NightWings

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NightWings are a tribe of dragons that originally lived in the "city of night", before moving to the secret kingdom somewhere off the northern coast of the Sky Kingdom and finally to the rainforest. They are said to be very mysterious and secretive. The tribe resided on a volcano located on an island, yet is not shown on any known map of Pyrrhia. They have magic tunnels to the mainland; one into the Rainforest Kingdom, and one from there into the Kingdom of Sand. They were made by Stonemover, an animus NightWing. In addition, they were secretly allied with Blister, although this alliance was broken when they surrendered to the RainWings. NightWings tend to be arrogant, mysterious, secretive, and very full of themselves. NightWings and IceWings loathe each other with a passion from a previous war. Darkstalker told Moonwatcher in Moon Rising that a Nightwing hatched under one full moon can either read minds or see the future, while a Nightwing that hatched under two full moons has both. He also said that if an egg hatches under three full moons the dragonet still has both powers, but he did not know if the would be any stronger or not.

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NightWing by Hawkyfoot Warrior

Click here for a list of NightWings:

History

The Prophecy was written by Queen Battlewinner and a NightWing prophet named Morrowseer, who delivered Starflight's and Fatespeaker's eggs to the Talons of Peace, after a volcanic eruption on their island. The prophecy was their plan to invade and take over the rainforest, which was already inhabited by RainWings.

IceWings and NightWings have hated each other going way back to a war they once fought against each other. Morrowseer even ordered the death of all of the eight IceWing prisoners in the rescue of Starflight. This is also shown in the prophecy, which does not include an IceWing dragonet. Another likely cause is Queen Battlewinner was blasted by an IceWing's breath in the mouth, forcing her to live submerged in lava.

The NightWings had captured seventeen RainWings for their experimentation on RainWing venom. Their goal was to make venom-proof armor for an attack on the RainWings, but all experiments were lost when the NightWings fled their home. Additionally, they seem to have animus dragons, however, Stonemover is the only known NightWing animus.

In The Dark Secret, it is shown that the NightWings are being threatened by the volcanic island they inhabit, which is slowly building up to an eruption and diminishing the main source of food. Although Greatness claimed that scientific estimates had placed the eruption at least twenty years into the future, at the end of the book, the volcano explodes. Shortly before this, the NightWings surrendered to the RainWings in exchange for a safe place to live and food to eat, and most of them escaped through the rainforest portal unharmed. However, Morrowseer was likely killed, and Starflight was blinded.

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Society

NightWings form lifelong partnerships, similar to SeaWings. Their dragonets live in dormitories located in caves on the sides of the volcano. They are not allowed to go to the mainland until they are at least 10 years old, to "keep NightWing secrets safe." These dragonets are usually named according to their talents; for example, Morrowseer got his name for "seeing" the "morrow." Morrow is short for tomorrow, meaning the future. Deathbringer's name refers to his occupation as an assassin. Queen Battlewinner presumably got hers for military strategy, or perhaps a future battle which was predicted to be won by her. NightWings are occasionally named for physical traits, like Fierceteeth, Mightyclaws, Bigtail and Strongwings, or after character virtues, like Greatness or Vengeance. Exactly how they know what a dragon's talent will be when it hatches is unknown. It is plausible that they might wait and see for it to appear, or have another NightWing predict it, although this is unlikely, because it was revealed Nightwings have not had powers in at least a century. Glory mentions in The Hidden Kingdom that in scrolls, NightWings always had ''mouthful names''.

Description

NightWings have forked, black tongues and usually have black, dark grey, or purplish-black scales with silver, light black, purple, or dark blue undersides. In The Dragonet Prophecy, when Morrowseer dropped off Starflight, it said that the sun picked up glints of purple and deep blue on his body. The underside of their wings are speckled with silver scales, giving it the appearance of a night sky filled with twinkling stars, allowing them to fly at night without detection. Starflight's father, Mastermind, has done studies about genetic wing patterns, although this remains unproven, although both Starflight and Mastermind have similar patterns, whereas Morrowseer's were different.

NightWing names are commonly made up of two words (for example, Mind-reader or Fate-speaker), although others are just made of one word (like Wisdom or Greatness).

