SandWing treasure
The SandWing treasure was stolen from the royal treasury. It was initially thought to have been stolen by the scavengers who killed Queen Oasis, although it was pointed out in The Brightest Night that it would have been impossible for a few scavengers to steal several rooms filled with treasure.
During the ending of The Brightest Night it was revealed that Blister was the actual thief of most of the treasure. Two sacks of treasure were found in the skull of the deceased Queen Oasis, which was revealed by Flower, one of the scavengers who assisted in robbing the queen. Some famous pieces had been stolen by the scavengers, which was shown when Flower revealed the location of the Eye of Onyx, and when Fluffy and Holler brought in pieces of treasure, such as the Lazulite Dragon and a dreamvisitor. Some of the treasure stolen by Blister included the SandWing Scepter and various gems, coins, and other precious items.
The treasure (mainly the Eye of Onyx) was one of the prominent reasons why the seven dragon tribes were sparring in the war, the title of SandWing queen being the other reason. The Eye of Onyx was the most valuable artifact, as whoever held it instantly became the queen of the SandWings, regardless of their bloodline. It is later shown that supposedly only a worthy SandWing can hold it and survive after Blister was violently electrocuted by the eye itself and died. In The Brightest Night, there is a moment where Sunny considered for a moment becoming the newest queen of the SandWings but decided her mother, Thorn, would be a better and more respected choice. The IceWings spent a lot of their time searching for it by destroying scavenger dens; thus it can be concluded that finding the stolen treasure was a priority to Queen Glacier, as her ally Blaze had promised Queen Glacier more land for helping her claim the throne.
It is unknown if the treasure was returned to the SandWing citizens or the SandWing treasury after Blister's death in The Brightest Night. Various jewels were discovered, along with the Eye of Onyx, hidden in Queen Oasis's skull. It is assumed that this was done by Smolder's pet scavenger, Flower, thinking she would be able to return later to gather it, or just that she didn't want to be caught with it. The two scavengers, known as Holler and Fluffy, had the Lazulite Dragon and one of the dreamvisitors, which was returned to Sunny. Another piece of the treasure, the SandWing Scepter, has yet to be found or make a formal appearance but may appear later in the series.
Apparently, in Darkstalker's time, the SandWings had barely any treasure, and Darkstalker believed that they plundered the original Night Kingdom upon his being put to sleep. Therefore, some of the treasures may have originally belonged to the NightWings, like the dreamvisitors.
History
It was mentioned by Blister when she convinced Burn not to fight her for the throne after the discovery of Queen Oasis's body. Someone (it was never revealed who) suggested the fight, but when one of the princes pointed out that it wouldn't be fair to Blaze, Blister agreed and said that first, they should discover who killed Oasis, adding quietly to Burn: "Besides, we don't have the Eye of Onyx."
In the introduction, Rose sneaked into the treasure room alone to steal as much of Queen Oasis's treasure as she could, and Stone had the job of transporting it home. However, they were attacked by Oasis and lost some of the treasure due to Rose throwing a bag of it at the queens head. Heath and Stone managed to get away with the remaining stolen treasure, but Rose had gone missing. It is assumed that Rose recovered the Eye of Onyx and was the one to hide it.
Later during the book, the treasure was mentioned multiple times, and it was revealed that Heath had hidden the treasure from the other residents of Valor. It was said to contain the gold nuggets, glittering gems, the Lazulite Dragon, and an invisibility necklace that Stone, and later Ivy and Leaf, used.
In part one of the book, the dragonets of destiny acted out the start of the War of SandWing Succession, in which Clay portrayed the scavenger who stole all the SandWing treasure. Tsunami then listed the names of the most well-known treasures, including the Lazulite Dragon, the Royal SandWing Scepter, and the Eye of Onyx.
Smolder brought Sunny out of Burn's weirdling tower to ask for her opinion about what happened to the treasure. Sunny then said that Burn must have wanted a treasure that was stolen, and began to list the ones she knew of, like the Lazulite Dragon, before confirming that Burn wanted the Eye of Onyx, as Smolder accidentally led her to this conclusion.
