"So... How goes the preparations?" Storm suddenly asked.
"Hmmm. What?" The sudden change in topic caught Aurora by suprise.
"The celebration you all have been preparing?"
"What celebration?! There's no celebration!! Nothing to see at all!!"
Storm just gave her a flat stare.
"You've never been able to lie, Aurora. "
The dragoness seemed to visibly deflate in disappointment.
"Damn it! How long have you known?!"
"Since this morning, everyone seemed far too eager to get me away from the tunnels. " Storm replied.
"Please don't tell anyone I spoiled it!! They worked so hard on it!! They'll skin my hide if they found out!!" Begged Aurora.
"Your secret is safe with me. But you never answered my question. "
"It progresses. Preparations will probably be done by tonight. It was your mother's idea, you know?
Your father was against it, he said that trying to keep this secret from you would be a waste of time as you were much too observant to be fooled. "
"He isn't wrong. " thought Storm.
"Where is my father?"
"Probably in his study. He seemed troubled when I last saw him. You should go check up on him."
Storm nodded his head.
"I'll leave you to continue your preparations. I'll see you tonight then. "
"Try and 'act' suprised when you do, the adults worked hard on this."
Storm nodded his head before turning around and walking deeper into the tunnels.
He didn't go visit his father immediately, instead he wandered the tunnels until he came to a stop in front of a large wooden door that marked the entrance to his family's dwelling.
He knocked on the door twice with a claw, then waited. He could hear his mother frantically running on the other side of the door.
"Just a minute!!" She called.
A moment later, a Golden scaled dragoness opened the door for him.
"What brings you here, Raijin?"
"Just came to check up on them. And you know no one calls me by that name anymore, mother. "
"Yes, I am aware they don't. They've used that nickname so much that you've forgotten your true name, But you will always be 'Raijin' to me and your father. "
She stepped aside to allow Storm entry into the room. His mother had done a good job hiding whatever she was working on.
But she wasn't able to eliminate the smell completely.
"Boar stew. My favorite. " said Storm.
"Just made some dinner for your father. He's so busy, that he barely gets time to eat anything. I thought I'd surprise him with some lunch."
"'Sure'"
Storm decided to drop the topic for now and walked over to the nest located in the center of the room.
Two eggs were located inside the nest, one was Gold, the other a dark blue. The surface of the eggs were covered in tiny scales in order to protect the newborn within.
A glass dome covered a hole in the ceiling, sunlight streamed in though the hole and bathed the eggs in it's warmth.
He placed a claw on the golden egg and felt the warming within, as well as the occasional pulse as the newborn within stirred restlessly within.
"They still haven't hatched?" Asked Storm.
"They've been stirring on quite regularly of late. Your new siblings are growing restless and I imagine they'll hatch anyday now. We just need to be patient. " his mother replied.
"You realize that you'll become a big brother soon? That position would come with a certain amount of responsibility. "
"I know." Storm replied.
"They will look up to you. And you will have to set an example for them."
"I'll do my best."
"First thing you'll need to work on is your curiosity. You have a tendency to stick your snout in every hidden hollow you can find."
"Don't remind me! Storm still remembered how inquisitive he could be as a youngling
Once, when the elven elder visited the nest to speak to his father.
He walked straight up to the Elder and asked him whether it was true that his people hatched from acorns.
He still remembered the scolding his father gave him that night after his visit was complete .
Fortunately for Storm's hide, the Elven Elder wasn't offended by his query, and even found it humorous, so his father decided to let Storm off with a light scolding.
"Speaking off, I should probably go see him." Storm said quickly.
"Don't take up too much of his time. From what I understand, he's very busy trying to increase the response time of the early warning network. "
As one of the oldest dragons in the nest, Storm's father acted as the unofficial leader of the Nesting grounds.
He took up the responsibilities reluctantly after the previous elder was killed by hunters while out in the wild.
His father always believed that 'information' was one of the most important commodities for the Nesting grounds, so a few years ago, he set up a communication network with the outlying non human settlements.
If any settlements of the network spotted hunter activity, they would relay the warning to the other settlements with a dragon messenger that was permanently stationed at the settlement.
Due to only having a limited amount of dragons he could assign to the task, the networked settlements were few in number and there were gaps in their range that hunters could use to sneak up on them.
Response time was also a problem, even though dragons were some of the fastest messangers (save perhaps for the agile Griffins.)
It could still take up to a day for the settlements to receive the warnings, by which point it might already be too late.
His father had been working on a means to improve the response time using magic. This would free up the dragons assigned to these settlements to be used on other duties. But his father struggled to acquire the materials he needed for the upgrade.
"I won't take much of his time. I just want to see how he's doing and see if there isn't something I can do to assist him with the workload." Storm replied
"I'm sure he would appreciate it. Give him my regards and tell him that he's sorely missed." Said Storm's mother.
Storm nodded, before leaving his family's dwelling, he wandered the tunnels until he came to the large double doors that led to his father's study. He raised a limb and knocked on the doors.
"Enter!" Called his father's voice.