dragonflame cactus. He noted that this particular type of cactus was used in the Summer Palace when it was attacked by Burn's forces and informed them that his mother, Queen Coral, tortured a SkyWing prisoner until she found out what they were. He was surprisingly casual about this subject. Turtle gave one of his skyfire stones to each member of the Jade Winglet, after Moon asked him to. He complained about going out to find Winter in the rain, but followed his winglet anyway.

Winter Turning

Turtle and his winglet arrived in the forest to find Winter, who was about to release his scavenger pet. When Moon announced that they would help Winter on his quest, Turtle was startled but did not add more. Moon then prompted him to hand over one of his skyfire stones to Winter. When pondering whether to help Winter, Turtle was shown to be worried about how the prophecy affected the students in the school and his promise to keep his sister Anemone safe. Winter seized the opportunity to convince Turtle into going back to the Jade Mountain Academy to tell Sunny, Tsunami, and the other dragonets of destiny to not worry about the rest of Jade Winglet in their quest to search for Winter's brother. Later, according to Glory, that made them even more worried when they received Turtle's report. Turtle was also shown in the epilogue with Anemone, Pike, and Barracuda in the underground lake. He felt terrible for leaving his winglet, but Anemone tried to reassure him that he still had her and the other SeaWings.

Escaping Peril

Turtle was introduced very early on in the book, surprising Peril with how little caution he had around her. He encouraged her to spy with him on the conversation between a couple of the dragonets of destiny, Queen Ruby, and her accompanying dragons, admitting that he did it often as an unnoticeable, unmemorable dragon. Peril quickly began seeing him as a potential friend. Later, he insisted on traveling with Peril on a hunt to bring down Scarlet, saying he could be useful (he was referring to his animus magic), and the two's friendship developed even more. Turtle convinced Peril to travel with him to meet up with the Jade Winglet in the town of Possibility further to investigate Scarlet's location despite her initial protests. After meeting a few Talons of Peace members, a dragonflame cactus was kicked by a SandWing wanting to buy them, most likely Sirocco or Rattlesnake, Qibli's older siblings. Peril accidentally set off the cactus and caused an explosion. It knocked Peril temporarily unconscious, and at least three other dragons were burned. Turtle also had thorns in his scales, but Peril burnt them off. The explosion attracted the conscious remnant of the Jade Winglet, Moon, and Qibli. Turtle had aching wings from flying to Possibility around this time, so he enchanted a rock to heal outer wounds. Peril was shocked at how fast he could "heal in the water" until Peril burnt Winter and Turtle used the rock to heal Winter. That was when he exposed his animus magic for the first time in his life. After Peril left in a fit, Turtle called back to Peril, but she was too angry to turn back. Later he reappeared after Scarlet was killed, saying that he came to save Peril but that she seemed to have already done that by herself. Turtle was also present when Chameleon wrote the enchantment for Tourmaline to become Queen Ruby again, checking over his writing before handing it to the queen. When Chameleon tried to escape with Darkstalker's scroll, Turtle temporarily enchanted the case to bash Chameleon on the head with it and go to Turtle. He left with the rest of the winglet to find Moon before she released Darkstalker. When Peril burned the Darkstalker's scroll, he gave her a smile before realizing what Peril had actually done.

