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Moon noticed it, the extra something that seemed to happen between herself and Winter or Qibli whenever she had recently been talking to the other one privately.
There always seemed to be a tension there, one that Moon couldn’t figure out the reason for.
Sometimes, when they thought she wasn’t looking, Moon would catch one of them staring at the other from a distance. This usually happened when Moon was alone with one of them. When she talked with Qibli, Winter would gain a sad, wounded look in his eyes and stare after them, and when she talked with Winter, Qibli would do the same.
And Moon was at her wit’s end with it all.
One morning, she’d gone to talk to Kinkajou about it, but the names “Winter and Qibli” had barely slipped out of her mouth before she was interrupted.
“Ooooh, have you decided which one you’re gonna pick???” Kinkajou asked, bouncing excitedly.
Moon was confused. “What do you mean, ‘which one I’ll pick?’”
Kinkajou grinned. “Isn’t it obvious? They both really like you!”
“And you’re saying I have to… pick which one of them I like?” Moon asked, starting to fear what Kinkajou was implying.
“Yeah, pretty much! Why?”
“Well, I was going to ask you if you knew why they were acting weird lately, but honestly this might explain it and that scares me,” Moon rambled, eyes moving to the ground.
“Oh, yeah, I guess I can see why it would, huh? Well, good luck!” Kinkajou answered, patting Moon on the back of the neck and running off to go talk with Qibli.
Moon didn’t understand. She had to pick between Winter and Qibli? Why couldn’t she just be friends with both of them?
(And honestly, couldn’t they have at least let the friendship drama wait until after this whole Darkstalker situation was over with? These past few days she’d barely been able to go a few minutes without having the vision of Jade Mountain falli-
…
Case in point.)
What remained of the Jade Winglet (plus Anemone) prepared themselves for the flight back to Jade Mountain.
(And if Moon found herself practically doing vertical zigzags with how often her vision struck her on the flight, even needing to be steadied by Qibli once, she didn’t say anything. She was too busy worrying about what could have possibly caused Qibli and Winter to fight so badly they felt the need to make her claim only one of them as a friend.)
——————
Moon hadn’t meant to make it look like she’d already chosen Qibli. She hadn’t. She hadn’t chosen Qibli OR Winter, in fact. Honestly, at this point her plan was to stall until either Winter and Qibli made up, or they let her continue to be friends with both of them.
However, that didn’t change the fact that when she’d come back from the lost continent and immediately went to visit Winter, he seemed very confused.
“Moon? What are you doing here?” he asked, eyes wide with shock.
“Visiting…? If you want me to leave, I can. I just thought since I was too busy and far away to visit the past few weeks, I’d come say hi now.”
“Alright…” Winter seemed slightly suspicious, but he let her through the doorway and they talked about what they’d been doing since they’d last spoken.
“Hold on, you’re telling me you met a scavenger that speaks Dragon??? Why didn’t you lead with that?!”
“Well, mostly because I’m telling you all this in chronological order so I don’t forget anything.”
…
“And I think we might actually be getting through to other dragons! I’ve been saying for years that scavengers are smarter than they seem, and everything we’ve been studying here just confirms it!”
“You’re right, you know. I figured out something was up pretty quick when I realized I could, you know, feel Bandit’s fear as he was running for his life. That… probably helped you find me out in the end, in hindsight…”
“Moon, I was thinking about what could have possibly been wrong with Bandit and you answered me before I’d even opened my mouth to ask. Of course I was onto you.”
“…Okay that too.”
“You know, I wonder what the other scavengers would’ve called Bandit…”
…
The pair talked until sunset, and the conversation flowed easily between them.
Then, Moon mentioned that she had to go back to the academy because she’d told the rest of the winglet she’d be back by nightfall.
There was a slight twitch in one of Winter’s wings. Nothing too noticeable, but enough that Moon noticed.
“Come visit again sometime,” Winter said as she walked out the door. “Maybe bring the rest of the winglet, too.”
Moon went back to the academy in a good mood, but there was something sad in Qibli’s eyes when she told him she’d been visiting Winter.
That settled it. It seemed that if Winter and Qibli wouldn’t make up on their own, Moon would simply have to give them a push in the right direction.
——————
So the next time Moon went to Sanctuary, she took Qibli with her. All she said was that there was someone she needed Qibli to see.
“Here we are,” Moon said, touching down in front of Winter’s door and knocking.
“Moon, if you wanted to visit Winter with me, you could’ve just said so,” Qibli responded.
“What?” Moon asked, but she didn’t get a response before Winter opened the door.
“Hello, Moon,” he said, before turning his eyes to Moon’s current travel companion. “Hello, Qibli.”
“Hey, Winter,” Qibli responded.
“Come in,” Winter offered.
Moon and Qibli walked through the door.
The second the door was closed, Moon turned to Winter and Qibli and began to speak.
“Okay, I don’t know what you two are fighting about, but please tell me it’s not bad enough that I have to choose which one of you to be friends with.”
Winter and Qibli looked at Moon’s nervous expression, then at each other’s confused ones. When they both turned back to Moon, one word came out of both of their mouths in perfect sync.
“What?” they asked, looking at her like she’d somehow sprouted an extra head.
“You guys’ve been acting… weird about each other for awhile, so I asked Kinkajou about it, and she asked which one of you I was going to pick because you both really liked me,” Moon explained, confusion rising in her own voice as well.
