Kinkajou

"Have you explored yet? There's the most amazing library- not that I can read yet, but oh my gosh, I'm working on it really hard. And an art cave! It's full of all these colors of paint, like, like, like a couple of RainWings just EMOTED all over it! You guys, we should make amazing paintings and then decorate our cave with them. WOULDN'T THAT BE AMAZING?"

— Kinkajou to Carnelian and Moonwatcher, Moon Rising

Kinkajou is a young female RainWing who was introduced in The Hidden Kingdom. She was captured and imprisoned by the NightWings before the events of The Hidden Kingdom, but was able to escape the NightWing island with the help of Clay, Deathbringer, and Glory. She is currently a student attending Jade Mountain Academy as a member of the Jade Winglet, and she may have romantic feelings for Turtle.

Appearance

Kinkajou usually keeps her scales bright, happy colors, such as pink and yellow. She a long neck, gigantic dark green eyes, and a diamond-shaped snout. She is small, but not that much smaller than Qibli. After being attacked by Shapeshifter, she suffered from a skull fracture, three or four broken ribs, a hairline crack on one elbow, and brusing all along her spine and left side.

Personality

Moonwatcher has never heard a bad thought in Kinkajou's mind. After realizing she had experienced the NightWing island, Winter felt something like respect for her and surprise that a dragon a silly as she is could have survived. He also observed that Kinkajou did not seem to hold a grudge against the NightWings at all.

She is outgoing, bubbly, very energetic, talkative, friendly, optimistic, and well-known for her exuberant nature. Contrary to the stereotype that RainWings are lazy, Kinkajou is hardworking and often eager to try new things. She once described herself as "clever but annoying." When she was captured by the NightWings, she learned to communicate with the other RainWing prisoners by observing the shifting colors of their scales. She is also shown to be very dedicated and loyal to those she believes deserve her faith, a trait exhibited when she enthusiastically backed Glory's challenge to the RainWing throne. She was devastated at Glory's near loss in the RainWing Royal Challenge, showing that she cares very much about helping others.

She is very curious and open-minded, and enjoys learning about new things and having new experiences. When she is excited, she finds it difficult to keep her scales from turning neon yellow and pink, like many other members of her tribe. Kinkajou also seems to enjoy making friends. However, she has been shown to worry about her friends abandoning her, even wondering whether Moonwatcher liked Sora better than her after Moonwatcher and Sora left the Prey Center to go to the library together at Jade Mountain Academy. She once stated that she is the last to know everything, such as the knowledge of Turtle's animus powers and Moonwatcher's mind-reading and foresight abilities. Kinkajou was very excited when she arrived at Jade Mountain Academy because she had never been anywhere but the rainforest and the now-abandoned NightWing island. She can be casually snarky, shown when she refers to Darkstalker as "King Bossy" in Darkness of Dragons. Kinkajou will become angry, aggressive and even dangerous if she or her friends are in danger or insulted; in Talons of Power, she melted one of Darkstalker's eyeballs with her venom because she believed Turtle was in danger and became irritated when Darkstalker later referred to her as "a little ball of fluff", saying that she was terrifying.

Her concern for living creatures is shown when she jumps in front of an innocent sloth during her venom shooting contest with Grandeur, saving it but being hit with Grandeur's venom herself in the process.

Biography

The Dragonet Prophecy

The Hidden Kingdom

Kinkajou was one of the seventeen missing RainWings held captive by the NightWings on the NightWing Island. Kinkajou met Glory when she was knocked unconscious Kinkajou, imprisoned on the NightWing island and brought through the animus-touched NightWing tunnels to the Night Kingdom. Kinkajou's venom was so weak that the NightWings didn't even bother binding her snout shut. She claimed that she was the youngest dragon there, and confirmed that there had been seventeen missing, three of which were already dead. When the NightWings were coming after them during their escape, Glory asked Kinkajou to camouflage herself to look like a NightWing dragonet. Kinkajou fooled the guards for long enough so that she could escape. With her help (as well as Clay and Deathbringer's), she and Glory were both able to escape, and warn the rest of the RainWings about the upcoming danger that they had been ignoring. Most of them continued to ignore them and follow Magnificent's example. Kinkajou participated in the venom contest during Glory's challenge for the RainWing throne and proved to be exceptionally better than what Bromeliad had claimed. During Grandeur's turn, a sloth tumbled out of the trees and landed in front of the targeting board. When Kinkajou leaped to move it away, Grandeur's venom accidentally hit the young RainWing's wing, causing the venom to start burning through her wings. Kinkajou started to scream, her scales turning white and green. The venom, in three spots, started eating away at Kinkajou's wing. Due to her Kinkajou saving the sloth panicking, she fainted. After a quick and panicked venom test with Grandeur, Glory put some of her venom on Kinkajou's affected wing in an attempt to stop the venom from eating through her scales. It proved successful. Grandeur forfeited, realizing that Glory should be the rightful queen, especially because Glory was related to Grandeur. Kinkajou thereby was awarded the victory for the venom targeting, and Glory became the new queen of the RainWings.