Talons of Power

The prologue was set around three years before the rest of the book's events. Gill found Turtle, Cerulean and Octopus playing in the palace and asked if one of them could fetch Snapper. Turtle volunteered, but failed; as a result, the eggs were destroyed and Abalone and Snapper were both executed by the queen. Darkstalker emerged from the mountain. Turtle noticed that Darkstalker seemed to hate him and quickly enchanted a stick to hide him, and later, completely from Darkstalker, making him non-existent to Darkstalker. Darkstalker revealed that when Peril burned his talisman, his magic returned to him. Winter argued with him, but Darkstalker 'won' him over, which was later revealed to be from a spell cast by Darkstalker. Despite Moon and Qibli's concerns, both dragons denied Darkstalker using magic. Eventually, Darkstalker went hunting with the rest of the Jade Winglet, and Turtle went to warn Jade Mountain Academy on the suggestion of his clawmates. He splashed into the underground pool and was immediately found by his sister, Anemone. He tried to talk to her alone, but she waved him off. He told her about Darkstalker's awakening in public, but Anemone grew excited at the prospect of meeting another animus besides Stonemover. Turtle accidentally revealed to Tamarin that Anemone is an animus, leading to a brief discussion about the pros and cons of animus magic. The three parted ways and Turtle went to warn the dragonets of destiny. Before he does, he heard Sunny and Tsunami discussing the escape of Fierceteeth and Strongwings and whether Thorn should replace the guards with Outclaws or not. They ended the discussion and then discovered Turtle eavesdropping on them. Sunny then questioned Turtle about the whereabouts of the rest of the Jade Winglet. Turtle warned her about Darkstalker's awakening. Mightyclaws overheard them and bolted to warn the other NightWings. Turtle filled Tsunami in about everything, including Moon's powers, except his own powers. After this, they went to the library and asked Starflight about Darkstalker. Starflight told them that Darkstalker was a very powerful NightWing animus who disappeared over 2,000 years ago after being betrayed by Prince Fathom and Clearsight and that nobody knews what happened to him. A trio of IceWings provided them some IceWing superstitions about Darkstalker, which were that he spent years in the shadows killing IceWings and that he killed his father, Arctic. Darkstalker then told them that the legends had been simplified. One of the IceWings failed to kill Darkstalker due to his immortality and his impenetrable scales, and then all three bolted. He asked Starflight for scrolls on Fathom and Clearsight, and when he left, he was immediately dive-bombed by NightWings. By then, most of the school had gathered. Darkstalker reassured Clay and Sunny by saying he was Sunny's distant ancestor. A storm then gathered, and Anemone descended. Darkstalker announced that he was looking for her and that he was impressed by the storm her enchanted copper armbands caused. Turtle apologized to his friends that he could not stop Darkstalker, but they did not mind. Qibli told him to keep an eye on Darkstalker. Turtle watched as Darkstalker enchanted Anemone's soul to be safe. He also noticed Darkstalker had an earring and wondered if it was animus-touched. He watched as Darkstalker healed Flame's face and gave Mindreader, Mightyclaws, and Fearless powers. He then saw Darkstalker save Stonemover and declared Flame as the darkness of dragons and the stalker of dreams after looking into Flame's pouch and finding the third dreamvisitor before trapping Flame in the academy. Turtle then went to the cave shared by Qibli and Winter and asked if he could stay there. Qibli agreed, and Turtle told them about Darkstalker's activities. Qibli was slightly suspicious, but Winter was irritated by this and left the cave. Then Qibli asked Turtle to cast a spell on him to make him immune to Darkstalker's spell. After Turtle rejected the idea to cast a spell to make Qibli an animus Turtle agreed and cast the spell. However, Darkstalker sensed the spell being cast and visited the cave. Qibli convinced him that it was probably Anemone, but Darkstalker was still suspicious. Turtle realized that Darkstalker could tell when another animus casts a spell and left for the Rainforest Kingdom to watch him. Turtle, Anemone, Moonwatcher, and the other NightWing students at Jade Mountain followed Darkstalker to the RainWing kingdom, where Darkstalker wanted to challenge Queen Glory for the NightWing throne. They eventually decided that NightWings could go with Darkstalker if they wanted to. To ensure that most of the NightWings followed him, he granted more dragons powers before he and most of the NightWings set off for the lost city of night. While in the old Night Kingdom, Anemone used her magic to hurt Moon with a mop. This caused Darkstalker to banish her, sending her off to kill her family. Turtle followed her to the ruins of the Island Palace, where they had an animus fight. After Turtle managed to end the battle, he and Anemone had a brief discussion about animus magic. Darkstalker then summoned all of the animus dragons in Pyrrhia using a spell. Turtle was then revealed to Darkstalker and fights Darkstalker while Anemone escapes. Darkstalker puts Turtle in the dungeon, as Moon had forbidden him from hurting her friends, but he takes away Turtle's powers with a spell.