Apparently, something she’d said was embarrassing for the two drakes sat in front of her, because they both looked down at the ground and shuffled their talons awkwardly.
“Yyyeah, there’s been a BIT of a misunderstanding…” Qibli began, tapping one of his talons faster the more he spoke.
“ That’s an understatement,” Winter muttered, avoiding anyone else’s eyes.
“Really? Then what’s going on? Why did Kinkajou say I had to choose one of you?”
“Uh, Moon, this is probably the kind of conversation you should have in private with each of us,” Qibli finally answered.
“So should I take one of you outside, or…?” Moon asked, growing more confused with each new sentence added to the conversation.
Qibli nodded. “Probably. So… uh, Winter, should we scale-scroll-claw for it?”
“Alright,” Winter muttered, and together, the two drakes chanted.
“Scale, scroll, claw, GO!”
In the end, Qibli’s scale had beaten Winter’s claw, so Moon took him outside to have the conversation, even though she still didn’t know why it was necessary.
“Okay, here we go…” Qibli began. “Moon, I like you. Like… like-like you.”
“Like-like me?” Moon parroted, still confused.
“Like…” Qibli began, thinking for a moment. “Like how Fatespeaker likes Starflight. Or how Peril likes Clay.”
“O-oh,” Moon responded, shocked (and somewhat terrified.)
On the one talon, she supposed she should be honored that Qibli felt that way about her.
But on the other, she’d never really considered it happening to her. It was nice to read about in scrolls sometimes, or to listen to in stories, even if it did get old after seeing it in just about every single scroll and hearing about it in almost every single story.
But Moon herself hadn’t felt that sort of heart-pounding, nerve-wracking surge of love everyone talked about. Not unless you counted picking it up from someone else’s mind, which Moon didn’t, because it wasn’t hers.
And while all the other dragons her age were going on dates and “like-liking” each other and “finding the love of their lives,” Moon had been left alone, feeling like she hadn’t really grown to be her age at all.
So she stood there, trying to sort through various thoughts she couldn’t understand. This was an experience she was used to, but this time the thoughts were all her own, and raindrops wouldn’t help her here.
“Um… wow,” Moon finally responded. “Uh, thanks, but… I don’t think I feel the same way about you. I’m sorry, Qibli.”
Qibli’s eyes grew sad, for a moment, but he hid it a few moments later. “Is it Winter, then?” he asked.
“No, I don’t feel like that about Winter either.”
Moon looked away, feeling horrible. She’d already hidden her powers and her communication with Darkstalker from her winglet. If they found out she’d been hiding whatever THIS was too, would they start to believe she’d never trusted them with anything at all? Maybe they’d leave to find new friends, or maybe they’d keep the same old ones and simply force her out of the group.
They probably wouldn’t believe her when she told them she truly hadn’t meant to hide the fact that she didn’t get romantic feelings the way other dragons did. Genuinely, it had simply never come up.
Honestly, Moon didn’t even know when she’d figured that fact out for herself .
“Hey, hey… you don’t need to cry, you can’t help who you do or don’t fall in love with. It’s okay if it’s not me or Winter. As long as you’re happy, it doesn’t matter who you have those feelings for.” Qibli spoke suddenly, but his voice took the edge off her fears for just a moment.
“But… what if I don’t have those feelings for anyone?”
There it was. She’d said it. Everything was out in the open now.
The only thing left to worry about at the moment was Qibli’s reaction.
So Moon shut her eyes to avoid any chance of seeing the disgust that was sure to be on Qibli’s face.
When his response came, however, it wasn’t what Moon had expected.
“Oh, like Sunny!”
She slowly opened her eyes and looked up at Qibli. His face held no disdain, and that alone was almost enough to send Moon crying again.
Almost.
“What?” Moon asked, voice shaky.
“Sunny’s the same way,” Qibli responded.
“Really?” Moon asked.
“Yup. She told me.”
“Oh.”
Truly, that was the only response Moon was able to give. It took everything in her not to start crying again, this time with relief.
If Qibli’s reaction was anything to go by, there was nothing wrong with her.
She wasn’t the only one.
——————
When Qibli and Moon reentered Winter’s hut, Winter immediately asked them how the conversation had gone.
“Is it alright if I tell him, Moon? Or do you want to?” Qibli asked.
Winter seemed to sadden a bit as Moon nodded for Qibli to go ahead.
“You know how Sunny doesn’t really… “like-like” other dragons?” Qibli began.
“Yes…” Winter responded, dragging out the word for a few seconds longer than was necessary.
“Turns out, Moon’s like that too,” Qibli explained. “She was pretty scared to say that though, so go easy on her.”
“Oh,” Winter began. “Is… is that why you thought we were talking about choosing one of us to be friends with? Or something along those lines?”
“Kinda, yeah,” Moon responded, voice almost a whisper. “I forget dragons actually feel that way sometimes. Also, all I was told was that you both “really liked” me.”
“Oh, yes, I can see how that would be confusing,” Winter responded.
The rest of the visit was spent mostly talking about more mundane things such as the latest news from Jade Mountain Academy and new developments on Winter’s research.
As the trio talked like nothing had changed, Moon thought that maybe, just maybe, she’d be able to work up the courage to explain her feelings to her mother the next time she gave Moon a significant look in Winter or Qibli’s direction during a visit.