The Dark Secret
Kinkajou had dreams about Glory and was shown to look up to her. She was terrified that she might lose the ability to fly after the venom scarred three black spots on her wing and badly burned her. Kinkajou was the first dragon that Starflight visited while using the dreamvisitor he found, visiting a nightmare of hers.

The Brightest Night

Near the beginning of the book, Sunny spied on Starflight with the Obsidian Mirror. As she watched, some healers were mumbling to each other about preferring to be Kinkajou rather than him, believing Starflight's injuries to be worse than Kinkajou's. Kinkajou was mentioned when Peril asked Sunny if Clay had talked about her. Sunny remembered that Clay hadn't mentioned her in a while and that they had both been watching over Kinkajou after her venom accident when he finally did. In the epilogue, Glory mentioned her as a possibility when the dragonets discussed students for a new school on Jade Mountain. She said that Kinkajou and Tamarin needed real teachers, not just the scraps of the time she had for them.

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The Jade Mountain Prophecy

Moon Rising

Kinkajou was a friend and clawmate of Moonwatcher (the main protagonist and point of view of Moon Rising). When Moon first saw Kinkajou, she noticed there were three ink-like drops on Kinkajou's wing that didn't change color like the rest of her body. In the prey center, Kinkajou introduced Moon to her former "friend" Coconut, whom she held a little resentment for, considering he didn't even realize she was missing when she was captured. She also handed Bandit, Winter's pet scavenger, a blueberry when Winter said that he wouldn't eat anything that Winter gave him. She was considered annoying by their clawmate, Carnelian. When Moonwatcher revealed her powers, Kinkajou didn't know what to think and was shocked and a little angry. Later, after Qibli, Winter, and Moon had fought Icicle, Kinkajou forgave Moon, saying, "Well, yeah, but that was yesterday," and all of the Jade Winglet (excluding Umber, who ran away with Sora, and Carnelian, who died in the explosion) set off to find Winter. Kinkajou was also given a piece of skyfire by Turtle, to keep her thoughts private.

Winter Turning

Kinkajou set out with Winter and the others to go find Hailstorm and travel to the Rainforest, where she saw Glory again. While in the Rainforest, she, Winter, Moon, and Qibli were discovered by a NightWing Patrol, and Kinkajou recognized Bromeliad after calling out to her, thinking the older dragon was Orchid, leading us to believe the dragons may have bonded during their time in the NightWings' prison. Bromeliad was with the NightWing Obsidian. Obsidian lead them to the NightWing village while Bromeliad flew off to tell Queen Glory that they have arrived. After a brief stint in the hatchery, Kinkajou and the others retrieved Icicle. Queen Glory's guards knocked her out with a sleeping dart. Later, while searching for Scarlet, Scarlet's ally, Chameleon, attacked Kinkajou in the form of Shapeshifter, knocking her into a tree with his tail and putting her in a coma until she was woken up with animus magic from Princess Anemone and Turtle in Talons of Power. The group then left the Claws of the Clouds mountains, each of them taking turns to carry Kinkajou. Eventually, they reached the town of Possibility, where Mayfly diagnosed her with broken ribs, skull fracture, and a bruised spine. She was in a coma and would not be able to move for at least a month if she ever woke up at all.

Escaping Peril

Kinkajou was mentioned once Turtle and Peril reached Possibility. She was still in a coma, and Turtle went to go visit her with Moon and Qibli, leaving Peril to wait outside of town. Later in the book, Peril was having a conversation with her father about Kinkajou, Peril was slightly shocked Chameleon would hurt a young dragonet like Kinkajou. Chameleon (as Soar) answered that she would've laughed at her like the other RainWings. Near the end of the book, Qibli was pointing out that Chameleon wasn't working for Scarlet when he put Kinkajou in the hospital when Chameleon argued to Peril about using Darkstalker's scroll for evil.