Darkness of Dragons

Turtle was shown after he was released from the NightWing dungeon that Darkstalker put him in, Anemone and Kinkajou leading him out. As Qibli began to describe what they had been doing, he was shocked when Qibli said that it was him that saved everyone from Darkstalker. Qibli gave him one of the earrings to reverse the spell Darkstalker put on him to take his animus powers away. Turtle said that he did not deserve magic, but when he realized that he is the hero he always wanted to be, he put on the earring and looked up at Qibli with cloudy eyes, almost crying. He left with the other dragonets towards Jade Mountain with his powers back, determined to warn the IceWings before the NightWings attack. Later, he tried to help end the battle with the NightWings and the IceWings, but Darkstalker hurled a boulder at him and an invisible Anemone. He luckily survived due to him enchanting his scales to be invulnerable in Talons of Power and was able to protect Anemone from the impact. After Qibli came up with the mind-connecting spell, he offered to enchant it, but Anemone insisted upon her doing it and refused to allow her brother to lose some of his soul. He was horrified when Darkstalker took Qibli. He was later shown in his part of the epilogue, joyfully reading a letter from Queen Coral, and then Kinkajou showed up, talking about the love spell and Anemone's crush on Tamarin.

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The Lost Continent Prophecy

The Hive Queen

In the prologue, he appeared with Tsunami while Moon and Qibli were talking. He revealed to Moon and Qibli that animus magic was not working and claimed Qibli had "broke animus magic" with his soul spells, which the SandWing denied. After some debate, Tsunami suggested that she and Turtle swim to Pantala, which he agreed to. In the epilogue, he and Tsunami have managed to swim to Pantala and are in the Poison Jungle. They meet Willow, who rescues them from a snake, and after asking where they are from, she tells them to return to Pyrrhia if they want to live, implying that the dangers of Pantala are not something the Pyrrhians should want to encounter.

The Poison Jungle

Turtle and Tsunami are seen when Sundew was invited to see Queen Sequoia by Willow. He was curled up, sleeping near his sister, and was ill from drinking too much river water. He was seen again at the end of the book, and because he felt better, he volunteered to draw a copy of Clearsight's map to Pyrrhia for Io; however, he may have been planning to duplicate it with his enchanted bowl. He then leaves for Pyrrhia with the LeafWing and SilkWing refugees, planning to get back-up from Pyrrhia and defeat the othermind.

The Dangerous Gift

When the SilkWings and LeafWings are landing in Pyrrhia, Tsunami said that he would come huffing along soon. He was later seen when he and Tsunami were helping the Pantalan refugees get past the Great Ice Cliff, and again when he was flying with Tsunami to Sanctuary. Turtle was indirectly mentioned by Tsunami when she was telling Sundew that they have four animus dragons. Turtle also briefly appeared in Snowfall's vision as Jerboa III, when Jerboa III was brought into Darkstalker's throne room. She saw two SeaWings and a NightWing, who were Anemone, Turtle, and Stonemover.

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Field Guides

A Guide to the Dragon World
Turtle's scroll to Starflight about his hatching day was featured in the SeaWing chapter of the guide. He was the recipient of a letter from his brother, Fin, about their brothers celebrating their hatching day together. Turtle was later mentioned in the SandWing chapter in Sunny's list of Burn's collection, thinking that Turtle or Anemone could help identify the creatures from Burn's fish tank.

Relationships

Anemone

Before the Talons of Power ceremony, he had only ever seen his sister from a distance. During the ceremony, he enchanted Anemone to become an animus to draw attention to her and away from his own animus abilities so he could keep his secret hidden and fulfill the greatest hopes of his mother. He ended up regretting this greatly afterward. Upon going to the academy, they did begin to spend more time together, but she still treated him like another subject to order around. She finally started paying attention to him when he started following her and Darkstalker around, but the attention was not positive. During their duel on the beach, Turtle refused to hurt Anemone, and cast only defense spells, despite Anemone being willing to kill him. After their duel and Turtle hiding her from Darkstalker, he seems to regard her more as his younger sister, who he should protect, and she seems to respect him as an older brother. She once referred to him as a doofus, but he is reassuring and kind toward her, and she is willing to listen to and react upon how he feels.