Notable NightWings

Starflight

Starflight is one of the dragonets of destiny and the main protagonist of The Dark Secret. His replacement dragonet is Fatespeaker, with whom he became friends with. He relies on his mind and knowledge rather than his pathetic combat skills. He does not possess abilities of mind-reading and foretelling the future. He was revealed to have strong feelings for Sunny, the SandWing dragonet of the prophecy. He is the half sister of Fierceteeth and the son of Mastermind and Farsight. Starflight however has relationship problems. Now the librarian at Jade Mountain School.

Morrowseer

Morrowseer is one of the most notable NightWings, and has unlimited access to Queen Battlewinner's throne room. He is excluded from the rotating food schedule that NightWings have due to the lack of prey on the island, as he is too important to the tribe's future to eat so little. He is shown to be grumpy all the time and tries to use Starflight to make the dragonets choose Blister, but Starflight only ends up antagonizing Blister. Morrowseer may or may not have been killed after he is engulfed in lava and fire from the volcanic explosion at the end of The Dark Secret.

Queen Battlewinner

The NightWing tribe's queen. Her existence is kept a secret and she communicates through her daughter, Greatness. She lives in a pool of hot lava, because her vital organs were frozen by an IceWing's freezing breath while she was on the continent. The lava counteracts the ice freezing her from the inside. She froze to death after exiting the lava pool to kill Glory in a matter of seconds.

Greatness

Greatness is the queen's daughter. Battlewinner speaks through her using small holes in the NightWing Fortress's walls. She wears a diamond necklace and she agrees to Starflight's plan of the NightWings coming to the Rainforest Kingdom. Deathbringer is known as her "pet assassin". She is not an evil dragon, but is not fit to rule as queen.

Deathbringer

A NightWing assassin hired to kill a few of the dragonets. He is described, by Glory, as "a lot younger and smaller than Morrowseer, wiry and graceful in his movements even when he was startled". He is a lot less grumpy than some other NightWings. He clearly has feelings for Glory, as shown in The Hidden Kingdom. He uses sharp silver discs as weapons against the dragonets and Blaze. In The Dark Secret, he is imprisoned for aiding Glory, Kinkajou, and Clay in their escape from the kingdom. Due to his relationship with Greatness, he narrowly avoided being executed.

Stonemover

Stonemover is a animus dragon that lives in a cave on the Jade Mountain. He was the one that made the tunnels from the NightWing island to the rainforest and from there to the SandWings' kingdom. He is the father of Sunny and mate of Queen Thorn. His scales are slowly turning to stone.

Fatespeaker

Fatespeaker is a false dragonet of destiny and Starflight's replacement. She has strong feelings for Starflight and helps him fly around due to his blindness.

Moonwatcher

Moonwatcher is the main character of Moon Rising. Glory said that her egg was left alone in the Rainforest Kingdom by her mother. Sutherland has revealed that she is telepathic and precognitive, from being hatched under the light of two full moons.

Abilities

NightWings are described as "the night sky coming down on you" if they are to attack. They move unseen through the shadows and blend into the night, which gives them a fearful reputation and make them more deadly. They can also be described as being able to melt into the shadows, becoming invisible.

In scrolls, NightWings are said to possess mystical abilities. They are claimed to have the ability of mind-reading and telepathy, as well as being able to prognosticate and tell prophecies; this was proved false by Stonemover, who said that no NightWing had had either of these abilities in the few centuries. In addition, these dragons are also able to breathe fire at any time, like SkyWings and SandWings.

In addition, they seem to have some kind of bacteria living in their saliva that does not affect them, like Komodo dragons. They use this to incapacitate their prey, ensuring it can't go anywhere, then return later for it when its wound has become infected or it has died. Eating this decayed food has caused them to have horrible breath. But other dragons such as Starflight, Fatespeaker or Deathbringer who lived away from the volcano a long time making their saliva not as those of the NightWings who lived in the volcano.

NightWings have been shown to be more active at night, with Deathbringer and Fatespeaker as examples. They seem to have a very strong sense of smell, shown with Starflight. Sunny's strong sense of smell and hearing came from the NightWing side and the SandWing side.

Darkstalker told Moonwatcher in Moon Rising that a Nightwing hatched under one full moon can either read minds or see the future, while a Nightwing that hatched under two full moons has both. He also said that if an egg hatches under three full moons the dragonet still has both powers, but he did not know if the would be any stronger or not.

Current Queen

Currently, the queen of the NightWings is Glory of the RainWings. This can be confusing, and several NightWings disagree with this. There are currently no known daughters of Battlewinner other than Greatness, who didn't want to be queen, and agreed with Glory being the queen.