Talons of Power

Kinkajou was woken up by Anemone, who was casting a spell on her with Turtle. Anemone enchanted Kinkajou's skyfire to heal her, and later added a spell to "make her love Turtle as much as he loved her." Turtle hated this but couldn't change the spell because it had already been cast, and he thought that it might risk hurting Kinkajou. The healing spell erased Kinkajou's three venom scars, and she seemed a bit disappointed about that since she claims it made her look tough. Turtle secretly enchanted the Skyfire at the same time to protect her from any spells by Darkstalker. Darkstalker would also not notice her, not be able to read her mind and regard her as unimportant if he ever spotted her, or if she was in any of his futures. Soon after she was woken up, Darkstalker showed up. He created a prison for the dragons coming to kill Glory, and Kinkajou didn't think that was good. As soon as he left, Kinkajou told Turtle "He's definitely evil." Turtle told her his suspicions of how evil Darkstalker was, and she agreed to help him spy on Darkstalker. When Darkstalker left with the dragons who wanted to come with him to the old Night Kingdom, Kinkajou followed him, along with Turtle. When they got there, Moonwatcher was attacked by the mop Anemone enchanted to hit her until she was done cleaning Anemone's room for her, and that she wouldn't be done until Anemone told her that it was done. Kinkajou told Anemone to stop and called her an "overripe melon" and a "jackdaw." She said she was being a horrible dragon and told her to stop using her magic for bad things. Then Darkstalker came in. He put Moon under a trance, and Turtle signaled to Kinkajou for her to pretend she was under the trance, too. Then, after Anemone was told to leave and she did, Moon came out of the trance and Kinkajou pretended to too. Turtle had to go after Anemone. Kinkajou flared her wings, turning them pink at the edges, and gave him a sweet smile. After that, she left the room with Darkstalker and Moon. Later, Kinkajou was brought to Darkstalker's throne room by a sword that he enchanted to find someone the hidden animus dragon (Turtle) cared about. She told Turtle not to mind her and to stay hidden, but he refused and gave his enchanted hiding stick to Anemone. Darkstalker then tried to kill Turtle, but Kinkajou melted his eyeball, hindering him temporarily, though it is possible she only did this due to Princess Anemone's love spell. Turtle then quickly gave Kinkajou his pouch of animus objects, and Kinkajou was sent out of the room as Turtle's animus powers were taken by Darkstalker. Darkstalker tried to enchant her to forget about everything that happened, but because of the spell Turtle put on her, it didn't work, though she pretended to leave under Darkstalker's spell. Turtle, while being brought to the dungeon, thought of her when he thought of the dragons that could still save him and the world.

Darkness of Dragons

Kinkajou was mentioned in a note from Turtle to Qibli, telling him that she was awake. Later, when Qibli was visiting the old Night Kingdom to rescue Turtle, Qibli ran into Kinkajou, who was camouflaged, spying on Chameleon in his MudWing form of Bog. Once seeing Chameleon change into his NightWing form, Shapeshifter, she noticed that Shapeshifter still had the same jewelry that was on Bog, but she then noticed that he was wearing another earring, and Kinkajou guessed that the scroll pieces were in it. They devised a plan to steal Chameleon's pieces of Darkstalker's scroll. Qibli acted as a distraction, and Kinkajou managed to camouflage and steal the earring, reverting Chameleon to his original lime-green RainWing state. They persuaded him to go back to the Rainforest Kingdom. After Darkstalker's discussion with Qibli, Kinkajou used the pieces of Darkstalker's talisman to turn him into Peacemaker, making herself the hero of the second arc. At the beginning of the Darkness of Dragons epilogue, Kinkajou was mentioned by Moon, who pointed out that she kept her accomplishment in defeating Darkstalker secret. Kinkajou was also seen accidentally scaring away the scavengers Winter was trying to catch for the Scavenger Sanctuary he and the other Talons of Peace planned to build. Winter pointed out to Kinkajou that she could help catch one of the scavengers, as she could camouflage herself. After a quick talk with her about Moon and leaving Jade Mountain Academy for Snowfall and the other IceWings, they set off to catch one. Kinkajou also appeared later in the epilogue, when it was Turtle's point of view. She said that she liked the story he wrote for a class at Jade Mountain Academy, and how she felt very confused after having a love spell on her. She also revealed Anemone's crush on Tamarin, which was a bit of a shock to Turtle.

Relationships

Moonwatcher

Moon and Kinkajou are very close friends and they get along pretty well, as shown several times in the second arc. Kinkajou also tends to think Moon likes other dragons better than her. She treats Moonwatcher like a best friend. Kinkajou used to hold a slight grudge against her since she was a NightWing, but after Moon told her about Secretkeeper hiding her egg in the rainforest, they've been best friends ever since, especially after she discovers Moon isn't at all what she thought of. In Darkness of Dragons, Anemone mentioned that Darkstalker wouldn't hurt a scale on Kinkajou's head because she was her best friend.