Auklet

Auklet got excited when she saw him in Talons of Power and hugged him. She might have wanted to go to Jade Mountain Academy too because he, along with Anemone and Tsunami, were attending the school. He also wanted to protect Auklet from Anemone, and could not imagine anyone hurting a dragonet so small.

Coral

Coral is Turtle's mother. Turtle, like his other brothers, had been neglected of Coral's love and attention. He admired her stories, as they were the closest he could ever get to her, and aspires to become an author like her. Though Coral had never loved him, he still loved her enough to save her from Anemone. When Coral revealed the truth about the deaths of the SeaWing princesses to him, she expresses pity and sympathy toward her son, even wrapping one of her wings around him to bring him in close. Though she forgets his name immediately afterward, she promises to remember it going forward, and she and Turtle share a tender moment. Afterward, Coral writes regular letters to her son while he is away at Jade Mountain Academy, sending Turtle her newest stories and thanking him for his help dispelling the Albatross specter cast by Darkstalker. Each letter Turtle received from his mother makes him feel stronger and braver, more like the hero he hopes to be.

Gill

Gill was Turtle's father. Before Anemone hatched, Gill found Abalone sick. Panicked, Gill rushed out of the Hatchery and called to the first dragons he saw, which happened to be Turtle and two of his brothers. He told Turtle to find Snapper, his co-general, and returned to the Hatchery to watch over his sick friend. However, Turtle could not find Snapper that day, and Gill gave up waiting, knowing that if he waited any longer, his general would surely die. He swam to the healers, and however fast he may have swum, when the king and the healers returned to the Hatchery, the two princesses were dead. Gill, furious, tracked his son down and blamed him for the unhatched princesses' deaths, telling a distraught Turtle that he was very disappointed in him because he had not gotten to Snapper quicker. This event discouraged Turtle from wanting to be a writer and hero, leading him to believe that his unhatched sisters' deaths were his fault and that his father had died hating him. However, Coral revealed that it was not Turtle's fault, as Snapper was stationed at the Summer Palace instead of the Deep Palace. Gill was captured by the SkyWings before he could tell Turtle about his guilt for being angry at him.

Kinkajou

His voice hitched slightly when speaking about her in her injured state, and he expends energy when it comes to her; he hopped around as he wondered what to bring Kinkajou as a gift or if she liked kumquats. One of the things Turtle likes about Kinkajou was that she was nothing like him. Turtle did not see Kinkajou as just another RainWing, similar to the ones that he had read about in Coral's stories, but as her own dragon. He believes Kinkajou is more cut out for heroism than he is. At the end of Talons of Power, Kinkajou says that she loves Turtle, not knowing she was under a spell. Turtle then sadly replies that it was only a spell and she did not really love him. At the end of Darkness of Dragons, the love spell is removed. Kinkajou returned to her normal feelings for him as one of her best friends. Anemone's spell enchanted Kinkajou to believe that Turtle was handsome, brave, and noble, but Kinkajou was aware that these feelings were a result of the spell and was quite angry at Anemone and at herself. Turtle has an enormous crush on her, and after not mentioning the spell for about a month after Anemone released Kinkajou from it, Turtle admitted that he still had feelings for her. Kinkajou likes him too, but confessed that it was confusing having to go through enchanted emotions. Kinkajou wants to keep spending time with him in order to sort out her feelings, but she thinks he is adorable. She once twined her tail around Turtle's and glared at Anemone, as though to say that she would be doing so even without the love spell.

Moonwatcher

After Winter, Qibli, and Kinkajou stormed off in response to Moonwatcher's revelation that she had mind-reading powers, Turtle asked her to follow him, taking her to an underground lake so that she could wash her shoulder after being injured by the dragonflame cactus. Moonwatcher was initially wary of Turtle due to the fact that she could not read his mind, and her vision of Turtle attacking Anemone. Upon meeting Moonwatcher again in Possibility, Turtle grinned as if the moment were the most delightful thing that had ever happened to any of them.

