Tamarin

"Most dragons don't realize how much I can figure out from their tone of voice, or the little huffs they make between sentences. She thinks because I can't see her, I won't be able to tell when she's rolling her eyes or making fun of someone. Sometimes she'll sneak in and out of our cave, because she doesn't want to have to talk to me, and she thinks I don't notice."

— Tamarin to Sunny about Onyx, Darkness of Dragons

Template:Charbox Tamarin is a blind female RainWing dragonet who was introduced in The Hidden Kingdom. Before attending Jade Mountain Academy as a member of the Gold Winglet, Tamarin worked as a flower gardener in the Rainforest Kingdom.

Appearance

Tamarin has several scars from crashing while learning to navigate the rainforest as a dragonet. Glory noted that she had odd, pale blue eyes (related to her blindness), and blue and gold scales by default. Tamarin cannot control her scale colors upon command like most RainWings, but her scales automatically adjust to her surroundings and emotions. She is slightly larger than Kinkajou.

Personality

Tamarin is a kind and quiet and determined dragon. In The Hidden Kingdom, she refused to let Glory down during her contest for the RainWing throne. Tamarin was hatched blind, but she never let her disability stop her from doing the same things as others. She kept this mentality later on as well; after the explosion at Jade Mountain Academy badly injured her, she recovered quickly and refused to let her wounds stop her from attending classes or socializing with other students. She also never lets anyone push her around. As shown in Talons of Power, Tamarin seems to prefer independence, as she probably feels pitied for something she doesn't want pity over, refusing Turtle's help when she reaches the fork. Throughout the series, she is shown to be quite thoughtful. She is also a caretaker at the RainWing royal gardens.

Biography

Pre-series

Tamarin worked in the royal gardens, where she took care of the flowers ruined year after year by Fruit Bat, who used the flowers to try and make perfume, much to Tamarin's annoyance. She is completely blind, although her other senses have been sharpened because of that. She has memorized every section of the Rainforest Kingdom and can sense anything out of the necessarily ordinary, such as flowers. If she was told to change her scales to red, for instance, she would be unable to, but if she relaxes, then her scales could automatically change to the color around her. She also has exceptionally sharp hearing, and that helps because of her being blind. Tamarin's underbelly, legs, and wings are scarred from previous attempts to learn how to navigate and fly blindly as a young dragonet. She also helped Starflight adjust to being blind after the events of The Dark Secret.

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The Dragonet Prophecy

The Hidden Kingdom

Tamarin was mentioned by her close friend Kinkajou when she was talking to Glory about the current queens and how Tamarin winning the flower-search competition Fruit Bat drove them. When she was picking her team to battle for the crown, Glory chose Tamarin (not knowing that she was blind) to join her team. As the team conferred about who would do which contest, Tamarin offered to do the flower one, insisting that she was knowledgeable in the field. Tamarin competed in the flower hunt for Glory during the challenge for the RainWing throne and won, defeating Fruit Bat, and making very good use of her excellent sense of smell, even when Glory doubted her skills. Tamarin nearly lost, as Fruit Bat was following her to the hidden flower, but Tamarin managed to grab the hidden flower just in time.

The Brightest Night
Although she did not make a formal appearance in the book, she was mentioned to be helping Starflight adjust to flying blind, with guidance, and avoiding obstacles. In the epilogue, Glory suggested that Tamarin, as well as Kinkajou, should be students at the Jade Mountain Academy to have a real teacher, not the "scraps of time" Glory had for them.

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The Jade Mountain Prophecy

Moon Rising

Tamarin was present when the Jade Winglet and Gold Winglet had a history class together. Kinkajou introduced Tamarin to Moonwatcher, and Tamarin introduced Kinkajou and Moon to Onyx. Later, Tamarin was accidentally injured by a Dragonflame Cactus, an explosive variety of cacti, set off by Sora, Clay's sister. Clay took Tamarin to one of the underground lakes with Onyx and Pike, and then she was brought to the medical wing to recover from her burns. Shortly after Sora tried to kill Icicle in the prey center, Sora went to visit Tamarin, who was unconscious and wrapped in bandages from her wings to her tail. Moon, Umber, and Qibli arrived to see her crying beside Tamarin's bedside, apologizing for her injuries.

Winter Turning
More information flying in soon...

Escaping Peril
More information flying in soon...