Glory

Kinkajou was introduced in The Hidden Kingdom alongside Tamarin, Jambu, Orchid, Bromeliad, Coconut, and Mangrove. She proved to be fierce and helpful while helping Glory escape the Night Kingdom, though a NightWing hit her with the blunt end of a spear. She views Glory as a role model, and it is shown that Queen Glory thinks of Kinkajou as a friend rather than a subject, as she mentions in Winter Turning and some of the other books. She also didn't hesitate to find a blood relative to Ex-Queen Grandeur to save Kinkajou from an accidental venom strike. She's one of Kinkajou's closest friends, and Kinkajou thinks of her as 'my awesome queen'. She is fiercely loyal to her, attacking Icicle when Icicle was plotting to murder Glory. She also sometimes brags about having Glory as a friend. She is one of Glory's favorite subjects.

Turtle

During Talons of Power, Princess Anemone casts a spell on Kinkajou to heal her, as in Winter Turning she was severely injured by Chameleon (as Shapeshifter). Anemone, however, also cast a love spell on Kinkajou, making her love Turtle as much as he loved her. By the end of Darkness of Dragons, Anemone removed the love spell on her. This made Kinkajou slightly confused, as she no longer had feelings for him, though she does think he is "adorable", somewhere between baby sloths and Anemone's crush on Tamarin. Still, Kinkajou never has real feelings for Prince Turtle but only feels for him as a friend.

Winter

Kinkajou considers Winter to be her friend, though Winter originally did not appear to not acknowledge her existence. Throughout Moon Rising, Kinkajou was shown to admire his "sparkly scales" having a huge crush on him as noted by Moon, however, he does not seem to notice. In Winter Turning, she showed multiple acts of kindness, none of which Winter cared for. During the epilogue of Darkness of Dragons, Winter and Kinkajou talk to each other about the aftermaths of the events of Darkness of Dragons and both now consider each other as friends. Winter noted that he does not want Kinkajou dead.

Darkstalker

After Kinkajou was healed from Anemone's magic in Talons of Power, Kinkajou and Darkstalker share a mutual hatred (Kinkajou's hatred is more exaggerated, while Darkstalker doesn't take her very seriously). In fact, he hasn't seemed to pay much attention to her. When Turtle was in the throne room with Darkstalker in Talons of Power, Darkstalker enchanted a sword to bring someone Turtle cared for very much into the room. Kinkajou came in, and when Darkstalker burned Turtle with his fire (Turtle was safe from his spell earlier). Kinkajou spat her venom all over Darkstalker's face from shock, and in response, Darkstalker slammed Kinkajou down, showing their genuine dislike of each other.

After the events of finding Foeslayer in Darkness of Dragons, Kinkajou used the fragments of Darkstalker's Scroll to turn him into Peacemaker by enchanting a strawberry. Darkstalker wasn't afraid of Kinkajou when he challenges her, but as the enchantment turned him younger and smaller, he realized in shock that he'd been beaten by a "ball of fluff".

Bromeliad

Bromeliad is Kinkajou's venom trainer, and Kinkajou and Bromeliad appear to have a genuine dislike for each other. She even quotes that "Bromeliad is a slow old baboon," showing her dislike for her. She once had a dream where Bromeliad was in Mastermind's place, doing experiments on her venom, and later mentioned to Turtle that Bromeliad and Mastermind were the two dragons she hated most and that she must have been stressed lately.

Anemone

Kinkajou held a grudge over Anemone ever since Turtle told her that she had put a love spell on her. Whenever she is around Anemone, she growls and she once said ‘I would rather eat my own tail then accept any help from her!' But since she broke the love spell, Kinkajou gradually began to forgive Anemone.

Quotes

"Don't worry, I know you can't talk. I'm the only one without a gag. They decided my venom wasn't strong enough or I couldn't shoot far enough to be dangerous, or something, I guess, which is a little unfair because if someone just train me properly, I think I'd be super-great at it and then these horrible dragons would be super-sorry for putting me in a cage."

― to Glory about the NightWings

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"Isn't this exciting? I'm so excited I can hardly STAND IT. That's why I'm this color, by the way. I have been trying all morning to turn myself something more dignified and I can't do it; my scales are all like, YAY WE'RE REALLY HERE! and will not listen to me."

― to Moon about school

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"I love this place, [...] Have you explored at all yet? There's the most amazing library - not that I can read yet, but oh my gosh, I'm working on it really hard. And an art cave! It's full of all these colors of paint, like, like, like a couple of RainWings just EMOTED all over it! You guys, we should make amazing paintings and then decorate our cave with them. WOULDN'T THAT BE AMAZING?"