Peril

Upon first meeting Turtle at Jade Mountain Academy, she was irritated at the way he lounged around in dimly lit caves, as it caused her to backpedal to avoid running into him. She made him laugh, although he considered her strange, but she later snapped at him and stated that he was boring and forgettable, although Turtle did not take offense, simply stating "I know. I try to be". Turtle later insisted on accompanying Peril to kill Scarlet, despite her bantering with him to stay at the academy. She was willing to admit to him that she was not entirely happy under Scarlet in the Sky Kingdom, and he giggled when he accidentally hit her with a fish. He laughed at her intense disgust at tasting raw fish for the first time, and was serene when she joked about setting him on fire as payback. She later became worried about his choice to sleep at the bottom of the river, as she thought he might simply want to get away from her, and had finally realized that she was a terrible dragon to be friends with. Although Turtle trusted her to remove a dragonflame cactus pod from his scales, she began panicking upon being introduced to Moonwatcher's mind reading, wondering if Turtle had simply meant to test her, and had never trusted her. She begrudgingly told Turtle to go on without her into Possibility to check up on Kinkajou, and Turtle believed that he and Peril were not so different because he harnessed animus magic. He stated that he thought Peril's goal was to help him and his friends, and became anxious upon discussing her accident with Winter. She became hurt and angry upon Qibli stating "she just showed up with Turtle" and fled into the sky, despite Turtle's protests; she also later thought that Turtle might be happy to never see her again. However, when Scarlet stated that she was the only dragon who cared for Peril, she mentioned Turtle, who laughs at her jokes, even the ones she makes accidentally. She realized that Turtle coming to rescue her from the Sky Kingdom was something only a friend would do, and when she asked if Turtle liked her after all, he stated "You're a loon. Of course I do," despite him being wary of Peril's abilities. She stated that she was lucky to have him as friend, and they banter often. She does not want anything to harm him. In Talons of Power, Turtle describes Peril's company as unpredictable and hilarious. He liked the dragon he was when he was with Peril though he had not figured out how their stories fit together. He thought the closest parallel was a scroll about a dragonet who was raised by a pack of orcas. Turtle sometimes felt like that dragon's foster brother.

Qibli

Upon meeting Qibli again in Possibility, Turtle grinned as if the moment were the most delightful thing that had ever happened to any of them, though Peril noted that Turtle was mainly there for Kinkajou, not Moon and Qibli. He cares about his friend's wellbeing as he did not want to risk anything bad happening to Qibli if he made the SandWing an animus. Turtle views Qibli as one of those "naturally heroic" dragons. In Darkness of Dragons, Qibli was constantly frustrated that Turtle had magic that he was horrible at using, and Qibli did not. Turtle's eyes brightened when he met Qibli after being imprisoned by Darkstalker.

Tsunami

Tsunami and Turtle grew quickly to love each other, although at first Tsunami was unaware that Turtle was one of her brothers. They met outside Jade Mountain, and Tsunami was incredulous that she had thirty-two brothers she did not know about. Whenever Turtle visits his sister at Jade Mountain Academy, Tsunami is either happy or relieved to see him. In the epilogue of The Hive Queen, Tsunami and Turtle swim to Pantala together, indicating that Tsunami trusts her brother enough to take him on a quest.

Umber

Turtle and Umber used to share a sleeping cave in Jade Mountain Academy before Umber left with Sora. They used to pull their reed mats close to each other and sleep with their backs together. Turtle said this was because they both felt a need to have siblings close to them, as Umber was used to being with his MudWing sibs, and Turtle usually slept with all his brothers. Turtle viewed Umber as a brother. He considered Umber to be kind-hearted and even considered using his magic to go look for Umber once Darkstalker was gone.

Winter

Winter is one of Turtle's friends. Despite Turtle heavily fearing his animus magic being discovered, he was willing to save Winter and expose his abilities. Upon discovering this, however, Winter exploded on Turtle and shouted that he should have served his tribe with his magic, causing Turtle to shy away from him.