After finding Fluffy and Ivy and asking for the treasure, Sunny was given the Lazulite Dragon as well as a Dreamvisitor.
At the end of the book, Flower revealed the location of all the rest of the treasure, hidden within the jaws of the skeleton remains of Queen Oasis. Among the treasure hidden was the Eye of Onyx, to which Sunny gave to her mother, Thorn, declaring her the new queen of the SandWings. Blister attempted to take it away from her, but then lightning shot out of it, killing Blister, and reducing her to a pile of ashes.
When Onyx challenged Thorn for the throne, Qibli used the weather bracelets to cast a sandstorm as he was afraid the Eye of Onyx would choose Onyx over Thorn because of her royal heritage. Inside Thorn told Qibli about the history of the Eye of Onyx, how it was enchanted by Jerboa to choose the best possible queen as a gift to the queen of SandWings, and how it has chosen normal dragons over royalty many times and that the current royal family was not the same as the original one. She then jokingly requested that the enchantment was a bit less extreme, so she could just retire quietly in peace, instead of getting incinerated. It was revealed Thorn put a fake Eye of Onyx in her treasury to "fool thieves and save their lives", which had been stolen by Vulture.
Known SandWing Treasure
The Eye of Onyx is an enchanted pendant, characterized by the wings made from molded, beaten gold, framing an orb of polished black stone. Due to its name, it is almost certainly and assumed to be made from onyx. It was hidden in Oasis' corpse's skull, stolen by Flower and the other scavengers.
Whoever holds the Eye of Onyx rules the Kingdom of Sand and the SandWings, as long as the previous ruler has died. Therefore, if any of the SandWing sisters (Burn, Blister, or Blaze) had had it, they would have become queen, suggesting that the Eye of Onyx was hidden away.
The Eye of Onyx was also created by a dragon named Jerboa, who is an animus that lived and disappeared over 2,000 years ago.
The Eye of Onyx chooses the best SandWing queen by picking the most worthy of the throne, as shown when it picked Thorn and blew Blister up. It was created by Jerboa, who was a runaway SandWing animus. Thorn reveals in Darkness of Dragons that she put a replica of the Eye of Onyx in her treasury to fool thieves.
The Lazulite Dragon was one of the stolen SandWing treasures. It is currently unknown if it is animus touched or not. Sunny received the Lazulite Dragon from Leaf in exchange for Ivy's safety in The Brightest Night. It is a blue statue of a dragon with green emerald eyes carved from lapis lazuli (presumably the gem). It was most likely made by a SandWing, as it was in their treasury and was stolen by the three scavengers (Rose, Stone, and Heath) that attacked the SandWing Stronghold and killed Queen Oasis.
Tui T. Sutherland hinted that the Lazulite Dragon and the SandWing Scepter might be important later in the story, as we saw with the Eye of Onyx. Its current owner or location is unknown.
The SandWing Scepter
The SandWing Scepter was an item of the royal SandWing treasure, mentioned only briefly by Starflight when he was lecturing the dragonets in the caves beneath the mountain. The scepter was also mentioned by Sunny in The Brightest Night when she was trying to guess what the scavengers had stolen and when talking with Smolder about the Eye of Onyx. It has yet to be uncovered and may play a larger part in books to come.
Trivia
- It is unknown whether or not the SandWing Scepter and Lazulite Dragon have any purpose or enchantment at all, or if they are just decorative pieces of treasure.
- It is possible that some of these items, such as the Eye of Onyx, were enchanted by Jerboa (a SandWing animus mentioned in Darkstalker) or any of her ancestors/descendants, seeing as the trait is hereditary. It was confirmed that Jerboa did indeed create the Eye of Onyx.
- Only the Eye of Onyx has revealed to have been enchanted so far in the series.
- The Eye of Onyx was enchanted by Jerboa as a gift to the SandWing queen.
- The Eye of Onyx has chosen ordinary dragons over royalty several times in SandWing history, meaning that Queen Oasis may not be a direct descendant of Scorpion.
- After the NightWings moved to the volcano, the SandWings raided their palace and stole a dreamvisitor. This led to many dragons to think a SandWing animus had created the dreamvisitors, but this was proven incorrect in Moon Rising.
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