Talons of Power

Having recovered from her injuries, Tamarin was shown with Princess Anemone and Pike when Turtle came to warn them about Darkstalker. She anxiously asked about Kinkajou, to which Turtle responded that "she was alive when I {Turtle} saw her last". Pike then showed some kindness towards her. Then Anemone left to go impress Darkstalker, and Pike asked Turtle to walk her to the infirmary. Once he left, Turtle admitted Tamarin how Kinkajou is really doing, as the RainWing pressed. Tamarin said she disliked secret faces and knew that Turtle and Pike were making them. Then, Tamarin told him she didn't know Anemone was an animus, and when Turtle realized that, he asked her to keep it secret. After that, she shared her thoughts on animus power, talking of how if animus RainWings made all the medicine appear in the healing hut, they'd never find new remedies. When they got to a fork in the tunnel, she said she could go on her own from there and limped off.

Darkness of Dragons

Tamarin was in the history cave (not the one blown up by Sora) and asked Qibli if he smells smoke, saying that she could only smell smoke since the explosion. Tamarin was also one of the students requesting a history on Darkstalker to Webs in the History Cave. In the epilogue, Tamarin was also mentioned doing a presentation on Darkstalker's history with Pike and Fearless, and when Kinkajou told Turtle that Anemone has a crush on her.

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The Lost Continent Prophecy

The Hive Queen
Turtle mentions Tamarin when he explains that Anemone told him that she tried to restore her sight with her animus magic, but failed due to animus magic mysteriously not working anymore.

Relationships

Kinkajou

Kinkajou and Tamarin are good friends. Kinkajou doesn't dwell on her blindness, and when telling someone about Tamarin, it's not the first thing she says. Tamarin thinks that Kinkajou is a little impulsive, however, she expresses that opinion in a way that indicates concern.

Princess Anemone

Anemone has a crush on Tamarin, but Tamarin doesn't acknowledge it. It is unknown whether or not Tamarin returns Anemone's feelings; however, based on her actions, she most likely does not.

Turtle

In Talons of Power Tamarin and Turtle have a conversation about animus magic. She threw some philosophical questions such 'how anyone could stay a good dragon with all that power.', 'Who gets to decide what's a good thing?', and 'Easy things might not always be the right thing.' Though at that moment, Tamarin had no idea Turtle was an animus, but by The Hive Queen, she probably does. They seem to be friends.

In The Hive Queen, Turtle mentioned trying to use his magic to fix Starflight's vision, while Anemone tried to use her magic to fix Tamarin's vision, but animus magic was not working at the time.

Quotes

"No, she's always nice to my face. Most dragons don't realize how much I can figure out from their tone of voice, or the little huffs they make between sentences. She thinks because I can't see her, I won't be able to tell when she's rolling her eyes or making fun of someone. Sometimes she'll sneak in and out of our cave, because she doesn't want to talk to me, and she thinks I don't notice. It's not personal though. I think she doesn't particularly care about any dragons unless they can help her get what she wants."

― to Sunny, about Onyx

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"It depends. For instance, an animus dragon might think, I'll make all our medicinal herbs appear magically in the healer's treehouse, so we never have to go looking for them again. That seems obviously good, right? But then we'd stop learning how to look for them, and we might stop experimenting with new ones to see how those might help dragons in different ways. We'd stop thinking about it at all, because everything would be too easy. Don't we lose something when everything is done for us?"

― to Turtle, about being an animus

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"Give me the flower one. If it's about flowers, I can do it."

― to Glory, during the royal challenge

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"But who gets to decide what's a good thing? Dragons would always be asking for spells or telling you your choices are wrong. And sometimes it's hard to tell what's good and what's just easy."

― to Turtle, about being an animus

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"So do I, normally. But I haven't been able to get the smell of smoke out of my nose since the explosion."

― to Qibli, about smelling smoke

Trivia

• Tamarin is the first known blind dragon in the series as well as the only known dragon that has been born blind.
• She has an extra sensitive nose and was good at finding things by smell, as shown in The Hidden Kingdom.
• Tamarin explained to Qibli in Darkness of Dragons that since the explosion, she can only smell smoke. It is unknown if this is a permanent result of her injuries. If so, she would be the first known dragon with an impaired sense of smell.
• In the minigame Speed Wings on Scholastic's Home Base, Tamarin is a playable character.
  • In this minigame, her eyes are depicted as green even though they are light blue. This may be because blind dragons cannot race.

Gallery

• Reference by Platypus the SeaWing
  Reference by Platypus the SeaWing
• 
  Tamarin's icon from Speed Wings, a minigame on Scholastic HomeBase

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

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