Family tree

More

Shark

Coral

Gill

Moray

Fin

Cerulean

Turtle

Octopus

28 Dragons

3 Dragons

Orca

Tsunami

Anemone

Auklet

Known Enchantments

Phrasing	Target	Intention
"Phrasing unknown."	A rock	To heal outer wounds, sores, and cramps.
"As long as this stick is near me or touching me, I enchant it to hide my entire existence from Darkstalker. That means he cannot see me or hear me; he cannot remember that he's heard of me; he cannot hear about me in other people's minds or conversations; and he cannot see me anywhere in his futures. I enchant this stick to completely erase the dragon holding it from Darkstalker's awareness."	A broken stick	To hide the wielder's existence from Darkstalker.
"Phrasing unknown."	A piece of kelp	To make him faster than some of his brothers.
"Phrasing unknown."	A seagull egg	To make Turtle's brothers forgive him after failing to find Snapper.
"Phrasing unknown."	Case of Darkstalker's scroll	To bash Chameleon's head and fly to Turtle.
"Enchant this earring to make the wearer immune to any spell Darkstalker has cast or will cast, whether past, present or future."	Qibli's earring	To make the wearer immune to any spell Darkstalker has cast or will cast, whether past, present, or future.
"Phrasing unknown."	A bowl	To double the amount of things put into it when ordered "twice as much, please!"
"Phrasing unknown."	Complimentary writing slates	To make writing on one send the message to the other. It only works one way.
"Earring, [...] get on my ear right now and stay there."	An earring	To get on Turtle's ear.
"I enchant this piece of coral to help me find whatever I'm looking for."	A piece of coral	To find things for the wielder.
"Coconut, don't move. No matter what I or anyone else says to you, you are now a completely normal coconut who can never be enchanted."	A coconut	To be completely normal.
"I enchant my sister Anemone to become an animus dragon, too. Anemone, become an animus dragon. I enchant you to have talons of power."	Anemone	To become an animus dragon.
"Necklace, [...] come to me. [...] I enchant you to be powerless from now on."	Anemone's necklace	To come to Turtle and be powerless.
"Dagger, [...] turn to sand forever."	Anemone's dagger	To be turned to sand forever.
"Disappear!"	A rock	To disappear.
"Waves! Wash these crabs out of the sea!"	Waves	To wash Anemone's enchanted crabs out to sea.
"Shield me!"	A palm tree	To shield him from a piece of stone wall.
"Make my scales as hard as diamonds. Make my bones unbreakable. Make me impossible to hurt, no matter how hard that thing lands on me."	A shell	To be impossible to hurt.
"Get... off... me."	A piece of stone wall	To get off Turtle.
"Seaweed, go wrap Anemone's mouth shut so she cannot cast any more spells — neither by voice or thought, as long as you are touching her. But make sure she can still breathe."	Strands of seaweed	To wrap Anemone's mouth shut and render her unable to cast more spells.
"Enchant this skyfire to make Kinkajou immune to any spell Darkstalker has ever or will ever cast, and enchant it to make her completely insignificant in his eyes — not worth thinking about, not visible in his futures, not in any way a threat to him [...] and enchant it to heal all her injuries as well."	Kinkajou's skyfire rock	To make Kinkajou immune to any spell Darkstalker has or ever will cast and completely insignificant to him, not seen as a threat or in any of his futures. It was also enchanted to heal her of all her injuries.
"I enchant you to break every spell Darkstalker has cast on Anemone the moment you touch her."	A seashell	To break all spells Darkstalker cast on Anemone.
"Protect me from the shells."	Two sand dollars	To protect him from Anemone's seashells.
"Seaweed, I want you to wrap around Anemone's arm instead — but still, as long as you're touching her, she cannot use her magic in any way. And stay put until I remove you."	Strands of seaweed	To wrap around Anemone's arm and stop her magic from working as long as it touches her.

Quotes

"You're a mind reader. [...] All you have to do is walk around the school until you hear someone's mind going, 'Well done, me; tiptop explosion I caused today; aren't I a clever arsonist.'"

― to Moonwatcher

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"Kind of a cool evolutionary thing that makes sense if you're a plant trying to survive on a mountain full of fire-breathing dragons, right? [...] But, uh, horrible, obviously."

