Morrowseer hissed. “There’s a rotating schedule. All NightWings are allowed to hunt or gather for about five days out of every month. Naturally, I am exempt.”
“Naturally?” Starflight echoed, although he hadn’t meant for it to sound so much like a question. Only five days a month? No wonder they’re all so thin … they must be running out of food on this island.
The older dragon frowned down at him. “My role in the tribe’s future makes me indispensable.”
“Oh,” Starflight said, not daring to ask any more questions.
As they got closer to the trees, it turned out to be a bigger forest than Starflight had expected, covering about a quarter of the island, from the edge of the lava to the ocean.
“I see,” he said with relief. “I wondered where you hunted.” Surely there couldn’t be much prey on an active volcano.
“Here, when we have to,” Morrowseer spat. “For instance, when we can’t get to the rainforest or the Kingdom of Sand.” His forked black tongue hissed in and out.
Oh. That must be another reason they’re so angry right now — they’ve been using the rainforest to find extra prey, he thought. Like that sloth Glory, Clay, and I found by the river. He’d had trouble getting the stench of that dying sloth out of his nose. For a moment, Starflight thought the memory of it had brought the smell back, until he realized a similar smell of decay was coming from the forest below him.
“The whole island was like this when we got here,” Morrowseer said.
“You mean, covered with trees?” Starflight asked. “What happened? The volcano?” Stupid question. Of course it was the volcano. He looked back at the mountain, which must have sent a river of lava this way that covered almost all the trees, turning the island into a mostly barren rockscape.
Morrowseer didn’t answer him. They circled overhead once and Starflight spotted a few other NightWings prowling through the trees. Morrowseer glowered at them, then flicked his tail at Starflight.
“Quickly,” he snapped. “Before one of them finds my prey.”
“Your —” Starflight started curiously, but Morrowseer had already tucked his wings and was arrowing down to a patch of stunted trees not far from the beach.
The older dragon landed with a thud that sent gray dust billowing around his talons and immediately dropped his nose to the ground. With a horrible snorting noise, he charged across the clearing, taking deep breaths and flicking his tongue rapidly in and out.
Starflight had never seen hunting like this. Dune had taught them what he could in the caves under the mountain, and sometimes it had involved scent trails — Starflight was always decent at those — but usually it also involved being quiet, waiting to spot your target, and then attacking swiftly, before they even knew you were there.
But from the noise Morrowseer was making, Starflight thought every animal on the island must know he was coming.
He followed the large black dragon, thinking about Dune and his hunting lessons. Their SandWing guardian hadn’t been particularly kind to the dragonets, although he’d never been as cruel as Kestrel. But he’d always noticed how hard Starflight studied, and sometimes he gave him special tutorials on scrolls that Starflight found confusing.
Their other guardian, Webs, had often made an effort to bring back more scrolls for Starflight on his trips outside. They’d both been more cautious with him than the other dragonets — perhaps wary that his NightWing mind reading or prophecy skills might suddenly manifest.
Something I’m still waiting for, he thought, hunching his wings.
Morrowseer made a guttural, triumphant noise and swiped a leafless bush out of his way.
Underneath it was something half dead.
More than half dead, Starflight thought. Almost all the way dead. It looked like a pile of gray and white feathers as big as a dragon’s head. When the giant NightWing hooked one claw in it to drag it out, it let out an awful pathetic squawk.
“What is it?” Starflight asked, trying to remember a bird like this from his scrolls. His curiosity made him forget about being too afraid to talk. “It’s bigger than any seagull I’ve seen.”
“A giant albatross,” Morrowseer said, flipping it over. “I was sure it would be dead by now.” With a shrug, he sliced one claw across the bird’s throat.
Starflight covered his snout with one of his wings. The toxic smell of the dead bird was almost overwhelming; he wanted to run to the ocean and bury his head in the salt water to make it go away.
As Morrowseer prodded it a few more times, Starflight spotted a bite on the bird’s neck like the one on the dead sloth in the rainforest. It looked infected and disgusting, crawling with insects.
“Are you sure that’s safe to eat?” he asked.
“I’m the one who killed it,” Morrowseer growled. “I’m certainly going to eat it.”
“But won’t it make you sick?”