― to Moon and Carnelian, about Jade Mountain Academy

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"...Look at her! I'm sure she'd love to be called Friendly."

― to Moon about Carnelian

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"Ooooo. How does it feel to be related to someone famous? Probably a bit like being best friends with a queen. Which I am, just incidentally, so, I mean, I totally get it!"

― to Sora

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"I say anyone who is gross enough to eat something that's alive and wriggling deserves to get pecked. You should take those dragons out hunting with you and leave the rest of us here to enjoy our quiet sensible fruit in peace."

― to Clay

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"Qibli told me what happened. I can't believe I missed it all! I can't believe I wasn't there to protect you! You're totally heroes, saving us all from bad guys! Although, I'm kind of confused about who's that bad guy and who I should be mad at, because SORA WHAT but also Icicle was totally scary but then SAVING HER BROTHER ACK so I get it but still, attacking my winglet! My best friend! Not OK!"

― to Moonwatcher

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"He looks like he's posing for a portrait. Pompous Sneerdagard the Magnificent Awaits His Legions of Doomed Enemies."

― to Turtle, about Darkstalker

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"Yes, without me. I know you can. Oh, monkey brains - does this mean I'm the hapless sidekick? Blorg, that is so lame. Better than the wailing victim who needs rescuing, though. Make sure nobody writes me that way when this story becomes an epic poem, all right? And I would definitely like to be the hero next time, please. I mean... in my next life, I guess."

― to Turtle

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"No way! Queen Glory is perfect. I want her to be my queen forever and always. MOON!"

― to Turtle

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"YIKES! Who are you? You are SO BIG!"

― to Darkstalker

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"...and I can be the WHAM BAM SHOVE A PINEAPPLE UP HIS SNOUT dragon."

― to Turtle about Darkstalker

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"I'm going to study him, so we can figure out what he's enchanted to hypnotize everybody, and then we're going to steal it or break it, and then everyone will be all, 'AAAAAH THERE'S A MONSTER DRAGON TRYING TO MANIPULATE US!' and they'll rise up and stop him. Done! The day is saved!"

― to Turtle

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"I can't tell you! Aaaarrrrgh! Because you don't have skyfire, so if I tell you Darkstalker might read it in your mind, and then he'll know I told you and ALL KINDS OF TERRIBLE THINGS MIGHT HAPPEN. AAAARRRRGH!"

― to Moonwatcher

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"Oh, yes, it's me! I'm investigating a suspicious character."

― to Qibli

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"...I know, never saw me coming! Taken down by a ball of fluff! Who's insignificant NOW, frogface!"

― to Darkstalker

Trivia

• Her favorite color is yellow, which she displays on her scales the most often.
• She is one of Tui T. Sutherland's favorite characters, as stated in one of her blog posts.
• Tui thought of giving Kinkajou her own book but decided against it, replying in a chat that she used books to evolve characters and make them better, but Kinkajou was already great. She also stated that Kinkajou was a lot like Sunny on the inside, who already had a book.
• Despite being unwilling to hurt other dragons, she had no problem melting Darkstalker's eye when he tried to kill Turtle, who mistakes him for Fathom. This may have been because of the love spell; she was extra protective of Turtle, and of course at the time if she loved him, she would not hesitate to hurt his would-be murderer. She was the first dragon to actually hurt Darkstalker after he came out from Jade Mountain, despite many other's attempts. Kinkajou also attacked Princess Icicle after she threatened to hurt Queen Glory, as she clearly cares about.
  • She also expressed the desire to use her venom on Anemone and Chameleon, but never actually did so.
• Even though most RainWings can't count, she stated there being seventeen missing RainWings. She was able to count at age three, unlike the other dragonets shown in the nursery in Winter Turning. This could mean she has above-average intelligence, but it's more likely this was simply an oversight on Tui's part.
• In the minigame Speed Wings on Scholastic's Home Base, Kinkajou is a playable character.
• Kinkajou once mentioned that she is a former hide-and-seek champion.

Gallery

• Reference by Platypus the SeaWing
  Reference by Platypus the SeaWing
• 
  Kinkajou's icon from Speed Wings, a minigame on Scholastic HomeBase
• 
  by Mike Holmes
• This is when Kinkajou was found by Queen Glory
  This is when Kinkajou was found by Queen Glory

Graphic novels
by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes by Mike Holmes

References

de:Kinkajou fr:Kinkajou pl:Kinkażu ru:Кинкажу