― to Moon, Tsunami, and Sunny about dragonflame cacti

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"It's different. [...] Swimming is not the same as trying to fly while getting blown about and whacked with little balls of water and also the lightning — have we talked about the lightning?"

― to the Jade Winglet about flying in a storm

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"I do not APPRECIATE your skeptical tone. [...] Just because I don't particularly like danger or uncertainty or ... or exercise, doesn't mean I couldn't be useful in a fight."

― to Peril

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"I, uh ... came to rescue you? [...] Well, to find out what was going on anyway. I heard there was a spell or something? But then I got here and it was very stormy and I couldn't find you and suddenly there were eight million SkyWings pouring out of the mountains and a big fight going on and I thought ... maybe better to stay out of the way until it's over. Right?"

― to Peril

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"Why did I ever let anyone notice me? I'd be safe if I'd stayed boring and forgettable. This is what happens — when someone sees you, soon everyone will see you. And one day that "everyone" will include a dragon who wants to kill you."

― thoughts

---

"You are ... but that's because of me. [...] I'm so sorry, Anemone. I'm the one that made you an animus. Right here, the day of the Talons of Power ceremony. I didn't want anyone to find out about me, so ... I distracted them with you. And everything that's happened to you since then is all my fault."

― to Anemone

---

"Maybe losing your soul isn't the right way to describe it. [...] Maybe it's more like ... the more you use your power for bad things, the more you feel like you're entitled to use your power for anything. It makes it harder to go back — only forward into more bad things. [...] But ... I think you can go back. I think anyone can choose to do good, or be good, no matter what happened before. I think you just have to try really hard. And that means stopping yourself before you do even worse things."

― to Anemone

---

"It's not too late for your soul. [...] You're here now, with us. You're on the right side, doing the right thing. You're not evil."

― to Anemone

---

"I'm going to work hard to be super awesome, too. [...] I should have some idea of what to do. It'll be crazy if I actually end up in one of these stories myself. Save the world, check. Stop being afraid of my magic, check. Figure out a way to protect my soul, check. Become the kind of dragon I'd want to read about — working on it. Probably working on it for the rest of my life. But I think I'm getting there."

― thoughts

Trivia

• Turtle fears storms.
• Turtle hates exercise.
• After failing to find Snapper, Turtle's brothers refused to talk to him for an entire month as punishment.
• Before animus magic stopped working, Turtle was in the process of writing an animus spell to restore Starflight's eyesight.
• Turtle believes that following the stars due west in the middle of the ocean can lead to major land.
• Turtle said he has excellent penmanship.
• Turtle was one of the hardest characters to write, because Tui purposely made him enigmatic in Moon Rising and had not completely figured him out by Talons of Power. She said he is not a typical hero, but he has the heart of one.
• Turtle does not have very good aim.
• Turtle fiddles with his armband by tugging it up and down when he is nervous.
• Turtle once took an anatomy class.
• Turtle is a slow swimmer.
• In the graphic novel, Turtle's armband is placed close to his wrist. On the cover of Talons of Power, however, it was placed closer to his shoulder.

Gallery

• 
  Turtle on the cover of Talons of Power, by Joy Ang
• 
  Turtle on the full cover of Talons of Power, by Joy Ang
• 
  Turtle on the cover of Moon Rising, by Joy Ang
• 
  Turtle on the cover of Talons of Power (graphic novel), by Mike Holmes
• 
  Turtle on the cover of Official Wings of Fire Coloring Book, by Brianna C. Walsh
• 
  Turtle on the cover of Glow-in-the-Dark Coloring Book, by Brianna C. Walsh
• 
  Turtle fullbody render, edited by Mimiccering
• 
  Turtle graphic novel render, edited by -zstarchaserr
• 
  Turtle on the cover of the Chinese version of Talons of Power, by Angelo Rinaldi
• 
  Reference by Spirit978

• Art by Mike Holmes, from the Wings of Fire Graphic Novels
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References

de:Turtle (M) fr:Triton es:Turtle pl:Żółw ru:Карапакс